Elysium (2013)

In the year 2154, the Earth has become such a polluted dump that the wealthiest citizens have located to an orbital space habitat called Elysium.  Elysium is beautiful, clean and every home has a medical bay that will cure anything that ails you.  Plus, you have one helluva view.  However, if you're one of the regular folks, you're stuck on Earth living in a shanty town and barely surviving.  There is where we find Max DeCosta (Matt Damon), an ex-con struggling to keep a job a local robot factory.

After an accident at work, Max is blasted with a lethal dose of radiation and is given just five days to live. Getting to Elysium is the only way he'll survive.  Desperate for a way to get there, he makes a deal with another criminal rob a wealthy businessman (William Fichtner).  They fit him with a powerful exoskeleton, as well as some brain doohickey, and off he goes.  Max ends up in the possession of something extremely valuable that's wanted by not only his boss, but Elysium's Secretary of Defense (Jodie Foster).  She dispatches a sleeper agent, Kruger (Sharlto Copley), to bring him in.

Elysium has a great pace and that's due in large part to the fact that it wastes no time in getting the main quest going.  Within the first few minutes you learn all the backstory you need to know about Elysium and Max through a simple series of images, lines of text and flashbacks.  No painful or clunky narration or exposition needed.  When Frey (Alice Braga), a childhood friend of Max's, appears you already understand their relationship and what Frey means to him.  The story itself it fairly straightforward and easy to follow.

Much like Neill Blomkamp's District 9, Elysium has parallels to modern issues like immigration, class warfare and healthcare.  I didn't find Elysium to be as heavy handed as District 9 or found it to be preachy.  You don't see anyone lamenting their situation, or blaming/cursing the upper class for it.  Elysium subtly weaves these thoughts into the story, and it's much smarter than what we usually get during the summer, especially for something that's so effects-laden.  An early attempt to break into Elysium feels like a high-tech attempt to cross the border.  However, when you later realize what city they're in and consider the ethnicity of many of the people, that's the one part that seemed a little too obvious.

Unlike another science fiction film this summer, the technology seemed feasible and consistent for the setting.  If this only took place 40-50 years in the future, it would have seemed a little too implausible.  The effects are fantastic, whether you're looking at scenic shots of Earth or Elysium, the various robots in the world, or ships flying around.  This is one of the best looking films of the year.  Blomkamp again showed he has a flair for inventive and graphic ways of killing people.  If he ever made a sci-fi version of a Saw film, then I'd think we'd be in for some true mayhem.

I did find a few issues with the plot though.  Before I start, I understand without some of these things there'd be no story, but it always strikes me odd when a movie that's otherwise smart misses things to me that would seem obvious.  Like when Max gets trapped and hit with all that radiation, the system detects there's a biological signature present, but there was no failsafe to turn it off, or not activate at all once knowing he's in there.  That seemed like an obvious safety feature that was missing, but they could have been making a point about workplace safety in sweatshop or low-income/third-world environments.

I understand the point the film was making about healthcare, but if all you need to do is lay in one of these machines and it fixes everything, what's the issue with not having them on Earth?  It's not like you ever see money exchange hands on Elysium.  Why can't they help?  You'll see something at the end that really made this point stick out to me.

While the surface shots of Earth show a littered, run down landscape, orbital shots didn't show much damage.  I might have believed how polluted the Earth was if I had seen less blue, or maybe craters showing that there'd been war or some kind of disaster.  With the kind of technology that was available, they didn't have anything that would have been able to clean up the planet?

Perhaps I'm projecting my own idealized, Star Trek vision of the future on Elysium.  I'd like to believe that when we arrive at this kind of technology in the future, that it will be used for the betterment of all mankind, not just the rich.

There were a few weird character decisions as well.  Jodie Foster spoke with a weird accent that didn't seem to belong to any particular nationality.  It wasn't as bad as the accent used in After Earth or Queen Amidala from Episode I, but it was a little distracting because there wasn't a real need for it.  Plus, I swore in the opening scene she spoke with her normal voice, and then it changed in a later scene.  On a side note, Foster can still rock the short haircut with the best of them, and still has one the best set of calves in Hollywood (I have a thing for calves).  Speaking of accents, while Sharlto Copley is from South Africa, his accent was also a little distracting, all things considered.  A few times I found him difficult to understand.  His performance was delightfully nutty though, and a good contrast to Matt Damon's more muted performance.  I found it funny despite lack of finances, Max still had plenty of tattoos.  He was an ex-con though, so maybe they were prison tattoos.  You also see a lot of facial branding or 'white tattoos' on the wealthier folks, but it's never really expounded upon.

Overall, Elysium is well acted and there are no weak performances, but it's really not the focus of the film.  There aren't a lot of character moments, and outside of a scene or two I never felt much emotionally.

Lastly, I was really irritated in the camera work in parts.  Once again, there's too much shaky camera.  Even in some of the earlier flashback scenes of Max this is used and simply unnecessary.  When we reach the climactic fight, it suffers from dizzying tight shots, quick cuts and camera movements that make it extremely difficult to tell what was going on.  This is really becoming a plague on movies, and I'm disappointed that Blomkamp went this direction, especially when I don't recall any this at all in District 9.

Oh, and as always MATT DAMON!

Despite it's flaws, Elysium is still a smart, thought-provoking and highly entertaining sci-fi film.  It's easily one of the best looking films of 2013.  While it's a bit of a step down from District 9, it still cements Neil Blomkamp as one of the top sci-fi filmmakers out there.  Don't hesitate to check it out.

3.5 (out of 5)

The Lone Ranger (2013)

"My favorite part was when the horse drank a beer and burped" - My 5-year-old nephew.

This is the kind of humor you can expect from The Lone Ranger, Disney's latest resurrection of an old character that nobody was asking for.  You also get to see things like a grown man having his head dragged through fresh horseshit, and Tonto repeatedly attempt to feed a dead bird as a gag.  You might think then that The Lone Ranger is a movie geared towards kids.  Well, it also features a scene of the main villain eating someones heart (although its not seen clearly), many people are shot several times, and others are brutally killed when thrown from moving trains while watching their bodies hit the ground and violently roll away.  The disconnect in tone makes it really hard to pin down exactly what kind of movie it was supposed to be or whom it's meant for.  Brutal violence juxtaposed with childish attempts at humor.  This is a Disney film?  If you're expecting family entertainment, you might have to be careful depending on what you want your kids to see.

I realize I'm being a bit of a hypocrite here as I saw The Lone Ranger with my 5 and 8-year-old nephews (and their mother), but they cut their teeth on the Indiana Jones movies, which also feature scary moments and brutal violence, so we knew that The Lone Ranger wasn't anything they wouldn't be able handle.  The younger of the two slept through most of the film anyway, so it really captivated his attention.  Oh, and don't think for a second that The Lone Ranger is in the same league as the Indiana Jones series.  Well, maybe except for The Crystal Skull.  I'm still irritated with how bad that movie was.

Anyway, my older nephew said his favorite parts were "that crazy horse" and "all the train parts", and that's really the strength of the film.  It's bookended with two pretty entertaining scenes, although I thought the final one was a little much.  That leads into one of the other main problems of the film in that it's way too long.  In between these two action scenes is two hours of meandering backstory, undeveloped side characters, and just general nothingness.

When watching The Lone Ranger, it will feel like something that was assembled together from various parts of other films.  At times it's a serious western, then it's a buddy cop film; there's undeveloped mystical elements, and a shoehorned love interest.  I get the vibe that even the writers (and there were three of them)  and director Gore Verbinski weren't sure what type of film they wanted to make, so they just tried a little bit of everything and hoped that something would stick.

Within the plot - what little there is of one - there didn't seem to be any concept of time or distance.  Characters appear when convenient or needed by the script.  Early in the film, you see Tonto in a jail cell, but in the very next scene, he's not only out of jail, but he's caught up with people that have been on horseback for several hours.  A character even asks Tonto how he got out of jail, only to not answer the question.  Just because you acknowledge the inconsistency to the audience, it doesn't let you off the hook for it, especially if you don't even bother to answer your own question.

Adding to this, I'm not even sure why this was called The Lone Ranger.  It's really all about Tonto.  The story is told from his perspective, you get more of his backstory, and he's the only competent one that does anything effective.  I get that they were trying to capitalize on Johnny Depp's star power and the Pirates connection, but while Depp is one of the only good things about the film, Tonto doesn't have any of the charm of Captain Jack Sparrow.

Armie Hammer as "The Ranger", is more of a secondary character.  He's never all that interesting or compelling.  This isn't the fault of Hammer or his performance - I like Armie Hammer - it's just not very well written.  They don't give you any reason to think he's a badass or even a capable hero.  In fact, they make a point of stating several times that he's not a fan of guns and refuses to use them on multiple occasions.  Yet every time he does shoot a gun, he hits his target perfectly.  He does this on accident at times, so you don't see where any skill comes in.  Tonto states he cannot be killed in battle, but never really delve into that either.  However, they do show you that both he and Tonto and superheroes.  In that early action scene, they are thrown from a speeding train and you see them roll around at high speed.  You see others in the film die from this, but after they are just sitting there without a scratch on them.  Later in the film, they fall from great heights without any ill effect.  I'm sure this is meant to be ridiculous action like many Summer films, but most films work up to that kind of ridiculousness as the film goes on, or even after a sequel or two.  The Lone Ranger starts with "god mode" turned on.

William Fichtner plays the main villain, and he's one of my favorite scenery chewing actors.  He was the best thing about Drive Angry and was I was able to enjoy that.  He does his usual great work, but he was underutilized.  None of the cast really has all that much to do.  Ruth Wilson, who I loved on Luther, seems to just be in the film to scream a few times and doesn't have much of a character beyond that.  Despite what you see in trailers, Helena Bonham Carter is barely in the film, so if you're expecting something from her, then you're going to be disappointed.  Tom Wilkinson is wasted as well.  Barry Pepper and James Badge Dale round out the supporting cast, but they don't have much going on either.

Before I finish up, I have to mention how hard it was not to type "The Long Ranger" instead of "The Lone Ranger".  I wonder why that is?  "The Long Ranger" sounds like a porn.  I'm sure when the Adult Film community gets around to their version they'll call it that.  If so, I want a cut, or at least a free copy.

I don't think The Lone Ranger is necessarily as bad as I've heard going in, but it's definitely a difficult movie to recommend.  I didn't come out of it absolutely hating it or thinking it was a total waste of time, but it's something I'll never watch again.  There are some entertaining action scenes and Johnny Depp has a few good moments, but it's way too long, and the story and tone are all over the place.  There's just not much to enjoy otherwise.  Depending on your view, it's not even suitable for the family.  It's a movie nobody was asking for and is just a ho-hum, forgettable summer film.  It's a rental.

2 (out of 5) Death Stars