Tweet

There are probably a few of you out there who have been wondering when the trailer for Neil Blomkamp’s District 9 will be hitting the internet. It was recently rumored to be attached to the release of Crank: High Voltage but that turned out to be untrue for whatever reason. Of course, the buzz for the Peter Jackson produced film started when footage was screened for press and industry folk at ShoWest in Las Vegas last month. Our friend Pete at /Film called the footage “very impressive” and said that “even though it was not complete, everything looked very real and gritty, and not so other worldly like other sci-fi films.”

Sadly none of that footage has made its way into the public eye, that is until this upcoming weekend. We’ve just received official notice from the publicity firm handling the release that the trailer for District 9 will in fact be attached to the release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which hits theaters this Friday. As well, we’ve been made aware of the fact that the trailer will premiering this Thursday, April 30th on Apple.com. We will of course bring it to you as soon as it hits the web, but it doesn’t hurt for you to know where else to look.

I’m personally very excited to finally see some footage. Neil Blomkamp’s short film “Alive in Joburg” (seen below) shows a ton of promise and the fact that Peter Jackson has come on board and helped push this thing along speaks volumes. As well, I dig the concept — a race of aliens come to Earth and instead of invading and killing off humanity they end up being relugated to second class citizenship and treated with disdain by humans. This movie could have a lot to say — beyond having cool effects — about civil rights and humanity as the aggressor. And thats a concept I can get behind.

District 9 is currently scheduled for an August 14, 2009 release. For more, check out “Alive in Joburg” directed by Neil Blomkamp below. Also, I would recommend checking out David Chen’s highly detailed write-up about the entire thing over at /Film.