Lucy (2014)

[RyanSz 3140]

Okay let me start by saying fuck the talks about having an episode on Limitless, because this movie is 10 times as batshit insane. From using Oliver Stone-style cuts to random things like natural disasters and animals fucking to there being almost ZERO plot, this movie would be perfect for the show. I also don't know what they told Scarlet Johansen to do in order to prep for the role, but she comes off has having a mental disorder after ingesting the drug with her role in Her showing more emotional range.

 

What's funnier is the fact this movie is sold on the idea of a person having access to 100% of their brain, but in reality humans DO use 100% of their brain, just not all at the same time. I assume if a person did use 100% of their brain all at once it would look something like this.

 

[seanotron 2307]

It's Luc Besson, man. His movies are gorgeous visual feasts where plot is usually on the bottom of the to-do list.

[RyanSz 3140]

See I would agree with that, but the majority of his directed films do have a strong plot or at least a cohesive narrative that the audience can follow: Leon, Fifth Element, The Messenger, the Arthur series, and hell even the Family had a plot. This was an attempt at pseudo-science mixed with pretty visuals at times. It almost looked like Morgan Freeman at times was going in his head "fuck didn't I already make Transcendence?"

[seanotron 2307]

I do agree Hollywood needs to stop already with the stupid 'We only use 10% of our brains!' garbage. But I also don't think Besson is selling this as realistic in any way, shape or form.

[RyanSz 3140]

Oh I would have thought so too from the trailers, but there is at least 5-10 minutes of Morgan Freeman giving a seminar on the science of evolution of the brain and what theoretical things a person can do with that power. It's sort of like how Revolver. which Besson wrote and produced, that used psychology and Kabbalah as a way to try and create a gangster story that went nowhere, but the themes were so heavy handed it was absurd.

 

It's like he gets an idea in his head for a topic and decides to write a fun popcorn flick, but he doesn't know where to stop before it becomes an attempt at coming off as realistic. I mean there was no way people would take Fifth Element as realistic and it seems like this is what he was going for with this, but he went over that tipping point in a big way.

[Snake 165]

 

What's funnier is the fact this movie is sold on the idea of a person having access to 100% of their brain, but in reality humans DO use 100% of their brain, just not all at the same time. I assume if a person did use 100% of their brain all at once it would look something like this.

 

 

 

Sort of like that, but it was more along the lines of the people who did the original research in like 1890 or so just didn't have the equipment to accurately measure brain waves and only picked up like 10% of them, then people ran with that forever.

 

The best part of them using this as the basis of their movie is that it is the main tagline in all the ads and I hear it like 20 times a day, but I don't have cable or listen to the radio. Somehow, the ad is just everywhere.

[Lando 2019]

I haven't seen this yet, but wasn't quite sure what to make of it from the commercials. On the one hand I usually enjoy Luc Besson action movies, even if the stories aren't fully formed there is usually some visually stunning action. Plus I have really enjoyed Min-sik Choi in everything that I have seen him in, so I was happy to see him making an English debut. However, I have to agree that the "100% of the brain" thing is just old and cliched. There are so many other ways that they could have phrased the idea without invoking this dated idea.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace 3138]

The "having access to more of her brain gives her superpowers" thing reminds me of the movie "Doom" and how all these people were turned into monsters because they had an extra chromosome that made them all powerful and stuff. In real life though, an extra chromosome means that you probably have Down Syndrome, which would have made for an infinitely more entertaining movie.

[Lando 2019]

I could explain the Doom thing such that it makes a little more sense, but that would probably be taking your joke literally (and not in the Jason sense of literally)

[RyanSz 3140]

Unfortunately Choi doesn't speak a word of English in the movie if I remember right. The visuals are pretty good for when Lucy is seeing the cells and electrons of everything, but that's about it. The ending is literally out of this world and reminds me of the South Park episode where Kyle starts reading quantum physics books because he felt like nothing mattered in life. Also there are completely absurd things in the movie like when an entire squad of French police show up to a building to protect Lucy and Morgan Freeman, but when they pull up to the building they are parking literally 20 feet from Asian gangsters who are unloading automatic weapons and a fucking bazooka from their cars, and the cops run by them without batting an eye.

[sillstaw 414]

You have to hand it to the filmmakers. They must be doing something right if they came up with a premise so stupid that practically everyone on the Internet complained about its unrealistic logline, and it still made over $40 million on opening weekend. That said, I would have loved it if the ending had somebody saying something like, "No, everyone uses 100% of their brain. The magic was inside Lucy all along!"

[RyanSz 3140]

Yeah I got sold on it being a more action-y Limitless as was shown in the trailer, but basically all of that shit happens in the first 20 mins and then we get the existential bullshit that makes up the remaining 70 minutes.

[IMAHUGEHDTGMFAN 1837]

That said, I would have loved it if the ending had somebody saying something like, "No, everyone uses 100% of their brain. The magic was inside Lucy all along!"

 

*SPOILERS for "Lucy" Warning*

 

I love LOVE Scarlett Johansson and I had high hopes for this movie but the trailer kinda spoiled the overall experience for me ( not plotwise but more in the sense that I knew what action piece / montage was coming next because I've seen the trailer :C ) Also I personally think that Scarlett Johansson's portrayal of Lucy, after she begins to gain brain power / knowledge and lose her humanity, was not as good or as engaging as the work she did in "Under The Skin" ( Many Thanks you Paul Scheer for that recomendation ) where she carried that whole movie and I truly felt connected to the things that happened to her character.

 

In "Lucy" I totally loved her helplessness and vulnerability in the first few scenes in the movie but as much as I wanted to really care for her, I didn't by the end of the film... It's weird because we are talking about Luc Besson the guy responsable for Leeloo ( She has a MultiPass to my heart <3 )

 

 

As for the ending... Personally I would have ended the movie ( maybe with a Morgan Freeman monologue ) right after Lucy touches the monkey man with her index finger like the "The Creation of Adam" painting and then shown how much faster mankind could create / discover things while using 100 % of their brains potential ( So to the audience it seems that Lucy traveled through time to share all of her knowledge before the discovery of fire and bringing the whole "Lucy was the name of the first female human" back full circle and also mindblowing EVERYONE! ) or made the Chinease drug dealer shoot her in the head at 99 % and then explain that humanity's true potential will never be reached as long as violence and ignorance rule our lives ( this also could be done via a Morgan Monologue )

 

But NOOOOOOOO... they went with the Transcendence ending,,, :S

 

 

Yes... the gang will have a field day if they pick "Lucy"

[Jamie Power 224]

This film was quite insane. Also, I couldn't stop thinking about Breaking Bad every time that blue drug was onscreen, which was distracting.

[Jamie Power 224]

I enjoyed the lecture scene quite a lot, due to certain audience reactions and questions posed to Morgan Freeman. Morgan Freeman's reaction when asked what might might happen if someone unlocked 100% of their brain capacity was hilarious. All his research is based on percentages of brain capacity, yet he reacts as if he's never heard anyone use the phrase '100%' before. As if he just decided to always limit his speculations to about 40%.

[JeffreyHeyman 0]

This movie was so terrible. It made no sense. Plus it had random cuts of animals having sex. This would be a perfect movie for HDTGM.

[sillstaw 414]

Amazingly, there are reports that a sequel is in development. I mean, never mind how the ending seems to make a sequel impossible; how do you escalate the premise? "She's using 245% of her brain! What will happen when she hits 1,000%?"

[ElieB 238]

USB stick of destiny!!! "Your usb drive of destiny is currently at 10% capacity... 20% capacity... 40%..."

 

Or would it go in reverse? Going down like a precious resource, infinite wisdom.

[seanotron 2307]

I finally saw this and I cannot lie - I LOVED IT. Yes, it is stupid. But enjoyably so.

[taylor anne photo 11311]

I have to agree with Maximiliano. I love Scarlett sooo much and her portrayal of Lucy in the first half of the film was brilliant. But as she gained more and more knowledge she just became boring and flat.

 

I think my problem with this film was that they never really set any rules up (at least in Limitless there were rules) and the more power she had the crazier things got. Yes there was the rule that once she reached 100% shit would hit the fan but it ended up not and nothing basically happens. But every time something is close to happening then she just magically waves her hands and everything is bueno again as she goes on her journey to Morgan Freeman. That's not really that fun to watch after the umpteenth time.

 

The visual effects were nice to look but I was still let down.

[jimkiler 84]

I finally saw this and I cannot lie - I LOVED IT. Yes, it is stupid. But enjoyably so.

 

Agreed, not a perfect movie, e.g. she lets the drug dealer live in order to further the plot of his attempt to kill her for the finale. But it was fun.

 

I never could decide was the ending supposed to mean she became one with God or she became a God?

[AmandaSelzman 2]

HBO just added the movie Lucy (2014) starring Scarlett Johansson and Morgan Freeman. My boyfriend thought it would be a fun movie for us to watch but when we finished I literally thought how the hell did this get made?!?!

 

This movie has:

- terrible CGI

- Scarlett Johansson's face melting off

- A protagonist no one cares about

- Morgan Freeman's voice

- Scarlett Johansson calling her mom to tell her she remembers the taste of her breast milk

- An Avatar tree

- Blue fancy cocaine

- Scarlett Johansson traveling through time on an office chair

- Some guy in a cowboy hat

- Black goo from Scarlett Johansson's fingertips

- and MORE

 

Basically everything you've always AND never wanted from a Scarlett Johansson/Morgan Freeman movie.

 

http://www.theatlant...ereview/375006/

 

^^^pretty much sums it up

 

This would be a PERFECT movie for the podcast and everyone can watch it for free through the HBO now app.

 

Thoughts?

[ElieB 238]

Yessssssss a million times yes. This movie will not be ignored! Morgan Freeman expounding the pseudo-science of "maybe this is how the brain works, but who knows?" will be heard!

 

Every part of this movie is insane from a film-plot perspective. Just scene after scene of wtf.

 

- Scarlett Johansson traveling through time on an office chair

 

 

I had such a good time dissecting this movie with a friend. It gave me a brain-full-of-fuck, know what I mean? It defies completely logical explanation but you just can't look away.

 

I would so rather they do a recent movie like this over some 30 year old piece of trash from the 80s.

[NundercoverBrother 174]

Theres some shit that goes down in this movie.

Luc Besson was really on one when he made this.

[FisterRoboto 7499]

I finally got around to watching this tonight because it's been on HBO for a couple weeks.

 

I don't think I've hatewatched a movie as intensely as I did this one.

 

Read my signature for my review of this fucking garbage.