District 9

Director: Neill Blomkamp

2009 / 112min / DCP

After Blomkamp caught the attention of Peter Jackson with his ingenious short films, Jackson gave him the opportunity to expand one of them, sci-fi mockumentary Alive in Joburg (2005), into this, his exceptional feature debut, an engrossing work of found footage speculative fiction with themes touching on the legacy of South African apartheid, in which aliens, 20 years after appearing in the sky over Johannesburg, have been reduced to living in squalor in the titular private corporation-operated internment camp. “Smart, swift … The filmmakers … embed their ideas in an ingenious, propulsive and suspenseful genre entertainment, one that respects your intelligence even as it makes your eyes pop (and, once in a while, your stomach turn).” —The New York Times