Watched: Elysium
Observations:
- This was a very pretty film that did not live up to its premise.
- I have had more than one eye-roll in response to that statement, but this was made by the man who made District 9. District 9 had pathos, and a coherent political point, and visuals far beyond any I’d seen previously in cinema. Elysium has visuals comparable with any huge-budget sci-fi release, Matt Damon saying “I’m not gonna fuckin’ die” a lot, and a lot of gore that feels gratuitous rather than shocking.
- Okay, but it was gorgeous. I think that might be this film’s saving grace. It says something that for most of the film, I was still enjoying myself despite the fact that not much was going on, and that’s because most of this film is a visual feast - with one or two exceptions.
- Those one or two mostly occur on Elysium itself, and involve protracted sequences in blank corridors that are not interesting in the slightest.
- That said, there is one camera trick towards the end that my jaw dropped at. You’ll know it when you see it.
- Also: William Fichtner is in this! He’s great. This is a film with quite a bit of shoddy acting (I’m looking right into your soul, Jodie Foster), and the brief period that he was on screen was glorious. He does coldness extraordinarily well, and arguably has the best line in the film.
- Just about worth watching, but it could have been a lot more.