Elysium is a 2013 science-fiction film starring Matt Damon and Jodie Foster. It takes place in the year 2154, right around the time scientists have predicted that Earth will reach its capacity for humans. Now, in Elysium, Earth reaches its capacity a bit early (the late 21st century, according to the opening text) and the rich moved off Earth to live on Elysium, which was built just to preserve the privileged style of life. The poor, however, still live on an over-polluted Earth and are left to fend for themselves.
Max De Costa (Matt Damon) is an ex-criminal on parole. He is trying hard to live a lawful life, and works for a technology (mostly military-grade items) company called Armadyne Corporation. Max is accidentally locked into a radiation chamber and is hit with a lethal amount of radiation. He now has five days to live. So he decides to go to Elysium to heal himself. First thing he does is talk to Spider (Wagner Moura), so he can get a “ticket” to Elysium. His “ticket” is in the form of an exo-suit, which gives him super-strength. Spider tells him to get the “keys” to the Elysium mainframe. The “keys” just so happen to be lines of data inside of a billionaire’s head. Max gets the keys and is ready to go to Elysium, but Delacourt (Jodie Foster) and Kruger (Sharlto Copley) plan to stop him. Kruger is like Bane in that you can’t understand what he’s saying half the time! Anyway, what ensues after Max gets the keys is basically a massive fight that lasts until the end of the movie. There are several twists to keep the viewer interested, and there are a lot of setting changes, however. It doesn’t sound very interesting, but it actually is.
Max is a very human superhero. First of all, his motivation to go to Elysium is not because of the suffering of others, but his own illness. Which leads me to the next thing, he’s sick. He’ll die if he doesn’t do anything about it. Much like Tony Stark/Iron Man, he needs to act immediately if he wants to live. Now, unlike Iron Man, who becomes a hero just to help others, Max has no intent of helping the other people who live on Earth (at least, not at the beginning of the film). Max also cries several times, because he’s afraid of dying. He wants to live. Unlike other major movie blockbuster protagonists, who are not afraid of death at all and are always brave (meaning they never once show signs of fear), Max fears a lot of things, and is actually overpowered pretty easily a few times (one of which you can see in the trailer).
Overall, Elysium is a fun, bloody, visually-stunning, sci-fi experience, and I sure had a good time watching it.
Run time: 1hr 49min.
9/10 (It’s not 10/10 for a reason I shall not disclose due to spoilers)