I don’t know which movie the reviewer saw, but it wasn’t the one my son and I sat through last Sunday afternoon.
Damon, who despite his political lunacy, can be a decent actor when cast appropriately, seemed to be sleepwalking. Jodie Foster, who can also be a terrific actor, tried to do some kind of accent (sounded like some cross between French and Afrikaans). Her focus on the accent ruined her timing and she completely stumbles through the film.
Maybe there was some anti-open borders message, but from what I saw, there was only one message that came through in the film: Rich people bad; poor people good.
And for the record, they pretty much ignored the laws of physics.
I went with my other son to see Percy Jackson last night, and despite it being a cheesy kids movie, for my money it was much better than Elysium.
The director's an unreconstructed and proud Boer (i.e Dutch-speaking South African) who buried it in the subtext. Matt Damon is the last white guy in LA, and the place is indistinguishable, in the shambolic open-borders future, from the anarchic Mexican cesspools of today. If you read the article, Sailer points out that Blomkamp pretty much lays out his views to interviewers without much beating around the bush, but they insist on looking at his movies differently.