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Elysium - grade/review and spoilers - also controversy

Solid follow up to District 9. I'd say that District 9 had a more involving story, but Elysium was a damn good action movie with impeccable visuals. Not a single thing looked fake. The space station, the barrio, the space ships... it all looked amazingly realistic. How does he manage it?! And why do all other movies look so CGI-y?
 
^Blomkamp started his carer as a VFX artist and later supervisor on TV commercials. He comes from a background of knowing what artists need to do the best work possible, and his movies reflect that.
 
Mr Light said:
Solid follow up to District 9. I'd say that District 9 had a more involving story, but Elysium was a damn good action movie with impeccable visuals. Not a single thing looked fake. The space station, the barrio, the space ships... it all looked amazingly realistic. How does he manage it?! And why do all other movies look so CGI-y?
Click to expand...

I think the era of the obvious CGI is pretty much over. STID's FX even with complex cities and orbital FX were flawless. Elysium looked just about as good as anything I've seen.
 
I still see crappy CGI all the time. In fact, it feels like CGI hasn't really advanced much in the past ten years. It still seems to be at the Revenge of the Sith level, with a few notable exceptions.

The worst offenders are horror movies with their incredibly fake CGI blood and bullet hits.
 
The CGI did look fantastic and realistic. Maybe Blomkamp knows how to present things in such a way that flaws or obvious CGI can be hidden if needed. He seems to use a lot of quick shots with a lot of motion to hide potential flaws as well as natural-looking shots with modest CGI instead of sweeping shots with heavy CGI that can end up looking like you're trying to showcase the CGI. A lot of the obvious looking stuff in movies and shows come from attempting CGI when it shouldn't be shown.
 
The long slow shots of Elysium in particular were absolutely break taking. They looked totally real. I can only assume he shot nice cities then comped them into a space station frame, but even the space station walls look absolutely real with depth and density. Wow.
 
I just got back from the theater. Here are some thoughts:

I'm afraid I have to agree with the general consensus that Elysium is a bit of a disappointment when compared to Blomkamp's superb debut, District 9. It starts out promisingly, but has some definite story problems towards the end, such as unclear villain motivations and an overly simplistic, somewhat unsatisfying ending.

However, there's still plenty to like about the movie. Matt Damon is great as the protagonist and his story arc works well, which keeps the movie afloat for most of its running time. And then there are the visuals, which are nothing short of exceptional. I would even go so far as to call Elysium one of the most visually impressive sci-fi movies of all time, not just in the quality of its CGI, but in its design and attention to detail. Elysium's depiction of future society comes close to the impeccable world building of Blade Runner (which is actually not that surprising, since both movies have the same production designer, Syd Mead).

I do wish the final act worked better, but I still had a great time with it as an interesting original sci-fi action movie, and am excited for what Blomkamp comes up with next.

7/10
 
I remember the scenes on that bridge at the end... I knew it had to be green screen with the gorgeous backdrop, but it absolutely looked 100% real. Amazing.
 
I have not seen this film yet, but when I was in the theater today (for a different film), I saw a cool Elysium poster which showed a modern cityscape but with thousands of ramshackle dwellings haphazardly attached to the sides of major skyscrapers. Is there a shot like this in the film?
 
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