20 years later the aliens, called "prawns" because of their similarity to  large shrimps, have multiplied to the point where there are now 1.8 million of them residing in the internment camp. Human patience with this burgeoning alien population living on their doorstep is wearing thin, so a movement begins to send the prawns to a distant internment camp known as District 10. 

A rather nefarious company known as MNU (MultiNational United) is charged with their relocation. Legal notices to the prawns are couched in terms that appear to be beneficial to them, but this is really a forced evacuation. A midlevel executive named Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley) is promoted to run the operation solely because of his marriage to the daughter of the president of MNU. 

Unfortunately, Wikus has an on site accident with a mysterious liquid which starts a process whereby he begins to adapt to the DNA of the prawns. This makes him greatly desirable to the scientists at MNU, who now want to harvest his body parts for the DNA blend, but also desirable to a Nigerian crime lord who wants to eat his alien-corrupted flesh so that he can assume the strength of the prawns. Wikus becomes a man hunted by his own kind.

There is much to admire about this movie. Unfortunately, there is also much to criticize about it, and its faults end up canceling out the strengths with the result that my thumb is resolutely placed in the horizontal position, neither up nor down. 

Highlights are the inventive story line with an alien invasion turned completely on its head with the aliens left as submissive supplicants to their human captors. I also love the fact that this movie takes place in South Africa in a sly, though perhaps not subtle, critique of that country's former days as the home of apartheid. In addition, the cinema verité film style gives the movie a documentary feel and a "you are there" quality. Also admired is the innuendo of a Nigerian crime lord living amidst the camp squalor preying off the prawn inhabitants much like some Nigerians do today with their barrage of junk emails promising instant wealth.

Then there are the flaws. First of all, the "F-bomb" constitutes just about every other word in this film. I find this offensive, and it implies a creative laziness on the part of the writers. There are many other ways of expressing shock, anger, and horror without resorting to the use of this four letter expletive. 

Additionally the last part of the movie develops into an armed combat between MNU-hired thugs and Wikus attired in an alien-built transformer-like machine. I also found this to be a sign of creative laziness. If I had wanted to go to a transformer movie, which I don't, I would have purchased a ticket to that film. Finally, the overuse of a shaky handicam to add emphasis to the cinema verité style quickly becomes very annoying. Interesting movie, never boring, but too flawed to recommend. (B, Rent It?)