In the year 2154, Earth has become
polluted and overpopulated causing the richest inhabitants to vacate to a space
station that orbits the planet called Elysium.
Up on the celestial utopia there is no crime as well as no illness as
medic stations diagnose and cure all afflictions and diseases, which has left
the poor and the destitute of Earth to try and launch (mostly) suicide missions
in order to try and access the medical facilities.
The plot of the film follows Max (Matt
Damon), a factory worker living in 22nd century Los Angeles who has
dreamed of living on Elysium ever since he lived in an orphanage as a
child. As long as his own dreams, he
also made a childhood promise to his friend Frey (Alice Braga) that he would take
her there too. At the factory one day,
Max suffers an accident that has near fatal consequences, which forces him to
rekindle his previous life of crime in order to get up to the space station and
get cured. There is plenty more going on
but as with any sci-fi, there are plot-spoilers aplenty to navigate. The only other thing worth mentioning is that
the defense secretary of Elysium is the Machiavellian Delacourt (Jodie Foster),
who values the protection of the utopia over all else…
