Goes Down Swinging

Rating: 7/10 (9 August 2013)

This movie is not a completely successful one on an artistic level. Imaginative, well-produced, gorgeous art direction, costumes, settings, but it fails on some key levels for me in terms of story. However, the real test of a good movie is the suspension of disbelief and the degree to which you are entertained. In this sense, the movie may ultimately fail but it goes down swinging.
Matt Damon's character never truly comes to life for me. He has been excellent in other action pieces, the Bourne Identity movies come to mind. But here he has almost nothing to play with. Flashbacks of his childhood with a young girl from the orphanage run throughout the movie to give us an emotional connection that just doesn't work. Still, Damon is nothing if not talented and he tries to deliver.
Arguably the brightest element of the movie is Jodie Foster, who plays a futuristic version of Christine Lagarde, only prettier and sexier, who holds the position of Defense Minister of Elysium. She gives a coolly elegant portrayal in her sumptuous, tight dress suits and cutting edge hairstyle. When she's not on screen the movie loses some of its spark.
An interesting note about future class distinctions; Earth is, of course, where all the poor people live; it is multi-cultural with an interesting mixture of Spanish speaking and English speaking population groups. Elysium is where the plutocracy lives. It, too, is multicultural in the sense that you have a diversity of colors, and both women and men in positions of influence, but it seems to be characterized by people who come from a French and English speaking background. In Elysium there are moments when people speak exclusively in French (with English subtitles), just like on Earth there are moments where people speak exclusively in Spanish (including Matt Damon's character). This is an interesting take on future class distinctions and it happens so frequently throughout the film that it is clearly intentional, and thought-provoking. It's as if the American East Coast elite and the British City of London financial power-players joined forces in a plutocratic melting pot with the Grande Ecole upper echelon officials and chief executives of the French Republic.
Worth seeing, but catch a matinée.