by
Julien
Faddoul
** (2 Stars)
wd – Luc Besson
m – Eric
Serra
ph – Thierry
Arbogast
pd – Hugues
Tissandier
cos – Olivier
Bériot
p – Virginie
Silla-Besson
Cast:
Scarlett Johansson, Morgan Freeman, Min-sik Choi, Amr Waked, Julian Rhind-Tutt,
Pilou Asbæk, Analeigh Tipton, Nicolas Phongpheth
Lucy is not
the kind of movie that should be examined lightly. Even if it has a premise as
ludicrous and over-calculated as this one. By which I mean, one can detect the
pulpiness of the material and organize their mind accordingly. I would accept
the response of anyone who disliked the film on those grounds alone, but there's something quite brilliant about Luc Besson’s latest film that paradoxically can
only exist adjacent to the silliness.
The premise
is born from the idea that humans use only 10% of their brain’s capacity, a
ridiculous myth circulated to us from the schoolyard days of our youth. Lucy
(Scarlett Johansson) is, through a series of circumstances, kidnapped by a
Korean drug lord (Min-sik Choi) who decides to use Lucy as a mule and to hold a
pouch of blue crystal powder sewn into her abdomen. As this occurs, Mr Besson
hilariously intercuts back and forth with wildlife footage of a cheetah chasing
an antelope. This is after opening his film with the Australopithecus (otherwise known as Lucy) drinking from a stream.
Lucy and 3 other men have been selected to distribute this drug to
specific parts of the country for unspecified reasons. The drug, CPH4, we find
out is a chemical women produce for a brief moment in tiny doses when pregnant
as a catalyst for the fetus. Sure, why not.
Unfortunately
for the bad guys, one of the guards repeatedly kicks Lucy in the stomach (trust
me, it’s pretty funny), which causes the pouch to break, and the drug enters
Lucy’s system. This immediately gives her the power to pulverize, climb walls
and shoot people with total precision. If this doesn’t make sense to you, don’t
worry because Mr Besson casts Morgan Freeman in the part of crackpot explainer.
We know that Lucy is behaving this way due to accessing more of her brain’s
capacity because Mr Besson cuts to a lecture in a French university performed
by Professor Samuel Norman (Freeman), who clarifies the different stages man can reach
when able to access greater percentages, all while his audience conveniently
asks hyper-plot-specific questions.
The sequences
that materialize as a result are a glorious mix of ridiculousness and splendor.
These include Lucy performing surgery on herself, an act of painful revenge set
to Mozart’s Requiem Mass, an absurd car-chase through the streets of Paris and a
riotous mockery of the kind of fight choreography that is now prevalent in all
superhero cinema.
In regards
to the plot, characters and situations, Lucy is lathered in a thin slice of
alert sentience. The cast and crew are aware of the dopiness. It is
philosophical dumbness in the service of cinematic smartness. Something like The Tree of Life (2011) meets The Paperboy (2012). In regard to Mr
Besson’s handling of the form, it is deliciously risky. What happens to Lucy
and the end of the film when she reaches 100% isn’t delicious because of its
profundity (which it isn’t) but because of its nerve. We cheer the attempt
instead of the result.
Johansson,
Freeman and Choi aren’t really adding anything here, though many critics have
taken it upon themselves to recognize a thread within Ms Johansson current work
that expresses an interest in the sub-human.
A
film this simple can best be appreciated by a fairly sophisticated viewer, I
think. Your run-of-the-mill workaday moviegoer will relate to it on Level One
and think it contains clichés and stereotypes. But Mr Besson, whom I’ve never
liked until now, exudes an understanding and respect for genre-cinema that I can’t
help but admire. I believe others will too.
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