Elysium

Ever since he gained the strongest point of recognition with "Good Will Hunting," Matt Damon has made it as one of Hollywood's top actors. Since then films like "Dogma," "Ocean's Eleven," "True Grit," "The Departed," and "The Bourne Trilogy" have all shown us how strong an actor he can be. And that leads us to his newest film, "Elysium."

In the year 2154, Max Da Costa is among many people that are stuck on Earth, while the richest people in the world live paradise on Elysium, a country sized space station that allows humans to live life in the strongest luxary. When Max is exposed to radiation, he is then equipped with an exoskeleton, and now it's up to him to override Elysium and save his friends and the many people of Earth. The film does have many interesting ideas going, and it also manages to keep that flow going fairly well with exciting things coming in certain directions.

Matt Damon as Max manages to do well in the role, and you can see the conflict really come into play after his accident. The only problem I had was his character wasn't quite developed enough for me to have that much sympathy for him, which does tend to bring the film down a bit. Jodie Foster plays the head of Elysium, and honestly...she felt pretty unnecessary. She wasn't bad, I'm just saying if you took her out of the film, it wouldn't have changed much at all. William Fichtner plays Da Costa's boss, John Carlyle, and he does fairly decent, but not much is done with this character as I was expecting. I would have loved to see more happen with him. Sharlto Copley plays the villain, Kruger, and he's very entertaining to watch in this movie. He's crooked, he's determined, and has great personality. He manages to come back from death after being hit by a grenade, showing how this character can be a force reckoned with. However, his character seems pretty one dimensional, as all his character's nothing more than a hitman.

The action scenes and special effects are pretty decent, but the shaky came does get annoying, AS ALWAYS. The film was directed by Neil Blomkamp, the man behind "District 9;" people actually thought that this movie was supposed to be a sequel to that, but there are so many heavy differences that I don't know why people would think that. That's like saying the "Hellboy" movies are a continuation to "Pan's Labyrinth," just because of the director and look of the film.

Overall, "Elysium" was...okay at best. If you thought that "D9" was overrated and you're curious about this film...I'd say skip it, it's pretty much the same level.

Rating: 6/10