Review: Lucy

A high speed science fiction thriller with a difference, and three of my favourite actors!

Lucy is just another girl before a friend gets her involved with a Korean drug cartel, she is abducted and becomes infected with an experimental neural stimulating drug. The effect cascades and increases, making Lucy a superhuman with access to incredible mental powers. Can questions about the human mind be answered before the cartel catch up with her? Or will she self-destruct under the increasing strain on her body?

I was more than happy that two of my favourite actors were in this film, headliners Scarlett Johansson and Morgan Freeman, but imagine my joy and surprise to see Oldboy's Min-sik Choi in the opening credits too!
French director Luc Besson is no stranger to superhuman heroines either, colours of Leeloo from The Fifth Element and shades of one of his first films La Femme Nikita. He is in his element here. It is also great to see something original again! Something akin to comics and current science fiction franchises and yet an original screenplay!

The film is fast paced and full of action set pieces and physical fighting as we watch Lucy develop from the standard "10%" of her brain capacity escalates higher and higher! We know Johansson is capable in stunts and action what with Marvel's Black Widow character, but Lucy becomes more of a race against the clock than a brawler, introducing the audience to the incredible mental powers humans might be capable of. It uses its entire runtime to express what is happening to Lucy and how it affects her mentally.
Min-sik Choi's antagonist isn't used as much as I would have liked, but as a Korean powerhouse of acting talent, it is good to see him in a Western production, especially one such as this!
The film's key strength lies in its sense of humour, which goes from dry and intelligent to subtle and goofy. While Johansson's Lucy becomes colder and more detached from her human side, our secondary characters, especially Freeman, have great fun bouncing off her detachment and incredible powers with bewilderment. This humour and fast pace stops the film becoming something of a pretentious waste of time and more an enjoyable romp with intelligent undertones.

This sense of humour does go off the deep end a little. Besson, in a peculiar move, splices throughout his film footage of wildlife and disconnected scenes that are metaphors for what is happening narratively. For example, when Lucy is first kidnapped we see an escalating scene of a cheetah stalking its prey, or a mouse going towards a trap. Running parallel with this is Freeman's initial presentation speech about the human mind, also with wildlife footage.
This will probably alienate the wider audience, who'll wonder why there's National Geographic clips in their action movie!

But after reminding myself this is a Luc Besson film, Lucy gets better and better as it goes on and you can't wait to see how far her mental powers go, and how the director will present it!

Review: Olympus has Fallen

Well I had always intended to watch this... but now that I have I have discovered some awful not-supposed-to-be-funny 'Murica trite.

When a terrorist attack on the American White House ends with the President and his aids taken hostage and the House turned into a fortress, only an ex-Secret Service agent (who was retired due to an earlier accident that caused the death of the President's wife) can save the day.

The 1990s were full of action political thrillers and Olympus has Fallen appears to be trying to rekindle that genre of film: grounded, realistic and most importantly contemporary stories based around sieges, hostages or conspiracies. But either Olympus has missed the point completely, or something has been lost over the last fifteen years.
First of all, this film (as someone from the UK) is so overwhelmingly America, just... in your face AMERICA. Okay, that's fine for a while. But when every single scene for the first twenty minutes is noble politicans striding boldly through corridors while the score blares with trumpets and warbles with drums, over and over again, I'm sorry but you lose any sense of nobility.
We then have the actual attack on the White House which is spectacular, there's no denying that the action in the film is well done (there's no obnoxious shaky-cam for a start, I generally knew where everything was!) but again the total lack of defense around Washington DC was outright laughable.
"Suspension of disbelief" is all well and good, but when a tone of a film is generally seen as realistic or gritty, behaving like an action thriller than a standard popcorn flick, these sorts of issues become targets for criticism. Sure, trumpet how awesome America is just before obliterating everything it stands for a moment later! ...
The film is a bloody sequence too: televised executions, beatings, stabbings, traitors, all shown through a lens of gritty hardship. I can't actually call this pro-America, it comes across more like self-defecation!

Then there is Gerald Butler... Oh boy. I don't dislike the man; I enjoyed Law Abiding Citizen (for example) but this film's script and acting is atrocious. I've already said this film is bringing the 1990s back, and that is right. I've seen all of these cliche sequences before. I had all of the emotional attachment for him and his wife/girlfriend/partner/person as I do for my toothbrush: every now and then, I am reminded that it's there.
Butler's character is, for want of a better analogy, The Terminator. We see these terrorists enter the story by massacring hundreds of civilians, and so naturally Butler can go on a bloody rampage executing any terrorist he sees with impunity. Imagine Die Hard, but without the sense of humour or self awareness. He just growls and murders his way to inevitable victory (oh, could that be a spoiler? You mean you weren't sure if the personification of America would survive this ordeal?)

Ugh. Suspension of disbelief can carry you so far, but after that you need to tone down the pretentiousness. It is a forgettable action film that doesn't know how to act. "We are realistic and contemporary: We... have hi-tech Hydra weapon platforms. We Stand for American integrity: We use a three-code nuclear activation system called Cerberus."

I need a good note to finish on... uhm... uhm... It is better than A Good Day to Die Hard?

Avoid, unless you want to have some noise in the background while you do something productive.
 

     

Review: The Lego Movie (3D)

Utter lunacy!

As if progressing from such experiences as Scott Pilgrim and Wreck-It Ralph, The Lego Movie fully embraces its decision to simple exist that what we get is magical, insane, inspiring, childish and so unbelievably happy. I had a stupid, stupid grin on my face constantly.

Emmett is a construction worker living in a world of regimented order, social control and live literally by the book (they have instruction manuals on how to live.) But when an evil tyrant called Lord Business looks to glue their world together, he discovers that a prophecy deems him “The Special” and will save the world from a fate worse than death.

What's incredible about The Lego Movie is how even critics like it. I'll be honest, perhaps a quarter of the way through I was asking myself: “What am I actually watching?? This is literally an insane concept! Stupid.” But those thoughts left as quickly as they came... A movie about Lego couldn't be (and shouldn't be) anything other than this!

This film is never on the rails; it is permanently unhinged and borderline surreal. We have wonderful animation techniques (CG stop-motion) that capture the plastic and printed nature of the toy, that looks charming up close and dissolves into absolute chaos when the bricks start flying! It becomes such a joy to watch, despite how airheaded and loopy it is.

You have tonnes of cameos too, Lego have rights to almost everything and here they do not pull their punches. Batman is a main character, Wonder Woman, Superman, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Lincoln, Gandalf, even Shaquille O'Neal, all feature.

That should be your inner child sated, kids will love it. But if I may delve a little further, this movie's theme actually speaks about Lego as a creative medium too! What's more devastating in a child's mind than someone  + gluing Lego pieces together?? That's terrible, and in terms of Lego plight that's as evil as it can be! The film goes further still, but I wouldn't want to tell you everything.

It is utter madness and there's a lot to be said about how it is a nonsense stitched together with a generic prophetic “zero-to-hero” storyline... But really, it says “The Lego Movie” on your ticket, this is what you should expect and, and a little bit more!

Also, the song “Everything is Awesome” is addictive as hell!

Review: Now You See Me

We've had numerous magician / magic trick movies, and while Now You See Me doesn't try to reinvent the concept, it is certainly a flashy, entertaining, easily consumable affair.

Four magicians, an escape artist, mentalist, card trickster and a slight-of-hand street magician, are all brought together to perform a dazzling show at Las Vegas. Who brought them together is a mystery, but when the show's climax has a bank in France robbed through a live act of teleportation, the FBI and Interpol are called in to investigate.

Our four tricksters are probably the best element of the movie. Their motivations are unclear and their stage presence is likeable and fun, spearheaded by Woody Harrelson and a surprisingly unique performance by Jesse Eisenberg. Everyone's favourite Hulk Mark Ruffalo is the FBI investigator hot on their heels, along with his Interpol not-romantic-interest-but-really-is Alma Drey. Admittedly, I found the two of them the least compelling of the cast, their scenes felt a little flat.
Adding further weight to the cast, Michael Cane is one of the show's benefactors, while Morgan Freeman is a man who profits from revealing the secrets of magicians.

It is a fast film, playing out more like an all out action thriller than say... The Prestige. We have a cat and mouse story with dozens of twists and turns most of which you should catch moments before their reveal. The film's pacing is consistent, and the visuals pop with a lot of flashy lighting and modern settings, glamorous and glitzy, making it very easy and pleasing to watch.

It is however... a bit silly. Some of the trickery involved has a little too much suspension of disbelief, while some of it is so blatant than you will want to bash the FBI's collective heads together for not getting it. The characters aren't that fleshed out either, we only know bits and pieces about everyone... a decision purposefully made to keep the film's insane level of ambiguity going strong.
The ongoing revelations to the tricks felt a little bit like the first Sherlock Holmes film's answer to deductive reasoning, going like this: How did they do that?? Answer: They are magicians, they just knew it would go that way. See aforementioned "suspension of disbelief".

However, the actors are clearly having a lot of fun here, and the glossy easy-going eye candy cannot be ignored. I had fun watching this; it is simple but effective.

Review: Invictus

Took me a while to watch it, and I had my reservations beforehand, but Invictus is simple but compelling.

I think I have my issues with sports films, mostly because there's very little scope or variety; they almost always tell of an underdog struggling to succeed and overcome adversity, and they always do.
Invictus I suppose is that formula... The South African rugby team become the flag bearers for newly elected President Nelson Mandela's bid to restore the county's hope and self confidence. The team are in shambles, virtually a laughing stock on the verge of being disbanded, while the President himself faces ridicule and doubt with his ethics of free-thinking and prosperity. Mandela's goal to restore his people's faith is to have their team win the World Cup.

These two characters, Freeman's Mandela and Damon's team captain Francois Pienaar, share the strife of a disbelieving public, and really seals the emotional investment of the story. The film is full of unlikely partnerships, from the lead actors to the extras (who make the final struggles all the more entertaining) and it quickly becomes a rewarding feel-good film.
Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon do excellent work in their roles, especially Freeman (can he ever do wrong, seriously?) who gives full conviction in Mandela's selfless confidence. Clint Eastwood is directing, and fortunately this is less heart-string pulling and more heart-warming and confident.


It does not have an exact antagonist, except for in the final rugby match, other than the potential failure of the characters' efforts, and it does seem to move along at a steady pace without great causes for concern. I felt there would have been more focus on Mandela's insomnia than there was, for example.
It is a sport film with a difference, I would recommend it to anyone who is even remotely curious.