Having just seen a commercial for "District 9", I'm actually considering heading to the theater to see this one (which is quite rare for me these days).

At worst it could end up a clone of "Independence Day" (which means it'll make tons of money from being popular popcorn fare) mixed with a dash of Terminator, while at best it could end up as a hard hitting experience depending how the story pans out.

http://www.district9movie.com/

I'm not big on the whole sci-fi/aliens genre, but I have mild interest in seeing District 9, if only because Pete Jackson's name is attached to the project.  Could be good.

Speaking of Independence Day, have you seen the trailer for "2012" yet?  Shit looks so awful, I was rolling my eyes throughout the whole thing.  I'm clearly not the biggest fan of Roland Emmerich's works.

District 9 looks really, really cool.  There's something about it that makes it escape the whole Hollywood vibe.  Reminds me a little bit of the feeling I had when I saw trailers for Children of Men and thought "hey, that looks like it could rise above typical summer movie schlock."  Definitely interested.

I was literally laughing out loud by the end of that trailer.  As with most real-life disasters, it looks completely terrible and I was unable to tear my eyes away.  Nobody does destruction and carnage quite like him.

That's how I reacted when I saw a trailer for the new G.I.Joe movie... That crap looks so fake my eyes wanted to hurl.

Exactly, it'll pull this off because it DOES look real.  I also get a bit of Half-Life / City 17 vibe from it.

Ditto on the G.I. Joe movie, proves hollywood will do anything if it may make money.

Also has an element of 'Resistance' (DNA changing)...

In other Peter Jackson news, he is no longer affiliated with the Halo movie films, as the development/production deal with his studios has expired.

Hahaha! District 9 looks like it could be interesting at the least. I share Angie's sentiments regarding 2012, but I'll probably still see it. Might be good for a popcorn flick, to be experienced and tossed aside quickly like a cheap hooker.

I too had a similar feeling with G.I. Joe.  Surprisingly, early test screens and impressions are penning it comparatively positive against Stephen Sommers' other works.  Which may be a subpar standard to begin with, but hey, I kind of dug Van Helsing. 

I'm looking forward to Alan Silvestri's music score for Joe, though.

That other movie 'GAMER' or whatever they're calling it, looks pretty awful and boringly unimaginative as well.

Was thinking the same thing, bro. Man, does hollywood ever know how to piss me off.

So who's heading to District 9 this week?  In the face of near unanimous positive reviews, I'm looking forward to the film more than I was before.  Statements like "redefining the sci-fi genre for the 21st century" and "one of the best sci-fi films of the decade", well...... curiosity prevails.

It's supposed to be intensely gory, but equally thought-provoking -- a fascinating balance if pulled off right.

I echo this sentiment as well.  VGCats had a great comic about the word "Gamer."  http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=282.  Their latest comic is great too.

I'll be seeing it tomorrow hopefully. It has always looked appealing to me.

I'll definitely be seeing it. Probably next week.

Looking forward to my visit to District 9 this weekend!

I'm not going to pretend that i have the same interests in movies as everyone else or even that everyone else will have the same feelings about this movie as i did but wow....... definitely not your run of the mill science fiction movies. Since when did action/science fiction movies actually try to make a worth while statement? All around this movie is highly recommended although im sure some of you saw GI Joe and if you didn't then don't....

Well....what'd you all think?

I just saw it, and, while I found it to be entertaining, I found it really to be not to have much development, (i.e. you could tell it came from a smaller idea / concept) to warrant an completely satisfying experience...I dug the Total Recall'esque type violence that came during the action sequences - and as a Sci Fi flick, it's pretty good...but I'm not sure it warranted all the supposed rave reviews (is someone out there creating artificial positive buzz??)

I can't think of a film superior to District 9 that's come out within the last 33 years, that is, the number of years I've been capable of visiting a movie theater. While I have seen better movies at home, via the DVD and VHS formats, District 9 is the best I've actually seen in the theater. It struck me as an 'art' film, typical of the style that I enjoy the most. It intimates a lot and answers little, thus forcing the viewer to provide their own answers. I like that.

It didn't seem as if things would suddenly get electrifyingly hyperviolent and I had no problems with that. I don't think anyone else had a problem, either. While the audience barely squeaked a sole during the most of the movie, I found myself amidst boisterous collections of bosons near the end.

Very impressive experience, I thoroughly enjoyed the entire film.

All the people were quite real and believable, as the only ones who even remotely reminded me of  "actors" were the couple of military guys.

Way better than like 95% of Hollywood flicks in every department.

Only two minor complaints:
The gratuitous F-bombs don't impress, but it didn't detract from my enjoyment either.
I'm sick of seeing the 'behind-the-lens' camera work in every movie these days.

Other than that it was great. Well acted by no-name actors (a good thing) with a decently believable socio-political plot.

Also, all I could think of when he was in the mech was Fallout's powersuit.

Came back from seeing the movie today, and I'm inclined to agree.  It's a solid, entertaining film from start to finish, but nowhere near as mindblowing or revolutionary as the hype's been making it out to be.  Or maybe I was simply expecting more out of the whole documentary style of storytelling and apartheid-fueled social commentary.

Hard to imagine the movie had a production budget of just 30 million, as there are some really cool special effects and action sequences on display here.  Both Blomkamp and Copley do stellar work as debuting director and actor respectively.  The plot is well told, but hardly ground-breaking; people saying, "You have no idea what the end game is by the trailers alone" is a bit of a crock; it was far more predictable than I thought, but then I was completely braced for any big twists they might've thrown our way.  Points, though, for the movie's natural knack of living in the detail of things.  And as terrifically staged and exciting as they were, the movie does get a bit action-heavy toward the latter half - which is accompanied by an unexpected Hollywood blockbuster style score by Clinton Shorter.  Surprisingly though, the film wasn't nearly as gory as I thought it would be.

Am I the only one who thought the very last shot was unnecessary?  I thought it would have been better left to the audience's imagination..... Or, I dunno, placed as an end credits coda sequence to allow the final words of the interviewees to set in first.

On an unrelated note, the trailer to the Sorority Row remake looked scary as f---. o_O

It was pretty good, very watchable. Lots of entertaining gore and the usual CGI-based mayhem. Once you take away the presentation, the plot itself isn't anything special. It starts out hinting at something big... but in the end, it takes all the predictable routes. It's always very well-made... but it could have been more.

I was struck by how completely unsympathetic the entire human cast was (with the possible exception of Wikus' wife). Even the so-called hero was mostly a jerk (only slightly redeeming himself by the end). If given a choice, I would have sided with the prawns.

This came to Japanese cinemas just recently (sigh) so I finally caught it yesterday.

The visuals are certainly impressive for such a relatively low-budget, effects-heavy movie.  That said, I found the two somewhat different sides of the film didn't gel very well together. The serious side (including the documentary-style footage, social commentary and sometimes macabre sci-fi) has a realistic tone but suffers from some cheeky dialog and huge plot holes. The other side, which more resembles your standard popcorn action flick, provides a lot of fun (and that mech suite effects sequence would make James Cameron drool) but it gets weighed down by the serious side.

Still a good movie but I thought it fell well short of the hype.

It took me a second viewing to make me realize that Wikus's use of the F-word bordered on excessive.  Almost to the point of distraction.

It took me a second viewing (at home) to realize the movie wasn't as good as I thought it was the first time (in the theater). As to why I really don't know, maybe the hype?

Just saw the movie now. I thought it was incredible. I'll have to give it a second watching before I can see if I agree with everyone else's sentiments that it isn't as good the second time around.

I just watched it for free via amazon's video on demand service (used a coupon). It was a lot better than 10,000 B.C. (pure trash) and their explanation (in the beginning) of solar neutrinos heating the core of the earth was a novel idea. But they would kill us before the earth had a chance (because they'd heat us, too). Considering that trillions of solar neutrinos are passing through our bodies every second, it's a good thing they rarely bump into our atoms.

  P.S. - Just found a HUGE brown recluse under my sheets. Spent the past hour checking for more and spraying a healthy dose of deltamethrin. It had a shriveled abdomen. I probably didn't even need to kill it.