sup
just saw Elysium
Thoughts:
It's average. Story is poorly told with far too many heavy handed cliches. Action lacks punch due to bad camera work (shaky cam). Characters fall flat due to bad writing and dialogue. Plot does not flow as well as it should and as a result feels awkward.
It has potential inside. All the elements are there to make it great. However nearly every aspect is handled badly and as such the movie doesn't work overall.
There are some decent moments and it's not terrible. You may get enough entertainment out of it. If you're looking for another District 9, this isn't it. Fairly disappointing.
spoiler specific thoughts:
spoiler (click to show/hide)
The story.
It's bad. This is one of those movies where the story is extremely basic and thin. In the hands of a really expert write/director collaboration you can buff up the world building and characters and make the events contained in the movie weighty. Doing this makes up for the simple plot and that's perfectly OK. Pacific Rim is a recent example of this. However in Elysium the world is fairly straight forward and generic, the characters are one dimensional and generic. The dialogue is straight forward and filled with the most basic routine lines meant only to push the plot forward. Because there's nothing else to hold it up, the story is left flopping and we see all the messy, heavy handed, faults. RICH PEOPLE ARE BAD. that's the crux of it.
The Action.
So Blomkamp gave us some really well directed action in District 9. It was gritty and felt real. Some how that's lost here. The few action sequences are short, filled with shaky camera and quick jump edits, and just fall flat. They are so few and far between and disappointing entirely.
Kruger.
What a complete waste. When I heard the main dude from District 9 was playing a badass soldier I was like "awesome!". When I saw his design I was like "AWESOME!". When I actually saw the film I was like "Huh...". His character is about as generic as they come. He's an evil agent who assaults women and loves to kill people. You can totally have that in a movie and it can totally still work. But you need a great performance and great dialogue to hold up the simpleness to the character. Kruger has none of that. His actions don't shock you. His dialogue bores you. He doesn't give off the scary vibe he needs to work as a character. Then his ultimate fate is completely anticlimactic. I'm pretty sure I remember an image or a video where he has a fucking glowing blue sword. That never happens in the movie. His final confrontation with Matt Damon is just a basic brawl. It's short, lacks any clever touches, and ends abruptly. I'm so completely disappointed in his character in this movie.
spoiler (click to show/hide)
Krueger getting total facial reconstruction was really cool, though I think that a grenade would've taken out his brain too
Business - interesting chart. What happened in '70 that made social inequality start rising? Deindustrialization and the rise of the financial industry?