Elysium Movie Review

If Neill Blomkamp isn’t careful, he’s going to be forever remembered as a writer-director of allegorical science fiction. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing, but remember M. Night Shyamalan survived for a handful of films being known for doing something very specific and then became so hamstrung by a sense of his own greatness that his films became, one after another, more absurd and awful than the last. If District 9 was Blomkamp’s take on apartheid South Africa and immigration, Elysium is not just about a guy trying to illegally enter a forbidden and exclusive paradise to cure himself of fatal radiation exposure. Working on a larger scale and with a bigger budget, Blomkamp hasn’t lost sight of what makes a good movie work: namely good characters and story. He’s also made another technically sound piece of entertainment that puts most of the other big releases to shame. A coherently edited and structured movie? Who greenlit this thing? I’m almost shocked this sort of thing is allowed to pass muster.

The A-Team Movie Review

The writers, producers and directors responsible for continuing to bring the depths of 80s action TV to the big screen have flubbed the job so badly I would almost look forward with great relief to a feature adaptation of “Charles in Charge.” G.I. Joe and Transformers (the sequel in particular) are so famously awful I almost feel shame at even admitting they exist and that I’ve seen them. The latest victim of getting the big screen treatment is The A-Team, with a clunker of a screenplay by Joe Carnahan, Brian Bloom and Skip Woods, who was responsible for the cinematic treasures Swordfish and Wolverine.