I could be wrong, but you seem to be an embittered and jealous guy. I agree that blomkamp’s rough ‘n ready cinematic style might be a little hard for the popcorn flick crowd to get a handle on, but many people think it looks interesting. This is only the teaser trailer, we have no idea of what lies ahead.

My money is on a strange satire, more in the league of starship troopers, but with a realistic african undertone.

i know this movie is going to polarize people, but i believe that blomkamp is brave, from what has been seen so far.

He hasn’t gone the transformers route, in fact we don’t know what route this is we’re seeing, which is why interest is picking up.

Don’t get me wrong, i’m a MASSIVE popcorn flick fan, but a bit of dark comedy and edgy sci-fi also goes down well with me, and this looks like it’ll have both,

just not sure why you are pre-judging this guy.

as far as “nobody would give him a job for three years, blah blah,” i’m pretty sure this film took at least 18 months of pre-production and writing, a year of shooting, post and pickups, and more time on the post, so at we’re looking at at three years easily.

sounds pretty busy to me, think of what the real timeframes are before launching into hurtful conjecture.

Should I then be forced to choose between them or see both? You asked my opinion on which I would prefer, and my personal tastes lean more toward the fun entertaining effects driven popcorn film.

If forced to make the decision to see one film over the other makes me less of a fan of the genre. Being a fan of a genre doesn’t mean I have to hopelessly be in love with every film of the genre. And frankly I just didn’t see anything that drew me into wanting to see District 9. It has nothing to do with what some perceive as a personal vendetta against Blomkamp. If I knew nothing about the director and saw this trailer with fresh eyes I would still not be that driven by it. As it is, right now I would want to see it SOLELY based on the idea that “this is the guy who was to direct Halo” and little else.

If I wanted to see a thought provoking film about Apartheid I would watch Power of One (among my top ten favourite films of all time)

Well, you’re right in that they are two very different approaches. However, they are both based in Sci-Fi. So, looking at them from a Sci-Fi perspective, which movie you would choose to see if they were both opening tomorrow? I’m guessing Transformers, which is fine. I just find it a surprising choice coming from self-professed fan of the genre.

Neill’s efforts are to make an insightful film and combine it with a unique style to tell his story. Transformers has no message.

“interesting” is far too subjective to try and label either film. I am clearly more “interested” in Transformers, but more because I find a great deal of entertainment in light action popcorn flicks. You are asking me to apply a subjective term to two movies that bear very little to compare.