5. Sharlto Copley Is A Star In The Making

Despite having known Neill Blomkamp for years, Copley hadn't harboured any thought that he'd end up even appearing in District 9, let alone playing the lead.

He specialises in producing and directing TV and short films and while he's occasionally been in front of the camera, he never saw his destiny in acting.

Talk about a duck to water, though... “I suppose I feel very natural as an actor," he laughs. "It was a very easy, effortless process, if I’m honest about it.

"I hadn’t acted professionally ever before. I had done… I could do accents. I wasn’t pursuing it as a career in any way but I was comfortable with characters, messing around as a businessman or as a producer. I was always being different characters while I was working. I just didn’t see myself as an actor.”

But when Blomkamp was working on District 9, and asked Copley to help workshop the main character, the director quickly saw that he'd found his man - and Peter Jackson agreed, even if it was physically demanding and mentally exhausting for the lead. "It was like flowing downhill with water and every now and then hitting a rock, but you know you’re gonna get to the bottom."

Plus, like Borat, the vast majority of the scenes were improvised. "All of my dialogue, all of my actual lines are improvised. There's a script but Neill works within a structure. 'This is what needs to happen in the scene – go there, evict the guy, pull the guy outside, go inside and see the computers.'"

When totalfilm.com met with Copley at Comic-Con in July, the difference from the character to the man who plays him was eerie. While Wikus is a nervous, eager-beaver bureaucrat who can't believe his luck when he's assigned the task of moving the aliens on, Copley the man is more like a rock star in person - albeit a modest, thoughtful one.

The vast gulf between the two makes you appreciate his work all the more.

Next: The aliens are awesome