“Elysium” is nothing we haven’t seen before: a film about a dystopian future world separated into a vastly stratified upper and lower class. If you’ve seen "Gattaca" or "Blade Runner," you probably get the idea. The wealthy live on a starkly beautiful space station called Elysium, while the rest of humanity remains on Earth. The earthlings fester in sickness and work to create the robots that oppress them, if they’re lucky enough to get a job at all.
Max (Matt Damon) is an ex-con obsessed with getting to Elysium. He is irradiated at work and left with only days to live. Supported by a mechanical bodysuit that looks like the skeleton of Iron Man screwed into his spine, Max is determined to break into Elysium and use one of their healing pods, which keep Elysium citizens in perfect health, to cure himself. He seeks out some friends from his car-jacking days who run illegal space flights to Elysium, and their actions catalyze a full-scale attack on the current political system, one that treats earthlings as second-class citizens.
“Elysium” treads the same path as director and writer Neill Blomkamp’s 2009 film “District 9." Similar to the apartheid allegory in "District 9," “Elysium” provides a take on immigration and racism between the impoverished, mostly-Hispanic future Los Angeles and the predominantly white Elysium. “Elysium,” however, doesn’t quite capture the emotional rawness of “District 9.” The latter made the audience instantly empathetic towards an oppressed, insect-like robo-alien species. “Elysium,” on the other hand, remained overly focused on a tortured romance between Max and his childhood friend Frey (Alice Braga), while attempting to make overarching commentary on a smorgasbord of issues: war, race, poverty, the environment, medicine, beauty and more.
Set over the course of just a few days, “Elysium” does an excellent job of conveying the frantic urgency of its characters. Tense and frequent action sequences are intercut with scenes of the villainous defense secretary, Delacourt (Jodie Foster). Her performance is both powerful and desperate as she barks orders and clenches her jaw, pursed-lipped, as she watches the pawns in her carefully devised chess match fall. Her minions include viciously wolfish rogue agent Kruger (Sharlto Copley of "District 9"). Unfortunately, the villains in "Elysium" are more compelling than Max, who fluctuates between selfishness and irrationality.
Still, as an action film, “Elysium” succeeds. Every frame is packed with grimy detail as the movie offers a crash course in the worst-case scenario of the next 150 years. While at times heavy-handed, it toys with the perception of perfection and ideal society in a thought-provoking and compelling manner.
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