Elysium

Trailer- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QILNSgou5BY

Cool sounding names. Elysium could be a film about the life of a lolipop man or documentary on cardboard and I'd still say 'ooh Elysium, sounds intriguing!'. As it it, Elysium is some pretty bland sci-fi that had me pretty underwhelmed.

I'm not sure what I'm missing here because the general consensus is that it's fantastic. The premise is indeed intriguing- Elysium is a spaceship where rich people live in the future, a bit like the one in Wall E but only poshos are allowed in. Everyone else scrabbles around on a browny-grey Earth and dies from cancer and things because for some reason all the anti-cancer machines are kept up in space. It's Matt Damon's job to get up there and spread the wealth.

Most of the film is set one Earth which is a little disappointing seeings as how muddy and bleak it all is. There's plenty action scenes but they all have such a dreary backgrounds and all characters involved are just buffed up thug-types. Even when it moves to Elysium itself its all a bit dull with fight scenes taking place is standard star-trek style corridors and what I imagine any factory in the world looks like. It's exciting enough but hardly jaw-dropping.

Almost all the characters I found to be pretty forgettable with the one massive exception being the films bad guy Kruger- the guy from District Nine. As far as villains go he's pretty terrifying and puts on a fantastic show. When he was alone with people I was just waiting for something horrible to happen to them. There's real menace in his voice when he talks and I don't think it'll be too long until he's snapped up by Marvel or DC to be a villain in one of their films.

Matt Damon puts on a good acting performance but he's hardly the most complex of characters. His relationships with Jodie Foster and the little girl in the film are quite heartfelt and believable but nothing gut-wrenchingly emotional. There's a nice meerkat and hippo analogy said by the little girl which stuck with me and was quite clever and made the film seem a bit deeper than it was.

I don't have that much more to say about Elysium to be honest. I saw there watching it thinking it was fine enough but it wouldn't be the end of the world if I missed the end. If the action was more spectacular and setting less bland I would have probably enjoyed it more- the story was pretty absorbing. It just fell a bit flat for me and was a bit of a letdown.

6/10