Movie Review: Elysium

Elysium - A place or condition of ideal happiness. Something we all search for right? In August 2013, it was a physical place, but only available to certain people.

Directing this 109 minute action/drama/sci-fi/thriller is Neil Blomkamp.

The cast showing us their futuristic world is: Matt Damon as Max, Jodie Foster as Delacourt, Sharlto Coplay as Kruger, Alice Braga as Frey, Emma Tremblay as Matilda, Wagner Moura as Spider, William Fichtner as John Carlyle and Faran Tahir as President Patel.

Earth 2154, there are two class of people, the haves and have nots. They are even more divided then you could imagine. All the wealthy or "citizens" are on a space station called Elysium, where there is no war, disease or poverty. While the immigrants (anyone not rich), are left on the over populated planet. Many try to reach the station, but are stopped by it's defense system. One day while at work
Max is exposed to a deadly level of radiation, which left him terminated from his job and five days to live. Meanwhile, Delacourt (sectary of defense) and Pres. Patel are having problems seeing eye to eye back on Elysium. So Delacourt tries a move that could give her control of the station, all she needs is computer program delivered to her from earth. If Max can get to Elysium, the med-pods could cure him. Enter Spider, a smuggler that has caught wind of some corporate information being moved. With a deal struck, Spider will get Max up to the med-pods in exchange, Max grabs the info. for him. Not knowing the true importance of the data, the chase starts and Delacourt will do anything to get her property back. All the while Max is counting down the time he has left.

Visually, the movie was great, with seamless special effects. The story was really good, but just didn't move me. Something was missing and it had trouble holding my attention, with a ending you saw coming. It's a futuristic story of today's problems. Rich are rich, poor are... you guessed it, poor. With one side enjoying the pros and the others suffer in the cons. Maybe that was the problem. I already know life's not fair and we need change, but how is being short on money and paying 10 bucks (in my area) to see a sci-fi flick about what I'm struggling against helping me? You wanna take a stand for change? Don't charge viewers to see what a lot of us already go through (end soapbox). Other than that the cast was great, and Damon, Foster and Coplay were excellent. Overall, cool looking movie, ok story great playthrough and really good cast.

It's rated R for violence, language and gore.

3 stars for showing me the struggle of everyday life... just in a more depressing sci-fi way.


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