Review: "Lucy"

Director: Luc Besson
Runtime: 90 minutes

Luc Besson's Lucy is dumb, but it is - in its own Besson-esque way - admirably dumb. It is better crafted than, say, the typical Michael Bay flick. It also avoids being just another action movie with nothing but violence. Lucy is a look at what happens when a person does what mankind has been trying to do for millennia: reach the absolute height of our capabilities. Does this make Lucy deep or insightful? Not even close. It is ludicrous, as is Besson's way, but ludicrous in a way that takes the idea of "mindless entertainment" to places it has not yet ventured. 

The silliness begins right at the start, with Lucy (Scarlett Johannson, having quite a stellar year) being egged on by her new boyfriend to make a delivery to a prominent member of a global drug ring (Choi Min-sik, AKA the original "Oldboy"). That delivery turns out to be a special new drug that, when ingested, boosts brain activity. After lots of pleading and crying, Lucy winds up with a bag of the blue drug lodged in her intestines. And then, after an unfortunate beating, the blue stuff starts leaking out of its container, and into Lucy's bloodstream, thus enabling her to push past the normal limits (10%) of human intellectual.

As any number of articles have pointed out, the idea that we only use 10% of our brains is a myth. To those using this issue as an actual criticism of the film I offer this response: it's a Luc Besson movie, not a documentary. This is not to suggest that everyone is obligated to enjoy the film based on this single fact. Rather, the idea that its conceptual inaccuracy (which was also used in the Bradley Cooper vehicle Limitless) is hardly something that should be wielded against the film as an unpardonable sin.  Lucy is not meant to be taken seriously, though everyone involved commits themselves enough to make the whole thing enjoyable. 

Besson, to his credit, actually does a fair job of bouncing between Lucy's wildly opposed narrative threads. On one hand, it's a revenge thriller, while on the other side it's a story of scientific enlightenment and the quest for knowledge. The latter part is, surprisingly, more fun to watch. From quite early on, it's clear that Lucy's ever increasing powers remove the idea of an actual threat. There is little suspense or tension. Instead, there are relentless visual flourishes and propulsive narrative energy. Besson has taken some ideas about life and the universe from The Tree of Life and 2001: A Space Odyssey, and applied them to the emptiest sort of sci-fi adventure. I don't know if that makes the film good, but it sure as hell makes it entertaining.

It's also a fun showcase for Johansson as a action star, which is always a plus. Lucy is, in some ways, the halfway point between two other releases from this year featuring Johansson: Captain America 2 and Under the Skin. Johansson gets to show off her star power, yet does it in a role that mostly requires her to be as emotionally rigid as a statue. Thankfully, Besson gives the actress a little time at the start to do some actual emoting before her inner demi-god emerges. Lucy is a reminder that Johansson can be a star, but simply not in the ways that Hollywood initially wanted her to be. 

Of course, even the allure of watching Scarlett Johansson strut around and play with time and space won't be enough for some, and that's understandable. As I said before, Lucy is one hell of a dumb movie. When it comes to movies that require switching off the brain, there's a limit to how far some are willing to go. Lucy is one of those movies that will push many way past their tolerance for this sort of flashy trifle. With a film like Lucy, it's not about whether or not you get something substantial out of it. No sane person will. All that matters is whether or not you happen to like how it tastes. 

Grade: C+

Review: "The Lego Movie"

Directors: Phil Lord & Christopher Miller
Runtime: 100 minutes

By all accounts, The Lego Movie shouldn't work. On the surface, it seems like the evil twin of Pixar's Toy Story franchise: a calculated attempt at cashing in on a name brand without any legitimate cinematic effort. Yet even though there's no doubt that The Lego Movie will help boost sales of the famous toys, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's film still stands tall as its own achievement. Rather than a cheap cash grab, The Lego Movie is a snappy, funny, and utterly delightful work with the right mix of broad appeal and actual cinematic smarts.

Though the story is full of cliches, including the prophecy-filled opening, Lord and Miller's script knows how to embrace and subvert cliches, rather than become weighed down by them. At its core, The Lego Movie is about an ordinary guy (Emmett, voiced by Chris Pratt), getting swept up in an adventure to save the world. Yet rather than settle for saccharine condescension, The Lego Movie has a little more going on under the surface, albeit not at first glance. 

Even without the final act (which I'll leave unspoiled), this is still a constantly engaging, frequently hilarious joyride. The stellar voice cast, which also includes Elizabeth Banks, Will Arnett, Will Ferrell, Alison Brie, and Morgan Freeman, are all perfectly on point with their delivery. Even when confined to the limited expressions of the digitally enhanced Lego figures, these characters really pop. Equally impressive is how Lord and Miller manage to make the film equally enjoyable for all ages, without ever stooping into crude or gross-out territory. Rather than pander, The Lego Movie focuses on a charming, and ultimately touching story about creativity and independence, with just the right touch of subversion.

The animation is just as impressive. The figures all look sleek and polished, yet the movement still has the feel of actual Lego bricks. It's a decision that feels both retro and refreshingly new. Above all, what makes The Lego Movie stand out is that it truly feels like a work of love, rather than a glorified advertisement. There are real characters, a real (albeit traditional) story, and even a brief flash of genuine emotional heft. 

That's not to say that The Lego Movie hits the same highs as the best of the Pixar canon, but it's still and beautifully accomplished work of animation on all fronts. Once the story movies past the purposefully bland introduction, the whole project roars to life, and keeps the jokes and exciting set pieces coming with smart efficiency. Above all else, The Lego Movie is proof that, with the right levels of passion and care, commercial properties can function as their own enjoyable films. It's enough to make you forget that the whole project likely started as nothing more than a glorified commercial designed to make a few extra bucks.

Grade: B+

Review: "Oblivion"

Director: Joseph Kosinski
Runtime: 126 minutes

Rather than try to prove his critics wrong with his second film, director Joseph Kosinski seems perfectly content with delivering more of the same. Just like 2010's TRON: Legacy, Kosinski's Oblivion delivers some entertaining moments and stunning visuals, yet is hindered by a disappointingly thin screenplay. Despite its problems, it's difficult to suggest seeing Oblivion anywhere outside of the theater, where Kosinski's visuals do the best job of distracting one from the flawed writing. 

Set some 60 years into the future, mankind is recovering from a devastating attack that occurred in 2017. Most of humanity has been evacuated to one of the moons of Saturn. Left behind are Jack Harper (Tom Cruise) and Victoria (Andrea Riseborough). They're part of a crew designed to repair drones that protect energy-gathering machines from the scattered remnants of the alien horde. As Harper informs us in the opening voice over, humanity won the war against the alien attack, yet lost Earth in the process. The pair are guided by Sally (Melissa Leo, appearing strictly on fuzzy video monitors), the head honcho of the ship that will eventually take Jack and Victoria off to join the rest of humanity. 

However, the situation becomes complicated when a craft crashes on Earth containing human passengers. The lone survivor is Julia (Olga Kurylenko), who eerily resembles a woman from Jack's strange dreams of the pre-invasion Earth. Julia's introduction to the plot is, at first, one of Oblivion's high points. Yet it doesn't take long for Kosinski and co-writer Karl Gadjusdek to begin stumbling through the remainder of the plot. 

Where the film starts to come apart is in the script's desire to tackle so many different story ideas that audiences have seen before in science fiction. Once Kosinski and Gadjusdek start piling on the twists and revelations, Oblivion's narrative becomes fractured, and the pacing is thrown off (the second hour feels far too long in comparison to the first). Rather than carefully select a few tropes to tackle, Oblivion tries to throw so many ideas together that the narrative becomes jumbled as it charges into what should be a heart-pounding conclusion. Certain developments lack weight because Kosinski's storytelling simply goes through the motions. This is most evident when, just before a major moment in the story, Kosinski decides to try and create the world's shortest love triangle, rather than just stick to the character relationships that have already been established (empty as they are). 

Compounding the narrative problems is that the role of Jack Harper is too thinly written, and Cruise doesn't bring any sort of spark in his performance to make up for it. It's the sort of role he's played far too many times, and as a result his work here isn't terribly engaging. There's no real sense of who Harper is outside of his job, and Cruise's performance doesn't inject the role with any personality. Thankfully, the supporting cast put in some effort with their roles, albeit with varying degrees of success. Melissa Leo proves that she can be enjoyable even when she's never even seen in person, while Kurylenko is solid as the woman responsible for Jack's disillusionment with his mission. However, the standout, if there is such a thing here, is Andrea Riseborough. More than any member of the cast, she's able to take even the most functional lines and imbue them with a liveliness that suggest that she should have been the film's hero. Though she has just as little to work with as anyone else, Riseborough is the only member of the cast who fully sells her material. 

Yet other than Riseborough's solid work, the only other standouts of the film are technical. And, to be fair, there's a lot to be said for Oblivion's technical accomplishments. As with TRON: Legacy, the settings and landscapes are gorgeously rendered, giving the film an incredibly polished look. Sets are also nicely rendered, balancing the sleek modernism of Harper's outpost with the cluttered remains of Earth.  The film is also carried along by first-rate sound work, and a knockout score from French electronic group M83, which helps keep the film from becoming totally stagnant, even with the flow of events is disrupted. 

Unfortunately, these technical achievements aren't enough to rescue Oblivion from being more than a workman-like mishmash of different concepts. The material is simply too flat to begin with. While Kosinski has conceived some fantastic visuals, he has delivered them without any sort of flair so as to really make them pop. Whatever flaws there are, Oblivion could have been a stronger experience overall if it had been able to create at least a few genuinely rewarding cinematic moments. While there are scenes that are exciting or intriguing, there's nothing about the execution to make them stand out. Kosinski has crafted impeccable visuals, yet seems to have stopped there, content to let them speak for themselves. As it turns out, they have precious little to say. 

Grade: C

Trailer for "Red"

So...Helen Mirren has a machine gun. I think I've said all that needs to be said.