District 9 / Plan 9

District 9 was NOT a traditional choice for Christmas Eve viewing. I admit it.

In my defense, Netflix listed District 9 as a long wait. The DVD being at the top of my queue said nothing about when D9 would appear in my mailbox.

If you're not familiar with this 2009 movie, think: Alien Nation meets The Battle of Algiers meets Enemy Mine.

I like all three of those (admittedly far from recent) movies. But District 9? Not so much.

Maybe that's because of D9's painfully blatant allegorical look at apartheid.  Or the alien weapons that turn people into ketchup eruptions. And it didn't help that the main human character was made up to bear an unfortunate resemblance to Peter Sellers / Inspector Clouseau. Or that without explanation, District 9's plot requires that the aliens' starship fuel also mutates humans into aliens.

District 9? I'm forced to remember Plan 9 from Outer Space. Imagine what Ed Wood would have done with an FX budget.