Lucy Movie Review!!!

Lucy can use 100% of her brain capacity but can she achieve 100% of her movie potential?? Read our review to find out!!!

So as summer draws to a close so does this years blockbuster movie offerings.  From Luc Besson, the genius that brought us Leon, the Taken series, the Transporter series, the Taxi series, Kiss of the Dragon and The Fifth Element, now comes Lucy.  Needless to say, expectations ran high but for this viewer the movie did not live up to them.

Anyone that’s seen the superior Limitless (Bradley Cooper) will be vaguely familiar with the premise.

Scarlett Johansson is Lucy, a student out in Taiwan, who finds herself double-crossed by her scumbag boyfriend and hand delivered to Korean mob boss Mr. Jang. 

Tricked into delivering a rare and valuable new synthetic drug called CPH4, Lucy soon finds herself in the middle of a drug smuggling ring.  Used as a drug mule to try and carry the new drug overseas, things take an unexpected turn when the drugs start to leak in her abdomen, bestowing her essentially with super powers.

The premise is that people normally only use 10% of their brains but this new super drug allows people to tap into the remaining 90%.

Despite being able to achieve super human brain function, Lucy seeks the advice of Morgan Freeman.  Well, it is Morgan Freeman!

The movie ultimately turns into a race against time as Lucy seeks to fulfill her potential before the bad guys can track her down.

It’s undeniably enjoyable watching Lucy do crazy things but I couldn’t help but wonder why being able to access 100% of your brain function would allow you to do some of the things that Lucy does.  A good sci-fi movie will always endeavor to tie in the premise to reality and justify things to increase viewer buy-in, even if it means using fake science.  Lucy failed in this respect, leaving me frequently scratching my head as I tried to fathom how they figured Lucy would be able to do some of the things that she does.

In this aspect, Limitless was just a much more relatable movie and ultimately more enjoyable.

Even more incomprehensible is why the bad guys would think this CPH4 drug would somehow kick off in the real world given everything that happens from just one person using it.

Performances were good all round.  Johansson was great as always, displaying the loss of humanity as she gained access to more and more of her brains ability well. 

Worthy of note was badass French cop Amr Waked and of course the inimitable Min-sik Choi of Oldboy fame, though Choi is not really given any material here that requires him to access 100% of his acting potential.

Besson exerts his usual stylistic flair which is like a breath of fresh air amongst the backdrop of the usual summer blockbusters.

However, this isn’t enough to save the movie from being surprisingly forgettable.  The film really doesn’t go anywhere and the underwhelming finale just left me thinking of all the possibilities that went unexplored.  The concept behind Lucy is great, but it’s just not executed well.

Worth checking out but if you had to pick one ‘achieving 100% brain function’ movie then Limitless is easily the superior choice.

Rating: Lucy uses 100% of her brain but achieves only 50% of her movie potential.

Bobby