Lucy (2014)

Director: Luc Besson
Starring: Scarlett Johansson, Morgan Freeman, Min-sik Choi

Synopsis:
A woman shanghaied to serve as a drug mule develops superhuman powers.

Impressions:
When I saw the trailers for this movie and the fact that it was running with the whole "10% of the brain" myth, I rolled my eyes and opted to ignore it entirely. However, with it now going into syndication, I thought I'd give it a try. After all, Luc Besson has brought us some good movies in the past. If not always intelligent, they're at least entertaining. That's pretty much the case here. The science is of course ridiculous and the philosophy isn't much better, but it's a fairly entertaining movie with some decent action and black humor. The fact that Lucy loses her empathy as her powers increase are likely to sap your sympathy for her and I do find it problematic. They try to mitigate this with a morality pet, but his role isn't quite large enough to make that work. Morgan Freeman is good and it takes his voice to make the pseudoscientific babble sound almost respectable. The CG is a bit of a mixed bag, which may or may not be a problem for you. All told, I don't regret seeing this, but Besson has done much better in the past. If the premise isn't a dealbreaker and you don't mind a largely emotionless protagonist, then give this one a watch. Otherwise, spare yourself so your complaints won't catch the ardent flames of this movie's defenders.

Rating:
50/50