Elysium: moments of excellence, but empty at the same time

Elysium is the follow up movie by Neill Blomkamp who directed the incredible District 9.  Elysium is not a sequel to District 9, but does have some of the same themes.  The rigid class system, divide between rich and poor and spectacularly sublime special effects are all present in both films.  Elysium has high aspirations and does go higher than most sci-fi films; but doesn’t reach ‘classic’ status because of the frequent moments that it takes its foot off of the accelerator. 

It’s still a very entertaining movie, but the promise that Elysium had was so great that it’s a shame that some aspects didn’t work as well as I would’ve liked.  The movies bottom line:  Elysium is a space station where the privileged live, have no disease and the rest of the people live on Earth, where conditions suck.

The Great

The visuals in Elysium are detailed in their good and bad surroundings.   When the film takes places in the slums of L.A, which were shot on a huge landfill outside of Mexico City, you can almost smell the stink and feel the sweat.  Likewise when it shows how the other half live, the mechanics of the robots and the scope of Elysium are all very well done.

Sharlito Copley plays Kruger a black ops military guy who lives on Earth, but takes his orders from Elysium.  He’s cruel, funny, manic, a little bit tough to understand at first, but provides the majority of human fireworks in the film.

Wagner Moura is fabulous as Spider, the tech kingpin of the underworld on Earth.  He sweats through most of the film and all but greases the seat next to you with his performance.

The OK

Matt Damon is Max, a semi-loser who’s wanted to go to Elysium since he was a kid living at the orphanage.  Damon is serviceable as the hero who must rise to the occasion to level the playing field for mankind blah, blah, blah.

The plot for Elysium starts out incredibly strong.  There’s a point, and I can’t decide exactly when it was, but at approximately 40 minutes into the film things went from jaw on the floor brilliant to just above par sci-fi.  Once the players in the movie are set up you know who will die, live or be killed in a coup.

The Bad

Jodie Foster can do the woman in power who knows evil secrets character very well.  She’s so good at it she can probably do it in her sleep, which is exactly where I’ll be the next time, asleep.   Because she’s on Elysium she keeps her emotions close to the chest, but she’s a great actress and was wholly wasted here.

Bottom line

Elysium has lots in common with Prometheus.  Is it better for a movie to have high aspirations and fall short or to succeed at being just a moderate sci-fi film?  My expectations for Elysium were high.  In the end, this is an above average movie that had potential be a real sci-fi classic.

Elysium is rated R for violence, gore and language.