The longer preview reminded me of Alien Nation mixed with Children of Men. That’s enough to get me excited.
The preview I saw in theaters this weekend left me sort of cold. I don’t know exactly what it is, but I feel like they missed a mark with their pseudo government documentary style. It seemed much too retro (moreso than any government agency would put out now), and visually dated in a weird way (a mix of very clean visuals and bizarre VHS-style tracking errors in other scenes) that just undermined any kind of “pseu-documentary” feel that I could draw from it. It felt like it was going to be played for laughs, like a Venture Bros. episode or something.
There was a screening of District 9 at this year’s Comic-Con, and the early word is that it’s absolutely fantastic
(Sci-Fi Squad one is more spoiled than the others)
http://www.scifisquad.com/2009/07/24/sdcc-first-impressions-peter-jackson-and-neil-blomkamps-distr/
http://chud.com/articles/articles/20239/1/COMIC-CON-09-DISTRICT-9-IS-AMAZING/Page1.html
http://scifiwire.com/2009/07/sdcc-district-9-triumphan.php
People seem almost shocked that it was so good
Now don’t go saying that, I was perfectly happy with my moderate expectations.
Every single person at work who saw it at Comic Con is raving about it. Several are already proclaiming it the unbeatable best movie of the year, and one horror fan claimed it was “the goriest movie I ever saw.”
Hype engines are go!
Goriest huh? I didn’t even know it was R rated… cool.
Several have commented that they’re amazed it didn’t get an NC-17 for violence. I was also told that it largely delivers the badass robot/mech action that Transformers 2 failed to.
I almost stole a sign from the movie theater that had a “No Aliens Allowed” over the bathroom’s normal signage. It was a pretty awesome poster.
So much for my hopes that this was more thoughtful than brutal.
When the heck did this become a thing to aspire to?
Get off my lawn, etc.
Who would have thought that an oppressed population fighting for their rights and possibly very survival would turn violent?
There’s a gaping chasm between depicting violence and depicting depraved brutality. A good director needn’t necessarily show the latter in order to imply it.
Where are you getting “depraved brutality,” exactly?
It doesn’t seem like this movie is shaping up exactly as I was expecting it to either, but, hey, I can go for a dash of depraved brutality with my dark satire sometimes.
Who said depraved brutality!?
My expectations from a trailer are different that those of a short film.
I’ll just go ahead and reassure you that no, the trailer does not reveal too much.
That is cool. Thanks.
More people have checked in with their impressions, and I have had no less than three people call it one of their top 5 movies of all time.
You’d better ask them what they thought of Transformers 2, as well, just to get grounds for comparison. ;-)
Nah, this trailer does look wicked cool, and I’m there.