Movie review: Elysium (2013)- Kill yourself to prove you’re not a racist

Although the film's story is set in 2154, Blomkamp has stated that it is a comment on the contemporary human condition. "Everybody wants to ask me lately about my predictions for the future," the director has said, "No, no, no. This isn't science fiction. This is today. This is now."

****Spoilers in review****

It took me a while, but I got there in the end and finally worked out that this movie wasn’t actually about the new world order but about liberal America’s attitudes towards immigration. To be more precise, it was about the Texas-Mexico border.

Matt Damon's liberal hero protecting poor innocent Mexicans

I was a bit slow on this one, but the clues were there all along. Why were all of the poor victims speaking Spanish? Why was Matt Damon the only white guy in the movie who wasn’t a villain? Why was the main villain speaking with a South African accent? Why was Elysium a big ‘lone star’ in space?

Yeah, I know I’m slow. So this was about Mexican people wanting to get citizenship in the United States, and how it’s really unfair and that the borders should be wide open so everybody can jump on the socialist bandwagon and into the loving arms of big brother government.

Here’s a spoiler alert. At the end of the movie all of the evil white people die, the Spanish speaking heroes are all made legal citizens of Elysium, and that’s it, end credits. Just how big is this Elysium then? Is there going to be room for everyone up there on that space station? How is this going to work resources wise? I guess we’ll never know, because the happy ending is just legalising everybody, and that’s paradise I guess. Big cheer for all of the heroic Spanish-speaking people, all the whites are dead, and everything is perfect now.

Errr, what? You don’t like that?  Sorry, but that’s the movie you’re getting here. Don’t you realise that we need to open our borders to all of the third world starving millions and only then will world peace and harmony be achieved. If you disagree, then you are racist.

Oh, this is a movie review isn’t it? So, the acting and what-not. The main racist South African villain was charismaticaly evil. Matt Damon did what he could with a largely unbelievable character, and Jodie Foster was mostly on autopilot playing a two dimensional evil politician. The plot had some nice twists, the special effects were great and there was a good fight scene at the end and a pretty emotional scene where the white man officially killed himself for the betterment of the human race.

Evil white racists

Matt Damon's character was self centred and unlikeable throughout most of the movie, but he was white, and I’m guess they’re trying to make a point here. Damon was nice to his Spanish mate, but his job was building brutal police robots, and when given the chance to act like a decent human being and help the little girl of the supposed love of his life he couldn’t be bothered and made a run for it instead. The movie really lost me at that point as I started to dislike the Matt Damon character, and he was at the centre of everthing that was happening. His selfish character didn’t make sense to me, and he came across as more of a vehicle for the plot than anything resembled a real human being.

What were they doing here? Oh yeah, I get it. White people are sociopathic racists who only care about themselves, so even though Damon was the main protagonist he couldn’t be portrayed as a good man until the end of the movie when he proved he wasn’t a racist by killing himself for the betterment of the Mexican people. Hey, that’s the white liberal dream, right? Killing yourself to prove you are not a racist. Great message for a movie that one. My only question is what the Hell did Matt Damon think he was doing here? Oh yeah, he’s a self-hating feminist liberal type isn’t he? I can just see him chuckling it up with Bill Maher and Jon Stewart now as he plays a game of who’s the most politically correct sap in town. What a bunch of twits.

Well, I hope you are feeling very happy with yourself now Matt. Extra liberal brownie points for you my son. Back to the mansion eh, just like all of the other evil white guys who live in luxury. You do realise that you’re living in Elysium right now, don’t you Matt? Just like me actually. I live in Elysium as well. All of us white people are loaded didn’t you know?  Now I’ve finished this review I’m going to kick back in my huge mansion, take a swim in my big outdoor swimming pool, and then do random racist things before I sign off for the day in my big luxury bedroom with my blonde haired supermodel girlfriend. I tell you what, it’s great being a rich white guy, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. They’ll never stop us, never I tell ya, ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Rating: 4/10