DVD: District 9, For retail & rental (Sony)

Never mind Avatar – District 9 was 2009's most original and exciting sci-fi thriller about someone bonding with an alien and turning against his own human colleagues.

These aliens don't live in a jungle paradise, though: they've been stranded in a Johannesburg shanty town for 20 years, to the increasing hostility of the locals. There's a strain of political comedy running through Neill Blomkamps' debut, but it's principally a hair-raising and exhausting thrill ride.