Elysium
2013, 109 mins
R
Grade: B-

Neill Blomkamp is a visionary director that likes to make films set in garbage heaps. For his first film since the breakout sleeper hit District 9, he goes from the slums of South Africa to the slums of Los Angeles, circa 2154 — the earth has been ruined and overcrowded, only to see the wealthy jump ship from the planet and set up shop in a rotating spacestation called Elysium — basically, one giant french-speaking country club with miracle beds that cure all diseases. Defense Minister Delacourt (Jodie Foster) is on hand to make sure no one disturbs their utopia, shooting down ships with “illegals” from Earth who try to find their way up there. Max Da Costa (Matt Damon), an ex-con trying to go straight in LA, is constantly abused by those around him — the police robots (who break his arm after a wisecrack); his ex-partners in crime; and his assembly-line foreman (who is such a thinly drawn character its hard not to laugh at his awful dialogue). After an accident exposes him to a fatal dose of radiation, Max has a handful of days to find his way up to Elysium, or die trying. Fused with a beat-up mechanical exoskeleton and a hard drive in his brain (that, through a series of events I won’t go into, contains information that pretty much everyone wants), Max has a lot of shooting, running and punching to do.

There’s more supporting characters on hand to aid or hinder Max in his quest, including his old buddy Julio (Diego Luna), a hacker named Spider, a childhood love interest (Alice Braga) and her sick daughter, an oily CEO (William Fichtner), and a psychopathic merc named Kruger (Sharlto Copley, of Blomkamp’s District 9 and guilty-pleasure The A-Team). That’s one of the problems with the film — a lot of the villains (and there are many) are paper-thin, with simplistic or unexplained motivations. Foster’s role, despite the second billing, doesn’t really have a lot to do, other than snap at everyone around her in a quasi-french, quasi-South African, quasi-I dunno accent. None of the character arcs really work here — motivations quickly change, and several suddenly become political and revolutionary. Blomkamp takes time to give Max a lot of backstory through flashback, but these scenes don’t really help to justify what’s to come for Max in the film.

Still, there are moments of creativity that show just what a talent Blomkamp is. He has a knack for gritty, dirty dystopian sci-fi, where the gadgets and weapons are at once primitive and super futuristic (and, more, often than not, blow a person into tiny flying bloody pieces). There’s knives and samurai swords, but also big energy bolt guns and giant hand-held missile launchers capable of shooting a ship down from space. The action set pieces are a winning combination of old and new, and can often be exhilarating — if only there were more of them. Copley’s crazed Kruger brings an unpredictable energy to the screen — I found myself wanting to see more of him, but also wanting to, well, just see more of District 9. And there-in lies the problem. This is a perfectly serviceable sci-fi film, but it’s not the masterpiece I had my fingers crossed for. Lightning doesn’t strike twice (even if its shot from a big ol’ laser gun), and Elysium fails to live up to expectations.