Movie Review: Lucy

When I had first seen trailers for this movie, I had hoped it would be one of those groundbreaking type of movies for women, that didn’t quite happen, but it wasn’t half bad, or half good either, really.  The story revolves around this woman who is in Taiwan and living it up.  Her so-called boyfriend of one week handcuffs a mystery case to her arm and sends her into a building to deliver it.  It doesn’t get better for the main character from there, nor the audience, really.

The story felt familiar and then I realized there was a movie with that guy from the Hangover, Bradley Cooper, with a similar premise, Limitless.  After that discovery, it kind of felt anticlimactic.  The entire movie has over the top antics and action sequences, a good summer blockbuster, but the story didn’t have much staying power.  The idea that humans only access 10% of their brain and then allowing one person to access the rest through recreational pharmaceuticals makes it less palpable. 

I wanted to enjoy the movie, but the lackluster reviews set me up and once I saw the movie, it just never drew me in or blew me away.  I want to like Scarlett Johansson, but outside of the Marvel world, this character didn’t have enough charisma to make her interesting. In a way, having the character portrayed as clinical instead of human made it ever harder to feel connected to the story or character at all.  As Lucy becomes smarter, she becomes less human, but there was so little time with “human” Lucy that it all felt very put on.

I can’t, in good faith, recommend this movie, but for $7, not $12, it might be worth seeing.  Either way I’m more excited about the Guardians movie coming out this coming weekend.