The best science fiction stories are those that take a piece of the present and extend it to the future to show the consequences of not changing our path. Good science fiction also acts as a metaphor for our way of life.
Elysium, a new science fiction film from writer and director Neil Blomkamp, does both. Unfortunately, it gets so bogged down in being a meaningful metaphor, it forgets about being a good movie.
All of the ingredients are in place for a transformative cinematic experience. Blomkamp’s last movie was District 9, which blended futuristic action with acidic commentary on immigration. It also demonstrated his good eye for special effects and acerbic wit, which cuts to the heart of social issues. Both are on display in Elysium, his second movie.
The special effects, especially the shots showing the titular space station, were designed to drop jaws. Orbiting outside the Earth’s atmosphere, Elysium initially looks like a giant, spoked wheel in the sky, but as the camera swoops in, viewers can see its rim contains organic habitats and beautifully conceived communities, protected not by a space hull but a generated atmosphere.
There are several visually exciting action scenes in the movie as well, and some cool technology, including ammunition that explodes in stages and packs a real punch. In terms of sheer entertainment value, there’s a lot on display in Elysium that will have science fiction geeks drooling.
The setting delivers a message relevant to viewers today, even though the movie takes place in the year 2154. By that time, the entire Earth will a dry husk, with robots running nearly everything for the mega-corporations that own them. Mocking the poor and the sick that scrape a living off the overcrowded dust bowl is Elysium, on which only the wealthy live. People on Elysium never die of natural causes thanks to the use of medpods that instantly cure every disease.
Blomkamp is clearly tackling issues of class separation, health care, and the environment, and even tips his hat to immigration again. He’s been quoted as saying, in reference to Elysium, “This is today. This is now.”
That’s admirable. It’s also astonishing, considering Blomkamp convinced a movie studio to give him one hundred million dollars to make his social diatribe for the masses. This is movie making as it rarely happens.
Unfortunately, the story is less interesting than the environment in which it takes place. The movie follows Max Da Costa, an ex-criminal who’s trying to make an honest living. When he’s doused with a lethal dose of radiation in a workplace accident, he decides to go to Elysium and find a medpod. To hitch a ride, he sees Spider, a former colleague from his criminal days, who can get him there for a price. In this case, the price is information.
I’ll leave you to discover the details, provided you’re interested. Just know the story telling gets clunky, to the point of diminishing the movie’s pleasures.
My internal alarm went off when a high ranking government minister played by Jodie Foster commissions the CEO of the corporation that owns Elysium to write a reboot program that will make her president. Okay, so, the computer shuts down, comes back up, and, “Dang, we’re stuck with a new president!”
Also silly is the CEO transporting the code via an implant in his brain, presumably because no one in the future has heard of USB drives or the cloud. Worse, he inexplicably protects the code so the carrier will die if anyone tries to download it. I hope he gave himself hazard pay.
Also off is Foster’s performance. Not only does she have trouble finding her character’s emotional core, she uses a distractingly fake accent.
Character motivations are also sketchy. The main bad guy, Kruger, played with villainous relish by Sharlto Copely, undergoes a shift late in the movie that’s just plain absurd.
Elysium is a movie with good intentions but poor writing. However, many viewers will enjoy its visuals and action scenes. With his ideas, Blomkamp could have made a classic; instead, he merely made a passable summer movie.
Two-and-a-half stars out of four. Rated R for language and strong, bloody violence.