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Elysium

December 2, 2013
Film Reviews
6 Comments

Elysium 2 Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, Sharlto Copley, Alice Braga, Diego Luna, Wagner Moura, William Fichtner, Jose Pablo Cantillo,

Elysium: in the near-future humans are divided into the haves and have-nots; with poverty and crime rife on a polluted earth and the 1% (!!) enjoying an idyllic and disease-free lifestyle in a giant space structure. I think this is about health care in America, although can’t be sure… To cut to the chase, I don’t believe that this is in the same league as District 9, but partly because a lot of the film’s tone and aesthetics appear to lean heavily on the ‘look and feel’ of Bloomkamp’s previous film. The story is also quite similar although less of a subtle political under-current, and more of an in-yer-face affair. While it’s bigger, brighter, shinier, and louder than his previous film, Dirctric 9 takes a lot of the wind out of Elysium’s sails, as you feel like you’ve seen a lot of this before – and in the end, it just gives you with a craving for prawns.

Score: 6/10

Elysium Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, Sharlto Copley, Alice Braga, Diego Luna, Wagner Moura, William Fichtner, Jose Pablo Cantillo

Contraband

March 21, 2012
Film Reviews
3 Comments

Contraband: a struggling ex-con must secure his family’s safety by doing one final smuggling run. Being a re-make of Rekjavik-Rotterdam, Hollywood does what it does best and strips out a lot of the smaller background stories, characters, undertones, and relationships that thickened up the original plot, and raised the stakes a little more. Wahlberg‘s steady, but disappointingly typecast as the everyman, and costume-wise, could be from any previous film. This is all minor compared to Giovanni Ribisi, what the fuck is he doing!? His lines were delivered in the most ridiculous accent I’ve heard in years. The rest of the supporting cast really do keep the film propped up, although nobody’s particularly stretched. It’s well-directed, with the urgency maximised and lots of nice shots that play with focusing – it feels quite European / independent. There’s a decent gunfight in the middle (audio is immense) and in true modern heist fashion lots of loose ends are tied up in the final 15 mins. Unfortunately, New Orleans felt like an excuse for decent music, and nothing more. As expected, this is pretty much a cut-down, edges-smoothed, version of the original. It’s decent, but I’d suggest seeking out the original instead.

Score: 6.5/10