Elysium

i found it pretty good. the story was a bit sloppy and quickly told but loved the action and the bad guys
no OTT CGI for a change, the ships and weapons looked real. there were not a lot of robots but too many and you get cgi overload

it was too easy to get into elysium though. and how did all the air not escape (no roof!)
he had a chance to heal himself in the armoury, it would only have taken a few mins

7/10
 
Thought this was mostly garbage, special effects were decent and Sharlto Copley made it worth a watch.
 
ChroniC said:
Bournes are average at best and all the others are films that are held up by the other actors, except Dogma which is probably just good Kevin Smith writing as Affleck is awful too.
Maybe I should have said, I've never seen him be a good lead actor in anything.
Click to expand...

How about Finding Forrester. I thought he was great in that ;) Rounders too.
 
After really enjoying Oblivion earlier this year I was looking forward to another scifi flick, something with a bit of substance and intelligence, but was left disappointed. So many dumb things happened in it! I can't remember a notable scene with Matt Damon, who hardly stretched his acting chops. His character was quite passive really, aside from the action scenes the dialogue came from Jodie Foster and Sharlto Copley. Kruger was the kind of bad guy you would find in a Steven Seagal DVD movie with his cheesy lines. At this point I don't think Neill Blomkamp films are up my street - I remember after seeing District 9 that it was not what I expected, and for Elysium he's reused a similar ghetto style and haves/ have nots storyline.
 
My review from the "What you watched last night" thread:

Elysium

Another slice of excellent Sci-fi from Neil Blomkamp. While the performances in the movie are acceptable, the subject matter is never really that focused on character development, so while Matt Damon plays his role convincingly, I felt that the "bad-guy" roles from Jodie Foster and Sharlto Copley were way more engaging on the whole. The Story itself is like a beautifully wrapped toffee - you kinda know what to expect and you enjoy yourself from the moment you start to unwrap it until the final bite. I would happily recommend this to anyone who wants Sci-fi to carry on in the Cinema in favour of utter mediocrity such as Twilight etc.

8.5 out of 10.
Click to expand...

As you can tell, I liked it a lot. I can agree that it wasn't outstanding like District 9, but the art here really is how Blomkamp uses that most malleable of genres - Sci-fi - to present really big human issues such as the gap between the rich and poor, military superiority, PMCs, covert/black-ops to oppress and terrorise, the lengths people will go for their own ends above those of others, resource scarcity...basically, what human life is worth. You will come out of the movie thinking along these lines, essentially an African take on the current global situation. Is that why many reviewers seem to miss the point? Maybe. I personally thought the movie was excellent.

EDIT: I would never rate Oblivion above this. Oblivion basically ripped off "Moon"'s concept and wrapped it up into a Tom Cruise action vehicle. At best, the movie would have been a 7 if not for the blatant "Moon" rip-off. As it is I would not give it more than a 6.
 
Last edited:
Finally got around to going to see this last night.

Overall I enjoyed it...

Though it did feel a bit rushed with it's story line. For me I would have liked them to spend more time showing the 2 different worlds and stretching it out a fair bit, even if that meant splitting it into 2 films, it seemed there was so much more potential there and there were some good characters that I would have liked to know more about.

Looking forward to seeing more films from Blomkamp, I like his style.
 
went to the cinema to watch this on opening night, managed to watch about half the film then left...

I have had more interesting dumps than that film...
 
This guy is obviously a PC gaming fan. First he blatently rips of some of the weapon design and aesthetics from HL2 and now he's copying the exoskeleton from STALKER.
 
Hikari Kisugi said:
Good Will Hunting?
Dogma?
The Talented Mr Ripley?
Ocean's Eleven?
The Bourne Movies, esp the first.
Click to expand...

I know.. he's such a terrible actor :rolleyes: (He's just an easy band wagon target I think for people).

The film itself doesn't grab me, but I'll watch it when it comes out on video/streaming.
 
I watch Elysium yesterday and all I can say is that I whole heartly stick to what I said about Matt Damon.
You could have put a smiley face on a pillow and it would have been as convincing.
You can see that Image Engine did the effects to this film, it almost looks identical to District9 in it's making.
Admittedly the story was thin on the ground and Jodie foster was just awful but she is not the excuse for it being so bad. The casting for this whole film was just completely wrong.

I'm sure there are many critics who would say I didn't understand the message it was trying to convey but I feel I did. I like the way Blomkamp takes current issues and re-imagines them as SciFi stories, but I couldn't get on board with this one.

I would have liked to have seen Sharto Copley as the lead character, I think he would have done a much better job in a similar fashion to D9. He did an ok job of playing the bad guy, but I prefer him as a slightly unwitting character who is given something special.
The action scenes in the film felt like something out of the bible of Michael Bay, my brain throughout felt like it didn't have more than a second to process what it had just seen before another 15 frames of fighting were crammed down my throat, which given the effects, was a little disappointing.

Overall, its gets a 4.5/10
 
Last edited:
I finally got round to watching this after having such high hopes due to District 9 being superb. This was utter horse poo. Just so many dumb things, absolutely terrible story. And Sharlto's South African accent was so over the top it was like he was making fun of himself, especially with all the slang and singing that stupid song.

Hard to believe this was written and directed by Blomkamp.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom