Based on the inspirational true-life romance between Botswanan King Seretse Khama (David Oyelowo) and his British wife, Ruth Williams Khama (Rosamund Pike), A United Kingdom is a British period piece set in the 1940s, following an interracial union in the face of fierce opposition from their families and the British government, the tribal elders of Botswana and the apartheid government of South Africa.

The film concentrates on the couple’s journey as they move to Bechuanaland (modern-day Botswana) and face similar obstacles of racism while Seretse tries to convince his people and the British government that he should be king, and that his marriage to a white woman is a separate matter of personal choice. Amma Asante, who also directed Belle, beautifully captures this defiant and enduring love story while shining a light on a complex and painful chapter in British history.

Khamas’ son, Ian Khama, is currently the democratically elected president of Botswana and the family cooperated in the making of this film. Releasing December 26, 2016.

www.aunitedkingdomfilm.com

Competition will be drawn 19 December 2016, winners will be notified by email.

The story revolves around a computer sciences geek Deon Wilson (played by Dev Patel, he of Slumdog Millionaire, The Newsroom and Best Exotic Marigold Hotel fame) who creates an Artificial Intelligence program to help his robots achieve a level of human consciousness. His place of employment has already used his technology to build robots that the police use to enforce the law in Johannesburg. Upper management is opposed to this, so he goes rogue to complete the task. This is when the story takes a rather large detour into ridiculousness.

Wilson is kidnapped by a group of hip-hop thugs lead by Ninja (Watkin Tudor Jones, a real life South African rapper, record producer and actor) who terrorizes Wilson but also helps him insert his AI program into a decommissioned robot. Once the program is installed, the robot essentially becomes a child and is taught the ways of life by both Wilson and the thugs. There are some interesting comments on nurture verses nature as the robot become more and more human.

The big finale borrows a bit too liberally from the film Robocop and the final end run takes science to unbelievable places. There are too many moments in the film that illustrate that working more diligently on the logic loop holes in the script would have helped immensely. The film errs on the side of big dumb entertainment, which is a bit of a shame as some of the ideas really showed promise. As it is, it’s entertaining but not much of a mental exercise. With Blomkamp’s stated intension of this being part one of a trilogy, here is hoping they work a little more believability into parts two and three.
Rob Hudson
www.facebook.com/ChappieMovie

The story follows Max (Matt Damon), a downtrodden underclassman vying for asylum in the privileged celestial city of Elysium. Like his poverty-stricken brethren, Max is an oppressed would-be saint crushed under the iron heel of an elitist upper class that is evil beyond redemption.

Emotionally-laden key words such as ‘homeland security’ and ‘no-fly zone’ are bandied about to ensure we don’t miss the point and one of the bad guys is Apartheid incarnate with his penchant for authoritarian violence and his thick South African accent; he even has a South African flag on his assault ship just in case you missed the reference. Subtlety is not a brand Blomkamp trades in but social and racial stereotyping apparently is.

Of course cautionary tales of social injustice are almost de rigueur for science fiction film and literature but they work best when embedded within the story. With Blomkamp, the political message dwarfs the story.

On the plus side, there is one great action scene in the middle of the film that is nail-biting stuff before launching back into mediocre faux sci-fi action territory for the final showdown between good and evil.

Amazingly Jody Foster foregoes her native Southern accent – who would have thought that possible? – and delivers the best performance of the cast despite having little to do beyond being an evil elitist authoritarian bitch. The rest of the cast which includes Matt Damon, Sharlto Copley and William Fichtner are serviceable if unremarkable. Every character here is composed of a singular dimension with the exception of Damon’s rough diamond. I suppose Blomkamp deemed this character the only one worthy of being fleshed out.

As a practical rerun of District 9, those who enjoyed Blomkamp’s first feature will probably glean some enjoyment from Elysium; others will do well to avoid it.

Stuart Jamieson
www.facebook.com/Elysium

Perhaps taking its cue from Banlieue 13, Pierre Morel’s thrill ride of 2004 set in Paris where the worst offenders existed in a walled-off ghetto, District 9 (set in Johannesburg) follows a similar theme except this ghetto’s populated by aliens with a taste for cat food. Eventually dark influences exploit the residents flavoured by, among other things, interspecies prostitution and with trouble following quickly, the government are left with no alternative but to create a new ‘haven’ for the visitors… District 10. Enter Wikus van der Merwe (played with disarming innocence by Sharlto Copely), an agent for M.N.U. (Multi-National United), who is enlisted to convince the aliens to sign agreements approving their own relocation. Here the dynamic of director Neill Blomkamp’s vision expands into sudden comedy and it drives this spectacle to near-perfection.

I say near-perfection because it opens in an almost catatonic state. At the risk of revealing anything, that sinister trailer is misleading. As District 9 opens, Blomkamp puts his cards on the table fast and it doesn’t quite match with what follows. Styled to look like a documentary (read guerrilla-style), the hand-held cinematography lends the atmosphere a sweaty thickness and while they have a clichéd appearance, the physicality of the aliens (like an anorexic version of the ‘Predator’) are the least of his concerns. It’s the interplay with their hosts that counts here and from this springs the film’s smart sense of humour.

With influences from Alien, Cloverfield, The Fly, and even Transformers, District 9 is going to be remembered. A native of Johannesburg, 29 year-old Blomkamp making an astounding debut here, directs with great assurance and flavours his adventure with a perfect concoction of thrills, scares and action and it’s all artfully underpinned with sentiment. The blending of live-action and CGI is remarkably seamless and after that disorienting beginning we join Copely (what a superb anti-hero he makes) on a dark, disturbing journey that doesn’t flag. A lot will be made of its heavy-handed dissection of racism and it’s all there on many levels but it doesn’t get in the way. That’s a good thing too because with the audiences District 9 will attract, it’s going to get lost in the translation.

Michael Dalton
www.district9movie.com