X

Great sites

Anything Hollywood

Atomic Popcorn

Banned in Hollywood

Bits & Pieces

Blockbuster Buzz

Book mistakes

CanMag

The Daily Column

Daily Stab

Defamer

Double Viking

EHOWA

The Evil Beet

Film Drunk

Filmofilia

Filmspotting

Foundry Music

Game mistakes

Geek Tyrant

Gone Hollywood

Hollyscoop

Hollywood Outbreak

I Am Bored

I Love Bacon

Joblo movie news

Movie Banter

Movie Buzz

Movie spoilers

Movie timeline

Other crap

Screenjunkies

Sky movie reviews

Something Really Funny

Tengossip

Trailer Addict

Unreality Magazine

Virtually Existing

Quotes

Fundiswa Mhlanga: He was an honest man, and he didn't deserve any of what happened to him.

See more...

Mistakes

After the SAD unit shoots down the command module, Christopher falls to his knees in sadness. In the next shot, the mercenary supposed to be pointing his gun at his head is looking and pointing as if Christopher was still standing, as revealed when he actually gets back up again. See more...

Trivia

There have been protests against the alleged stereotyping of Nigerians in the movie. Two of the more sensitive issues are the Nigerian prostitutes soliciting 'prawn' customers; and the character name Obesandjo (which is closely linked to the former Nigerian Prime Minister's name Olusegon Obesanjo). See more...

Mistake pictures

Movie Mistakes blog

Popular blog posts:

Top 15 biggest Harry Potter film mistakes

The biggest mistakes in the Harry Potter movies

15 biggest mistakes in Titanic

The 20 biggest Friends mistake pictures

10 Twilight mistakes in pictures

District 9 (2009) - 12 corrections

Directed by Neill Blomkamp (add more)

Genres: Sci-fi

Comments made in brackets are corrections from other visitors. To submit your own corrections for mistakes, just click "edit" under an entry, then choose "correct entry". You can also submit corrections for corrections, if you think a mistake has been unfairly removed.

Mistakes
Trivia
Quotes
Corrections
Questions
Submit
It was mentioned once in the movie that the aliens were on earth for about 20 years, meaning the film would've been set about 20 years in the future. Despite this, at about hour 5 minutes, you'll notice a 2010 Soccer World Cup logo at the top of a building. [It is also mentioned that the aliens landed in 1986, which puts the movie in 2010. This is seen on camera timestamps throughout the movie.]
Edit Corrected by Brad
During the credits roll, there is a spelling mistake for one of the crew categories. On the left side of the screen "effects" is spelled "effeects". ["Effects" is spelled corectly on the DVD version.]
Edit
Wikus van de Merwe's accent is not even close to sounding South African, which has a slight Australian-style lilt on many suffixes (compare it to the newsreaders who are SA or at least more convincing). Even if van de Merwe is supposed to be a foreigner, his somewhat French-sounding accent is punctuated by heavy Irish accented swearing (particularly with the f-word) which is highly unrealistic and improbable. [Rubbish. Sharlto Copley, the actor who plays Wikus, is South African, has lived there all his life and, as can be seen by watching interviews of him, is using his natural accent in the film. Try telling him that his accent is not authentic...]
Edit Corrected by Tailkinker
It is barely credible that Wikus can get from the MNU lab to District 9 in his condition, given that we know that District 9 is at least 12 kilometres from MNU Headquarters. It is not in the slightest bit credible, however, that he could get BACK, carrying a prawn weapon, with a similarly armed prawn trotting alongside him, after the whole city had been warned that he was a dangerous, escaped sexual deviant! Maybe people would avoid them as they walked through busy city streets (MNU HQ is in downtown Johannesburg) but not one single person calls the authorities in time to have them intercepted. [First, something requiring suspension of disbelief does not make it a mistake. Second, we are not shown how Wikus and the prawn get to MNU HQ. Perhaps they stole a vehicle. Not everything has to be shown on screen.]
Edit Corrected by wizard_of_gore
When we see Wikus start to lose his fingernails we see a shot that looks to be through the security cameras. The date is on the lower right as 2010/09/08 (8th of August 2010). When Wikus and Christopher break in to MNU, the date is shown on the security cameras to be 2010/13/08 (13th of August), four days later (roughly 96 hours). After escaping and going back to District 9, Wikus is captured and it displays "72 hours after exposure" on screen. [In order to accurately calculate the time span as 96 hours later, you'd need to know that both scenes occured at the same exact time of day. The closer you are to midnight, the less time you would need for the date changeover.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez
If starting up the buried vehicle with the fluid canister was so straightforward and quick, why not do it as soon as the canister was prepared at the beginning of the movie instead of hiding it for later? Christopher could have easily closed the floor hatch and started the vehicle. [Since we don't know the details of Christopher's original plan, this is simply a question, not a mistake.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez
In case of all the intelligent aliens dying, the ship is to find the nearest life sustaining planet. However, in the movie, the surviving aliens are unable to get off their own ship and thus require not only the planet to sustain their lives, but to sustain the lives of inhabitants with the ability to fly and cut through alien space crafts. (Thankfully, they didn't land on Earth pre-1900 or they would all simply die - not much of an emergency plan.) [Poor planning on the part of the aliens does not make it a movie mistake. Clearly, something went wrong on the ship.]
Edit Corrected by wizard_of_gore
A news announcer mentions that the suspect, Wikus, has been on the run for a week but moments later the screen shows "72 hours after exposure" meaning he's been on the run for 3 days at most. [There is no reason to believe that MNU furnished accurate information to the press. They may have had reasons to exaggerate the amount of time Wikus was on the run.]
Edit Corrected by sfbiker
Wikus is running away in the suit, after the alien that he is helping is captured and on the ground surrounded by the MNU forces. Just before Wikus comes back, there is a shot of the alien with what looks like red blood around his left eye. In the following shots, like in the craft, the "blood" is now gone. Also, near the start of the movie the alien blood is established as a black color, so shouldn't be red around his eye. [You're assuming the red is blood and that it belongs to the alien. There was plenty of human carnage in that scene to account for red substances on anyone.]
Edit Corrected by JC Fernandez
At the very end of the movie Christopher returns to the mother ship and pilots it away. No explanation as to how he could have done so with a giant hole in the side from the original rescue of the aliens. [All a hole in the side of the ship would do is decompress a section of the ship around the hole. Force fields and/or pressure doors would limit that to a very small part of the ship (this is an advanced alien spaceship we're talking about, even submarines and ships of ours have them). And even if these didn't work, Christopher and his son are inside a self contained module.]
Edit Corrected by Gary O'Reilly
We see Chris distill a drop of fuel, and he states that after 20 years of searching he finally has enough fuel. Later on, Wikus opens the fuel cell and is sprayed with a good amount of fuel. Though Chris knows that the fuel is responsible for changing Wikus into a prawn, Chris doesn't mention once that he'll now need to get more. [We do not know that what sprayed Wikus is in fact the fuel. It makes no sense that the fuel itself would make that kind of change (DNA restructuring). It is entirely possible that was just a defense mechanism to protect the small amount collected.]
Edit Corrected by Joshua Skains
In the movie it is stated that around one million aliens are ferried off of the mothership into camps on the ground. Presumably this occurs in helicopters or some other light air transport that can actually land on the ship. Considering that light aircraft can carry very limited loads, and that the stated purpose of the MNU incursion was to obtain weapons technology, it does not make sense that they would allow the aliens to bring technology and weapons with them to the camps. Further, since the aliens were not allowed to travel to most parts of the city or hold jobs like humans, it seems impossible that they would be able to obtain the raw materials and tools to construct advanced heavy weapons, mechs, and shuttles (!) in the camps. [News footage shows the shuttle dropped from the mothership early on and buried itself, clearly an emergency procedure of some kind. It is certainly large enough to carry a compliment of weapons and other needed equipment. The weapons and shuttle were not created in the camp.]
Edit Corrected by John W Rosa