Elysium starts off all right – it’s clearly sci-fi, and futuristic.  It’s the world after we’ve basically overpopulated it and let it all fall apart – it’s unsafe, dirty, falling apart.  And then there’s Elysium, where all the super rich people took off to and escaped.  It’s this Utopia that the earth people only dream of.

So Matt Damon looks up to the sky at this Elysium ever since he is a little boy in an orphanage in Mexico.  Even though he’s been a car thief and a criminal, we can tell he’s really a good guy who just got a bad break.  He’s trying to get his act together and save money to get a golden ticket that will smuggle him into Elysium.

Of course, his plans go awry, and the earth is messed up, and it turns out Elysium isn’t that Utopian after all.  But by that time, this movie that clearly had potential to make a statement has turned into a sort of “Transformers” brawl.  And it just gets more ridiculous.  I’m surprised Jodie Foster got through her part as the villain with a straight face.