Reply #12: Here's a review that reflects how I felt about this movie:

[elocs]

http://www.examiner.com/x-488-Movie-Examiner~y2009m8d15-Movie-review-District-9-avoid-this-movie-at-all-costs

Bad: I swore to myself that I wouldn't use the word "shit" or any variation of the term in this movie review. So now that I've tied both hands painfully behind my back review-wise let the verbal beating begin...

For the first ten minutes of District 9 we're treated to a sci-fi film opening with so much promise, so much outstanding potential - I could understand why folks were going ga-ga over this flick. The aliens have arrived. They're in bad shape. We've put them in camps. Everything looks documented and real. Whatever bad things I have to say concerning District 9, panning the film's opening wont' be one of them.

But as the movie rolled forward I started noticing that the acting seemed a bit off. Not totally rotten just yet, but definitely strolling in that direction. Which didn't seem to compute. This is a serious sci-fi flick right? It's got Peter Jackson's name on the poster right? The opening ten minutes of mockumentary footage were so convincing, so absolutely impressive in scale and dramatic value that the movie following them must be a movie of singular quality right? So why's everybody acting like we're in a low-grade zombie picture? How did this major sci-fi event film, (as it was advertised) suddenly become a cheese-grade splatter movie? And why weren't any of us warned about this?

District 9 is a bad movie. I'd say it's a bad B-movie but that's not totally correct either. It's a bad B-video-game-movie. If you've played any video games you're already aware that it doesn't take much to craft a convincing plot for a medium based solely on zoning out and killing stuff. You might need a dude who can shoot fire out of his eyes, or can meld weapons to his flesh, or has a retractable claw for an arm, and that's pretty much all it will take to get your common video-gamer on the couch and crushing buttons. But I doubt any sane filmmaker would ever base an entire film on a flimsy device like that. Or better stated, I "used" to doubt that. With District 9 I'm not so sure any more.