Neill Blomkamp's Elysium

That's something that was bugging me throughout the movie. It's like, why do they even care about Elysium, the place? All they want are the magical medical machines. So why aren't the evil businesses selling these machines? Why aren't the hacker revolutionaries trying to steal these machines? Where are they made? Why aren't we raiding the medical machine factory? Why didn't the entire planet pool all their money together to buy one of those machines and share it? I mean, it only takes 10 second to cure anything so having just one would be pretty awesome.

The only thing that makes even the slightest bit of sense is that maybe the machines are so ridiculously expensive to operate that owning one isn't even helpful without the magical Elysium power grid, but then the ending throws dozens of them onto a space ambulance. So my guess is that we're not supposed to think about this much and it's just a MacGuffin.

edited 19th Aug '13 2:24:31 AM by Clarste

My own, rather cynical, guess is that the writer thinks that medicine in the real world is free and magical and only kept away from the needy masses of the world by evil people being arbitrarily evil. As opposed to, you know, being often *extremely* expensive, and complicated, and dependent on a vast infrastructure that is not transferable to the third world.

Maybe the stockpiled medbays were supposed for emergencies. The film doesn't say anything how much they cost.

Struggle for power. It's something my brother had come up with, and he didn't even see the film. And really, it makes so much sense.

Elysium is a domain where the commoners couldn't and / or shouldn't go, according to those who live there. It's a sanctuary, and a priviledge to be there. The reason they keep the machines away from the people on Earth is to keep the power of healing to themselves, let the people of Earth die out.

And really, what use is there to give them a device? It wouldn't benefit anybody on Elysium. Plus, you can keep the paychecks of these citizens low enough, since any accident on or off the job can just be met with a corporate fuck you, and thank you for your being dead.

The problem isn't that the medbays being kept from the populace are kept just to be evil. The problem is that this practice is supposed to be allegory to the current lack of high end medicine availability in the third world even though there are perfectly understandable and non-evil reasons that the high end medicine isn't making it to the third world. The allegory falls apart and the whole thing becomes a broken Space Whale Aesop.

Not to mention the fact that letting all the people on Earth die is bad for the elites of Elysium, as they are using the Earthers for labor. Even if they are evil, they should be doing limited, controlled sharing of their technology as a carrot to produce a society of capots to control the rest of the populace. That way, 99% percent of the work can be done by their own most eager slaves, who are totally willing to sell their own freedom in exchange for comfort and power over the rest.

The magical space medicine beds aren't just an allegory for the lack of high-tech medicine in the third world; they represent all the resource disparity. We produce more than enough food for everyone in the world, and yet millions go to bed hungry every night. 40% of the world's population don't have access to flushing toilets.

And in real life, there are *reasons* for those disparities, unlike with Magic Miracle Beds. For instance, yes, enough food is produced to feed everyone in the world. However, if you just give it away:

1. The farmers need to actually be paid, seeing as they have their own livelihood to attend to

2. Free food given to third world starving means that those who are producing food *in the third world* are driven out of business, as they can't compete with free

Both of which are tangential, as with very few exceptions, *the third world could produce enough food to feed itself*. The problem isn't "evil people". . . or rather, it is. Only those evil people are the corrupt leadership and warlords in the third world, who make it impossible for the necessary infrastructure and stability to develop.

Elysium's Earth is overpopulated. Letting expendable worker die rather than keeping them alive and pay for it is logical. And they don't need to share technology to enforce their order, they already have security robots and people like Max's foreman for this job.

Which begs questions of its own: If they don't actually need human subjects on Earth because of their robots, why are they bothering with Earth humans at all? Just have your robots do all the work, and ignore or kill off any humans nearby to places you care about.

The core problem is that the setting doesn't hold together. There are parts that pretty much only work if they are cackling evil, and other parts that only work if they *aren't* cackling evil. Which is why I put my money on "the writer is clueless about actual economics, and is basing the logic of their setting on misconceived dogma."

1.Human workers seem to be cheaper and require less investments than robots.

2.The/Most people of Elysium are against killing other humans, unless they have no other choice.

edited 25th Aug '13 12:04:51 PM by GrandPrincePaulII

Also, robots require maintenance. No robot or machine is advanced enough to do this shit on its own, let alone build something to maintain itself, let alone build something to maintain that which maintains itself.

Which is all well and good. . . but it establishes that the people on Elysium *aren't* all mustache-evil. At which point it begs the question why *nobody* up in Elysium is engaging in humanitarian activity, or even outright white man's burden forced recivilizing.

Was the villainous Elysium woman meant to look like Julia Gillard?

Probably not, but I'm glad I'm not the only person who noticed. I saw it earlier today. I thought it was pretty good- see here for more detail.

Not as good as District 9, but still good.

I was pleased to see that Neill Blomkamp continues to equate social commentary with people exploding like balloons.

Nice review, don't quite agree with it. I thought it wasn't bad, but it could have been better. I thought some aspects didn't make a whole lot of sense.

As for the Julia Gillard lookalike, it got me thinking: although the obvious parable is Hispanic immigration into the United States, an even more apt parallel is Asian immigration into Australia, especially given the recent announcement by the opposition of their intention to put the military in charge of anti-immigration measures if elected.

edited 27th Aug '13 1:09:43 PM by Achaemenid

I'm watching this right now, probably against my better judgement. Damon is surprisingly good so far.

I think I get what they're trying to do with having the citizens of Elysium speak French, but that doesn't mean it isn't a little silly.

Oh god, Damon's irradiation screams...

Why haven't more people talked about Fitchner's performance? He's much worse than Jodie Foster so far, IMO.

First the little girl shrieks, now the projectile vomiting. This whole lethal radiation thing is a lot funnier than it's supposed to be. And now it's sad again.

"Bring out the bonesaw." "BONESAW IS READY!!!!" They oughta make a Rifftrax for this movie just so they can do that joke.

And here comes the blood. Yay.

Kruger sounds like...I don't know. The best I can come up with is Mr. Burns doing a cockney accent after taking an ounce or two of helium. Well, they said they were going for something distinctive.

When Damon called out Frey's name at one point, it sounded like he was saying "Brains." Stop with the unintentional comedy, movie!

"Keep your fuckin' eyes closed!" I'm compelled to laugh at this guy and slowly back away from him at the same time.

So you've always wanted a wafe? I am not familiar with this thing you call wafe. Is that like future shawarma or something?

So putting his face back together will make him even more crazy? Is that even possible?

...Apparently it is. Don't look so surprised, lady. You're the one who went and mouthed off to Evil Murdock. Who is ever so fetching without a shirt, might I add.

Is anyone else suspecting that the flesh wound line might have been a Throw It In!? He looked a bit too happy while saying it.

In the future, with all its amazing technology, we shall have cherry blossom factories. -Slow Clap-

Okay, now it sounds like he's just spouting gibberish at Damon.

And he tops it all off with an Evil Laugh. Well played, good sir. Your character was the most interesting out of all these weirdos and shall be missed greatly. -plays Taps-

STOP FLASHBACKING! Oh, wait, it wasn't a flashback. Ironic how I finally snap at the flashbacks when there isn't a flashback.

Thanks, Spider. We had no idea that there's no coming back from death.

Yay, a flashback to bitch at! Tell us what he said when they were kids EARLIER!

Best. Famous Last Words. Ever. I think.

So that was that. One of the better movies I've seen this summer. Not too gory for me, amazingly.

edited 27th Aug '13 10:42:17 PM by Mort08

The gore in the film was Fist Of The North Star worthy.

If a literal rat suddenly talked with an English accent, it would sound like Kruger.

Some of them probably are? How many people do you know who spend a significant amount of time and/or money helping people in the third world? We don't see how some people sponsor orphans in the slum or whatever because it's irrelevant to the story.

Yeah. The film suffered a bit by presenting the overarching conflict/issue as a bit too black and white.

Just saw this. It was okay, and the CGI and acting were decent (Jodie Foster makes a surprisingly good villain, until her abrupt exit). But I feel they could have done a lot more with the premise, and I didn't like the shaky-cam stuff during the action scenes.