Regie:
Neill BlomkampDrehbuch:
Neill BlomkampKamera:
Trent OpalochMusik:
Ryan AmonBesetzung:
Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, William Fichtner, Alice Braga, Diego Luna, Michael Shanks, Carly Pope, Talisa Soto, Sharlto Copley, Wagner Moura, Faran Tahir (mehr)Streaming (4)
Inhalte(1)
2154. Während die privilegierte Elite auf der Raumstation 'Elysium' in extravagantem Luxus schwelgt, ist der Großteil der Menschheit auf dem überbevölkerten, devastierten Planeten Erde sich selbst überlassen. Verteidigungsministerin Delacourt sorgt gnadenlos dafür, dass keiner unerwünscht die heile Welt betritt. Der vorbestrafte Max DeCosta wagt es dennoch. Nach einem Arbeitsunfall radioaktiv verstrahlt, bleiben ihm nur fünf Tage Zeit - denn nur auf 'Elysium' gibt es medizinische Hilfe. Gemeinsam mit dem zwielichtigen Raumschiff-Schlepper Spider nimmt er Kurs auf das vermeintliche Paradies im All. (ORF)
(mehr)Kritiken (12)
Paul Schrader’s Blue Collar crossed with Paul Verhoeven’s Total Recall. Elysium has a rawer exposition than many artsy social dramas. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, out of the fire and into the shit. Work hard, die in pain. In a setting as equally shabby as that in District 9. Poverty, filth, disorder (the repressive regime makes itself known only when someone penetrates the world of the privileged). But you hope that the melodramatic flashbacks won’t dictate the tone of the narrative and that the film won’t deteriorate into an equally irritating spiritual handbook as Cloud Atlas. Fortunately, that doesn’t happen. Elysium puts up a brave fight against its nicer self – which I would like to believe was imposed by the studio – until the end; only then does the ultimate idealistic softening come. The romantic storyline unfortunately fails due to the brief time that the partners spend together and the intention was probably to make the class struggle a stronger motivation than love. The main objective and uncompromising deadlines are established with B-movie directness: the protagonist wants something and he must do this and that within X number of days at the latest in order to get it. A bonus for the Marxists is that Max’s mission is indirectly motivated by the unfair healthcare system, excessive punishments for illegal migrants and the inequality of citizens who obviously no longer care about race or nationality, but only about social class (in addition to that, an important role in the story is played by the leaking of the powerful elite’s sensitive data to the public, which can only be seen as an allusion to the Wikileaks and Snowden affairs). Given the insidious adoration of capitalism in most Hollywood blockbusters, I consider the indignation expressed by some American critics’ over the naïve propaganda of Elysium, in which the good people are truly good, the bad are seriously bad and any more ambivalence is taboo, to be shortsighted at the very least. Regardless of its ideological essence and the guilelessness with which it presents that essence, Elysium is primarily a brutal, high-octane cyberpunk dystopia with an almost horror-like atmosphere (see, for example, most of the scenes with the monstrous Copley), unpredictable development (the characters act erratically, occasionally something just simply goes wrong and at one point the star system is nicely mocked) and, unfortunately, extremely chaotic action scenes. With the exception of the extreme-slow-motion shots, which are cool thanks to the fact that Blomkamp doesn’t squander them, but I found it very difficult to tell who delivered blows to whom because of the overabundance of cuts. The variability of the direction that the narrative takes makes Elysium one the most video-game-like films of recent years alongside Battle Los Angeles and Dredd. The ending is determined, the course is marked and the specific form of the action depends on the player (who in this case is half man and half machine) and his abilities, and it thus doesn’t necessarily have to be as neatly planned out as in the case of more conventional action. Elysium surely could have provided more material for study (whether that would involve ideology or narratology), but it’s definitely still good as summer entertainment. 75%
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One of my 10 most anticipated films of the year turned out to be meh. Neill Blomkamp still is an interesting talent as director, you can feel his almost fanlike zeal for smart science fiction, but like District 9, this movie stumbles with the script, though here it’s unfortunately worse. Elysium mixes a lot of things that are great with things that are far from great, and the result is inconsistent. First of all, I didn’t like: 1) The dense, black and white left-wing discourse. For most of the time, it isn’t so loud and I would have been fine with it, but the film lost me with the naive happy ending presented with a very serious face. Anyone with half a brain, or anyone capable of deducing the consequences of those left-wing ideas would realise that this can’t work. A couple of hospital ships (even if there were a lot more than shown, say, 1000) equipped with Med-Bays will peacefully go from slum to slum to treat an overpopulated planet, and people will stand in line and wait patiently? Yeah, right. And even if we assumed that “the resources are there”, i.e. that there are enough hospital ships, the film would deserve and even lower rating due to its hyperbole of putting all the rich people in the role of assholes who oppress the poor on Earth just for the fun of it… that would be extremely manipulative by Blomkamp, and I wouldn’t be willing to accept it. 2) The holes in the script, the half-assedness and the reliance on coincidences. All the activities of the Spider gang are so weird. Where do they get the codes or the ships? Why doesn’t the defence of Elysium do anything about it and waits to shoot at them one by one when they’re approaching? Why doesn’t Elysium have a modern defence system and instead uses some deranged agent to shoot down the ships manually (!!!) from Earth’s surface??? A criminal with his notebook is able to overwrite the entire system with the right codes? After one second of looking at a mass of code, the criminal is able to figure out that he’s holding a treasure in his hand and what that treasure can do? Earth is full of poverty, disease and destroyed buildings, but from the air it appears that lights work everywhere (=electricity)? The Med-Bays can’t cure a neck injury but they can cure half a head blown by a grenade? Or he didn’t die after being shot in the head? Really?! 3) Pathos, pathos, stupid pathos. I wouldn’t mind the left-wing stuff if it wasn’t adorned with slow-motion sunny scenes from the hero’s childhood. And the wise fairy-tale about a hippopotamus and a meerkat told by a cute little girl dying of leukaemia? God, why?! :-D____ And what I did like. 1) Magnificent sci-fi set design. The amazing design of Elysium, while on earth everything looks very realistic, worn-out, dirty. The world where the story takes place is brilliantly put together. 2) Sharlto Copley’s Agent Krueger, a brilliantly portrayed lunatic. 3) Certain moments in the script. Spoiler alert! For instance, the part when Krueger decides to take control of Elysium. I believe that the film would be much better if it focused only on Delacourt’s attempt at a coup d’etat, followed by Krueger’s military putsch and treason. They should have sod from the beginning that fairy-tale of the poor bastard that saves everyone.
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(weniger)
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The classic writer's evergreen about how a promising debutant from a remote corner of our planet came to Hollywood only to be scrapped by the very next film makes me want to sing along this time. But this is Blomkamp’s own fault. I would have also tolerated the leftist agitprop about an individual rebelling against a ruthless system this time if I hadn't had to ask so many questions during the screening, especially regarding elementary logic - How does Elysium work? Why does his defense work in such a stupid way? Why is the Minister being punished for defending him? And many others. It functions mostly because action-wise it's probably the best in years, and Blomkamp delivers the shots and moments in that central cut with such certainty that other directors would sell their mothers and their souls for it. Go back to the slums, Neill. And take those metamorphosis ideas with you. One day you will be a worthy successor to James Cameron.
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Neill Blomkamp is certainly one of the most prominent characters in world cinema. Above all, he’s definitely an idol for sci-fi maniacs, because what he did with aliens in the middle of Joburg this time shook me in several ways, and I haven’t really come around from that to this day. I got really happy when I learned that Neill was making another sci-fi movie, this time with Hollywood actors, which promised a bigger budget and possibly a more epic story. In the end, I was hoping that all those Hollywood weirdoes and big-wigs wouldn’t make it into a political agitation, dictating what Neill could and couldn’t do in a good old American blockbuster. In the end, I was pleasantly surprised. It wasn’t bad but it wasn’t quite perfect either, just like District 9. Maybe because it was pretty similar. The worst thing for me was the camerawork. I didn’t mind it as much in District 9 – it was a low budget movie with a unique idea, done in a distinctive half-documentary style, at least in the first half. But Elysium is a blockbuster, and in that case I expect that all these space-ships, monsters and modern machines will be well-visible. And not that I would look at it all as if I were sitting in a carriage pulled by a horse through some bumpy path somewhere in the mountains. That was quite a problem for me. However, the director of photography Trent Opaloch collaborates with Neil on a long-term basis, so I don’t expect Neil’s films to change much in the foreseeable future. On the positive side, we get to see Sharlto Copley, who delivers an almost demonic performance.
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Ein sozialistischer Blockbuster? Warum denn nicht. Es ist schade, dass die im Grunde genommen einzige Abweichung vom klassischen Hollywood darin besteht, dass alles exakt umgekehrt funktioniert. Diejenigen, welche den Status Quo schützen, sind widerlich, wohingegen diejenigen, die im Dreck und Demütigung roppen, nette und engagierte Menschen sind. Damon exzelliert nicht gerade als Jesus aus der Peripherie, jedoch niemand wollte von ihm, dass er es tut. Ein von Strahlung zefressener und mit rostigen Messern durchspickter Kerl sieht nullachtfünfzehnmäßig aus, anti-heroisch aus und setzt sich die meiste Zeit über für sich selbst ein, obwohl er am Ende versteht, wie der Hase läuft. Hiermit endet das Märchen dann auch schön zu meiner Zufriedenheit. Außerdem ist es schade, dass der Unterschied zwischen Bay und Blomkamp überwiegend in der Tatsache besteht, dass hier Jungs wie in brasilianischen Sozialdramen überspitzt schauspielern und bei einigen Negativcharakteren offensichtliche ein politischer Unterton mitschwingt (Jodie Foster hat da Maggie in der Tat unter zu viel Druck hereingepresst). Im Grunde genommen ist somit Elysium eigentlich ziemlich langweilig, jedoch (meines Erachtens) sympathisch "wahrheitsliebend". Das Problem besteht meiner Meinung nach darin, worin viele eine ausgezeichnete Regie sehen. Sie sehen hierin ein großartiges Art- / Sounddesign sowie einige teilweise schöne Aufnahmen, jedoch es gibt da auch eine außergewöhnlich weite Stilpalette zu sehen. Etwas überpsitzt formuliert ist es wie eine Mischung aus City of God, dem Elite Squad – Im Sumpf der Korruption und dem, was ich mit "Paul Greengrass imitiert Paul W.S. Anderson" bezeichnen würde. Einige Elemente werden hier uneinheitlich verwendet (Videospielaufnahme "über die Schulter", mitsamt des begleitenden Unschärfeeffekts). Außerdem wirken die konstanten Sprünge zwischen verschiedenen Stilen im Gegensatz zum District 9 unbeholfen. Die kinetische Spielchen und hackende Schnitte führen manchmal zu Unordnung. Mir fällt ein, dass das, was Blomkamp in seinem ersten Roman so effizient wie möglich hat lösen müssen, hier nur allzu sehr "aufegedunsen“ wird. Leider verliert Elysium hierdurch jedoch die verinheitlichende Atmosphäre. Paradoxerweise macht der Film umso mehr Spaß, je näher er dem Ende kommt, weil ich die Diskrepanz haben auffangen können. Wie bei In Time – Deine Zeit läuft ab: sympathisch, aber gar nicht zu Ende gezogen. P.S. Copley spielt in diesem Film zwei Ligen höher als die anderen ... der Soziopath des Jahrhunderts. [70%]
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The shaky (like really!) camera and crazy (like really!) editing hand in hand kills all action in this movie; and the stupidly and superficially forced social conscience would also have killed the action... If there were any. Simply awful. And if that wasn’t enough, it seems that half of the movie is missing. And of course it’s the half where Neill “I like to make ‘too many cooks’-style movies" Blomkamp devoted to the story, characters, elementary inner logic and the links between the (unlinked) scenes.
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Once I got through District 9, I had hoped it was just an unfortunate accident. However, Elysium confirmed to me that I don't understand Neill Blomkamp and it would be best if we went our separate ways. Never mind that this skeleton of an unstoppable machine suits Matt Damon perfectly with its camera shaking and flying around in the action scenes, while the story stumbles into plotholes despite its simple premise. Not to mention that practically all of the supporting characters are played strangely, to say the least. Jodie Foster, who doesn't fit her role, is an unpleasant surprise, William Fichtner disappoints in a way that is merely dull, but Sharlto Copley is actually annoying. His unintelligible hissing and desperately overplayed slickness are truly maddening. But I could forgive all of that if the screenplay had met me halfway and tried to play a different note in the finale than a humane and nostalgically romantic one. The social appeal was already starting to annoy me in the middle of District 9, so that was just predictable, while the sentimental storyline annoyed me because Max's relationship with Frey is nothing more than a distant memory that would never stand a chance in this vision of the future. And when emotions, characters, and actions don't work on the path to freedom, it makes for a rather sad ending. Elysium ultimately ends up being a giant nothing that tries so hard to aim high, but from the beginning, has no way up.
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I considered District 9 a revelation in the field of dying sci-fi, and Blomkamp as a herald of a better future for the genre. Not that I didn't find any weaknesses in that movie, but it falls into the category of likable where you tend to overlook the flaws. Elysium was supposed to confirm Blomkamp's position as a promising talent and genre specialist. But alas. Elysium is a dull B-movie in terms of content, where the attempts at an intellectual superstructure come across as untrustworthy. The characters are flat, the story shallow, and the world Blomkamp created is naive and dysfunctional. I felt sorry for the actors, especially Jodie Foster. She belongs in A productions, but in movies of this kind, it feels inappropriate. For people who follow these types of productions, the film may be average, but I really expected more. A lot more. And I was warned about it by a number of negative comments. Overall impression: 25%.
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A story comparable with the picture book about the hippo that Damon quotes from in the movie, but the way they did it! A flawless rendition of the future that meets my demands. Perfect atmosphere and awesome action which sometimes stops short of the proverbial icing on the cake (which is a shame). The exosuit fight at the end is one of the best action sci-fi (hand-to-hand) fights I’ve ever seen. Blomkamp has gone a bit soft since last time and even though most of the characters behave like swines, they don’t mean it badly, which is a drawback compared to D9. The main powerhouse of the picture is the fantastic Sharlto Copley as Kruger, a fanatical psychopath (and my favorite character) whose alternative would probably have made for the best ending. Max, where are you?!
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Blomkamp, Kosinski, Snyder, etc. are all cut from the same cloth. Visually, they are very original, with an incredible sense of innovation and aesthetic creativity, usually producing simpler, even skeletal films. It's not always necessarily bad, but Elysium was in many ways very clichéd and unnecessarily simplistic. Of course, there is a political subtext with references to this or that regime, and a twisted rhetoric of "the poor, dirty and smelly" being the good guys and the "rich, successful, and thriving" being the bad guys. No matter how you look at it, we have a predictable plot with a clear script, several thrilling action scenes, and unbelievably polished and over-the-top shots that you'll want to see again and again. It's an unprecedented mix of futuristic sci-fi with brutally raw action and blurry imagery, that continues the trademark of District 9, just with a slightly bigger budget, so everything is smoother and more refined. Finally, we can't forget the show-off objects like the Versace lounge chair or the private Bugatti jet. The director is a big fan of image, and unfortunately, this film is purely "image-driven". Nevertheless, it is incredibly captivating filmmaking.
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"Aktivieren Sie Kruger!“ Nach Lone Ranger habe ich einen nächsten neuen Film gesehen, der mich begeistert hat. Stänkerer können einwenden, dass Elysium keine besonders originelle Handlung hat, und sie werden wahrscheinlich Recht haben. Sie können eigentlich alles Mögliche kritisieren und sie werden es bestimmt auch tun. Das ist aber offenbar so eine Laune. Ich habe mich amüsiert und die Spannung sowie die Überraschungen genossen. Von den Actionszenen gibt es genau die richtige Menge, sodass sie nicht langweilig werden. Die dreckige Zukunft sieht wieder sehr glaubhaft aus… Und der Söldner Kruger, gespielt von Sharlto Copley, muss in die Filmgeschichte eingehen!
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Such high hopes, and nothing coming out of it. Blomkamp is excellent at his craft, there's no doubt about that, but if he continues to choose themes from the "Pretty Silly Blonde" category, it will all come down to his memorable debut. Elysium looks good, has an interesting cast and the basic premise is not worthless, but something so clichéd and ridiculously serious cannot even be considered the work of an A-list filmmaker. It's still good entertainment, but the ambitions of the film were somewhere else – and that's the main problem. 50%
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