Elysium (2013)

4/5

Neill Blomkamp's Elysium will, of course, draw comparisons to the director's previous work, District 9, since both are sci-fi action movies employing hyper-realistic special effects, cinema verité-style camerawork, and plots that play like morality tales about the maltreatment and subjugation of a population's citizens. While the combination of all those things felt exhilarating and unprecedented 5 years ago, here they feel a bit tired.

Elysium, like District 9 and Children of Men, delivers a precisely-detailed and complexly-envisioned future. But the characters with which it inhabits that world are unexciting; their quest is uncompelling; the stakes are underwhelming. It is not enough for the background to be thematically interesting, because the foreground is what will get our blood pumping and bring us to our feet cheering. Instead the story feels like a pretty barebones excuse for fights and explosions. Luckily, the (rather sparse) action is exceptional, leaps and bounds better than most of what we are seeing in theaters today. Some scenes are so visually arresting, so stunningly beautiful, that they seem somehow operatic and timeless. That they are simultaneously violently graphic and viscerally horrifying does not diminish their value, but simply brands them in our minds.

Elysium is ultimately not as good as District 9. While perhaps more technically impressive than his previous work, it needed a stronger story to unlock all the potential it had. What frustrates me is that we know Blomkamp can do better. And I sincerely hope he pulls through on the next one, because I love watching his movies.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1535108/

District 9 (2009)

5/5

Neill Blomkamp's District 9 is a rare treasure of cinema. Much like my favorite film of 2006, Children of Men, the director envisions an alternate yet wholly believable future, and then uses his camera to immerse us in the gritty, raw realism of his dystopia. The story is set in Johannesburg, where an alien spacecraft stops and hovers over the city. The military drills into the ship to reveal a population of malnourished prawn-like aliens. Humanitarian organizations demand they be taken care of, and a district is set aside for them to co-exist with humans. Crime and violence precipitates between humans and aliens for over 20 years until it is decided that the aliens should be relocated to a new area. It is here that the movie begins, after setting in place all the essential details that will be brought back, full circle, to the thrilling climax and poignant denouement.

Wikus van de Merwe is the bureaucratic agent responsible for evicting the prawns. One such prawn, Christopher Johnson, and his son are the other main characters of the story. All three are painted with such clarity and precision, and acted with such honesty, that they must be real. Shot with a vivid cinéma vérité style, you truly feel and live in their world. The editing and overall pacing are both brilliant, effortlessly mixing together CGI animation, documentary-like footage, and intense action sequences. The film does a remarkable thing, and it does so with absolute perfection. As I said in the beginning of my review, this film is a rare treasure of cinema and one I will not forget for a very long time. Go and see this movie. Go and see this movie now.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1136608/