Disappointment

Rating: 3/10 (27 June 2014)

Upon hearing my libertarian sister complain that Elysium's wealth-inequality theme was "a bit heavy-handed," I knew I would have to see it. I watched the trailer several times over - each time wowed by the special effects, the visual disparity between Elysium's absolute grace and Earth's poverty and chaos, and Jodie Foster's bizarre accent. I had high hopes.
Not only was the movie itself a completely run-of-the-mill Hollywood action film with terrible writing -- the full length film had hardly any more narrative than the trailer. Completely unidimensional characters with no development. No nuance in the plot. And the wealth- inequality theme wasn't just heavy-handed, it was entirely a gimmick with no depth.
I give Elysium 3/10 only for the special effects team, and give 0/10 to Neill Blonkamp for his god-awful script.