Frost/Nixon

Frost/Nixon; drama, USA / UK / France, 2008; D: Ron Howard, S: Michael Sheen, Frank Langella, Kevin Bacon, Rebecca Hall, Toby Jones, Matthew Macfadyen, Oliver Platt, Sam Rockwell

After the '72 Watergate scandal, American President Richard Nixon is forced to resign. Hated by a large amount of people, Nixon wants to speak to the public to present his perspective of things, and thus accepts the proposal of British talk show host David Frost for a TV interview in four parts. On his flight to California, Frost meets Caroline and starts a relationship with her. Since no TV network is willing to finance this endeavor, Frost is forced to pay $600,000 from his own pocket. When the interviews finally begin, Frost in unprepared and Nixon uses the camera to simply exonerate himself for the Vietnam War and everything else. This angers Frost's associate Reston, who insists that Frost should be more critical of Nixon. In the final interview, Frost asks more risky questions, until Nixon admits that he may have done wrong things and appologizes for it.

The famous '77 TV interviews between David Frost and one of the most hated US Presidents of the 20th century, Richard Nixon, are interesting, and more compelling to people fascinated by history. Ron Howard's movie about this topic is solid, but unravels like a dry PowerPoint presentation: too schematic, with little true ingenuity or inspiration. Its biggest vritues, save for its purpose of a hsitorical record, are great performances: Frank Langella is excellent as Nixon (save for the fact that he does not look like him, but then again, that is a frequent problem when making a biopic about historical figures), nailing his accent and mannerisms, though Michael Sheen is also strong as talk show host Frost. Howard relies on crispy clear cinematography and fast editing to engage the viewers, yet he has problems since the dialogues are not that well written, whereas the entire concept where two people just talk is not very cinematic. Behind the scenes problems are thus much more engaging, and in one scene at the airport, Frost, a British man, admits to his friend how he yearns for the interview, because "success in America is unlike success anywhere else." Howard and screenwriter Peter Morgan resisted in depicting Nixon in stereotypes, and instead showed him in a humanistic way, though their protagonist Frost did try to resist falling into the trap of allowing Nixon to simply use the interview as a giant, unchecked propaganda device to whitewash his own crimes and create an auto-hagiography (as it was the case with Oliver Stone's embarrassingly bad documentary with war criminal Vladimir Putin 9 years later), and instead tried to find a balance. "Frost/Nixon" is a standard, routine, yet overall good film with a few neat moments.

Grade:++

Galaxies Are Colliding

Galaxies Are Colliding; comedy, USA, 1992; D: John Ryman, S: Dwier Brown, Susan Walters, Karen Medak, Kelsey Grammer

Adam has always been a pessimistic, sad and neurotic lad. One of his rare friends is Peter, a museum employee. Adam confessed to Peter his fear of the Andromeda Galaxy colliding with the Solar system and how this makes all life pointless. On the day of the wedding, Adam leaves his car in the desert and leaves in search for the meaning of life. Since his car was destroyed by a rocket fired from the army, everyone concludes he died. But in a bar, Adam meets a young actress, Margo, falls in love with her and finally finds peace in his life.

Sometimes it happens that perfectly good little films get overshadowed by the hype and loud promotion of big movies at cinemas. This happened to the sympathetic independent tragicomedy "Galaxies Are Colliding" which is, admittedly, clumsy and overstretched, but at the same time fun in its spiritual search for the meaning of life, and in presenting the old archetype that some people, here the protagonist Adam, are depressed and plagued by existentialist thoughts until they find peace by falling in love. In the opening credits pictures of Galaxies show up, and a couple of philosophical comical observatios are quietly hilarious ("He always wondered what was so special about Mary's virginity. Since Isaac Newton was a virgin himself, he wondered why nobody had an apparition of Isaac Newton"; "He wondered what keeps Earth in the Sun's orbit. I told him it was God's mind. And he asked what if God changes his mind"). Kelsey Grammer sparkles in he supporting role of Adam's friend Peter, who is much better than the stiff performances by Karen Medak and Susan Waters. "Galaxies Are Colliding" is a movie whose execution does not do its fascinating concept justice—but in its limited and confined format, it is at times magical.

Grade:++

Forbidden Games

Jeux interdits; war drama, France, 1952; D: René Clément, S: Georges Poujouly, Brigitte Fossey, Amédée, Laurence Badie, Suzanne Courtal, Lucien Hubert

France, World War II. Hundreds of refugees are fleeing to the rural area, but a German war plane shoots at a bridge and kills the parents of Paulette, a 5-year old girl. In the commotion, she gets lost in the forest and stumbles upon Michel (11), a farmboy who brings her to his home, where the Dolle family gives Paulette sanctuary. Paulette wants to bury her dead dog in an abandoned mill, but does not want him to be alone, so Michel tells her they will bury other animals with him, to keep the dog company. They bury dead moles, chicks, crickets, cockroaches. Michel secretly steals crosses for the animal graveyards, but gets into trouble for this from his father, who thought that his rival, from the Gouard family, is stealing them. The police brings Paulette away, against her wishes, to a Red Cross center. Upon hearing someone calling the name "Michel", Paulette is reminded of the boy and searches for him in the crowd.

Not since "Cria Cuervos" has there been a film about kids with such an obsession about death as is the case with Rene Clement's most critically acclaimed achievement, "Forbidden Games"—and yet, in spite of this, it is never morbid or grotesque, and is instead a surprisingly honest and gentle little story, one of the purest examples of innocence in cinema. The film kicks off with a strong opening sequence of refugees fleeing from the war, and a shocking epilogue: a war plane shoots at the bridge, the parents lie on the ground, but a quick barrage of bullets hits them in the back, the mother just barely gasps, and they are dead. Left behind is their 5-year old child, Paulette (Brigitte Fossey in an unforgettable performance), who is still unaware that she has just become an orphan. The sequence is the kind of that the viewers will probably only see once in their lifetime, because it is so heartbreaking—another one has a peasant woman simply throwing away Paulette's dead dog into the river. The story presents a child not ready to come to grips with this dark realization, with death, and how Michel tries to make her a "buffer zone" of illusion.

"Forbidden Games" is an allegory on the origins of religion: Paulette and Michel burrying dead animals and insects, in order to give her dead dog company, is just a mental crotch for them to cope with traumatic loss, and a prototype of what grown ups do when they bury their dead, presented in the parallel of Michel's older brother, Georges, dying and getting buried. Some moments of childful playfulness sparkle here and there: in one scene, while she is in the bedroom, complaining that it is too dark, Paulette sticks her tongue out in front of Michel. He asks why she did that, and she replies: "To see if you could see me in the dark". In another, while at the church graveyard, they spot a very tall, slim cross, and Paulette comments that it would be "good for a giraffe". Some flaws are apparent in the movie, though. The story feels very overstretched at times, not knowing how to sustain the interest until the end, which is obvious in the unnecessary subplot of Francis and Berthe, two "Romeo & Juliet"-style lovers from two opposing families, who are forgotten in the final act. The ending also feels strangely abrupt and incomplete, without a clear point. However, at least it concluded the main theme: in the final shots, the crotch is taken away and Paulette realizes that there is no escape from harsh reality.

Grade:+++

Jojo Rabbit

Jojo Rabbit; black comedy / satire / drama, USA, 2019; D: Taika Waititi, S: Roman Griffin Davis, Thomasin McKenzie, Taika Waititi, Sam Rockwell, Scarlett Johansson, Rebel Wilson, Stephen Merchant, Alfie Allen 

The Third Reich, World War II. Jojo (10) has an imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler, and frantically enjoys being in the Hitler Youth. His father disappeared on the Italian front a long time ago. After Jojo is injured from a hand grenade, he discovers that his mother, Rosie, is secretly hiding a Jewish girl, Elsa, in their house. At first angered, Jojo slowly becomes friends with Elsa. When Rosie is hanged for being a traitor, Jojo is devastated. The Allied soldiers storm the town, ending the war. Jojo finally kicks his imaginary friend Hitler out of his life and exits the house with Elsa, who is now a free person.

Even though it is not for everyone's taste, Taika Waititi's satire is a deconstruction of how propaganda works, to such an extent that people indoctrinated by it do not even know how biased they are, and thus "Jojo Rabbit" becomes a giant essay on this gradual realization of 'cognitive dissonance'. This is actual for the time in which "Jojo" was made, the time of fake news and alternative facts. The story starts out with an optimistic film look, featuring a lot of bright lighting dominated by yellow-orange, cheerful colors, in order to conjure up the society in which a dictatorship is trying to show to their people that they are living in a perfect, ideal world, but in the last 30 minutes this is changed, and a lot of darker, grey, washed out colors with shadows are introduced, showing "cracks" in this worldview. As uncomfortable as it is to think about it, but the Nazis were taught that they are the good guys, and that everyone who opposes them is evil. The protagonist Jojo slowly comes to grips with this when he has a hunch that something is not quite right, for instance in the scene in which he has to show his loyalty to the Party by killing an innocent rabbit (the leitmotiv for his good side) or when he walks with his mother and they stumble upon several people hanged on the city square. The most controversial decision was for Waititi to play Hitler, an imaginary friend of the boy, which really is difficult to stomach at times. However, after the viewers get use to it, this concept starts to work: within these parameters of insanity, the story was actually assembled in a reasonable and logical way. Waititi's jokes are often really funny, with the highlight being the arguments between Jojo and Elsa, who says to him: "We Jews are just like you. Just human", or when she describes the German people: "You were chosen by a pathetic little man who can't even grow a full moustache!" Audacious and wickedly comical, "Jojo Rabbit" is very unusual—but art has to sometimes be like that to stay creative and fresh.

Grade:+++

The Golden Voyage of Sinbad

The Golden Voyage of Sinbad; fantasy adventure, UK, 1973; D: Gordon Hessler, S: John Phillip Law, Tom Baker, Takis Emmanuel, Caroline Munro, Douglas Wilmer, Martin Shaw

Sinbad and his crew arrive with their ship at a port and meet the Vizier, a man who is wearing a golden mask ever since he was disfigured by the evil wizard Koura. Vizier persuades Sinbad to try to find the magic fountain on the lost island of Lemuria in order to get magic powers before Koura, who wants to use it for evil. Sinbad is joined by slave girl Margiana and the clumsy Achmed. They arrive at Lemuria, but Koura uses his magic to bring a statue with six arms to life to attack Sinbad. In a duel, Sinbad kills Koura, while the fountain rejuvenates Vizier's face and makes him the king. Sinbad ends up in love with Margiana.

The 2nd Sinbad film for which Ray Harryhausen delivered his visual effects, "The Golden Voyage of Sinbad" is not as scary as "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad", but instead tries to tell a decent story and put more focus on the characters, though, ironically, many of them were left rather unmemorable. Caroline Munro is excellent as the heroine Margiana and steals the show, easily overshadowing everybody else, but is sadly underused, showing that the director Gordon Hessler was not able to recognize all his potentials and use them to elevate the film. The concept in which Sinbad and the evil wizard are rushing at who will get to the magic fountain first is fairly standard, predictable and bland, yet Harryhausen's surreal stop-motion effects conjured up five creatures that graced the screen and secured the film cult status, and the two most memorable are the sequence where a wooden 10ft tall statue comes to life and attacks the crew on the ship, as well as the bizarre centaur cyclops who attacks Sinbad.

Grade:++

Diary of a Lost Girl

Tagebuch einer verlorenen; silent drama, Germany, 1929; D: Georg Willhelm Pabst, S: Louise Brooks, Fritz Rasp, André Roanne, Josef Ravensky, Franziska Kinz

Thymian is the daughter of pharmacist Karl Robert Henning. She is shocked when the maid suddenly leaves the house and is found dead afterwards. Thymian feels lonely and falls unconscious, which is used by Meinert, Henning's assistant, to sleep with her. When Thymian gets the baby, the family wants her to marry Meinert, but she does not love him and refuses. The family thus bring her baby to an orphanage and Thymian herself to a boarding school, ruled by a strict director. Thanks to Count Osdorff, who loves her, Thymian escapes from the school with her friend Erika, but finds out her baby died in the meantime. Thymian becomes a prostitute. When her father dies, she inherits his money, but gives it away to father's new wife, Mata, and her two kids. Upon hearing Thymian gave away all the money, Osdorff commits suicide by jumping through the window. Thymian becomes the new director of the boarding school, and wants to show love and compassion towards the rebellious girls there.

The second and final collaboration between German director G. W. Pabst and American actress Louise Brooks, after their first film "Pandora's Box" became a sensation, "Diary of a Lost Girl" is an ambitious drama, but both films are overhyped and tend to be too much of a straight-forward melodrama at times. At his best, Pabst is able to conjure up an emotional essay about the tragedy of life and the misunderstanding of outsiders who are rejected by the society that does not even want to try to understand and help them in a constructive way; but at his worst, he makes a story that resembles a soap opera. Brooks is consistently great in both films and shows off her charisma. "Diary" seems like five films pressed into one, since the storyline jumps from subplot to subplot (father's affair; Thymian's unwanted pregnancy; Thymian in a reformatory; Thymian in a brothel...) yet only the reformatory school undergoes a full circle in the delicious ending where Thymian herself becomes the director of the institution, but decides to show compassion instead of punishment towards the students. This would have made a better film, a film that follows only this story, instead of losing focus on other episodes. Some details are also well directed, such as the sequence where the bald, tall assistant of the reformatory has his back turned towards Thymian and Count Osdorff, but sees them hugging in the reflection, and thus turns around to seperate them, indicating his jealousy and secret affection for her.

Grade:++

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein; horror comedy, USA, 1948; D: Charles Barton, S: Lou Costello, Bud Abbott, Lon Chaney Jr., Bela Lugosi, Glenn Strange

London. Lawrence Talbot makes a phone call to Florida to talk to the chubby Wilbur, a baggage clerk at a railway station, and warn him about two incoming crates intended for McDougal's House Of Horrors, a wax museum, but before he can finish, Talbot transforms under the full moon into a Werewolf, and Wilbur hangs up. The two crates arrive, and they contain Dracula and Frankenstein's Monster. Wilbur spots them, but his colleague Chick does not believe him when the two freaks are gone. Dracula blackmails Dr. Sandra into assisting his plan of getting Wilbur's brain transplanted into Frankenstein's Monster. Talbot appears at a mask party as a Werewolf and attacks a man, and Chick is later blamed for it since he wore a Werewolf mask. Sandra seduces Wilbur and brings him to Dracula's laboratory, but Chick and Talbot show up, freeing Wilbur. The Werewolf falls into the sea holding Dracula transformed into a bat. Frankenstein's Monster gets killed on a bridge set on fire.

In one the most popular movies of Abbott and Costello, the comedy duo was placed in a crossover with Universal's movie monsters Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster and the Werewolf, delivering a peculiar syncretism that works rather well, giving a sense of danger and weight to the slapstick duo. "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" works the best in the crazy, burlesque opening act, which has inspiration. In it, a man in London, Talbot, has a phone call with Wilbur (the hilarious Lou Costello), but the former suddenly transforms into a Werewolf in the middle of the conversation, howling, and Wilbur mistakes it for a dog barking on the phone (!) or something else ("Mr. McDougal, will you stop gurgling your throat?"), so he hangs up. The sequence is genius because the writers Robert Lees, Frederic I. Rinaldo and John Grant realize how absurd the concept is and thus treat is almost as a spoof. Unfortunately, the inspiration of the film exhausts itselfs fairly quickly and stops at just the same old "singing frog" gag being repeated again and again: Wilbur sees Dracula and/or Frankenestein's Monster, and calls for Chick, but by the time Chick arrives, the monsters hide and thus Chick thinks Wilbur is lying. This situation takes over half of the film's running time, and feels contrived, forced and annoying. The movie is thus vegitating for way too long, without much ideas getting prepared beforehand, until the amusing finale involving Wilbur tied up to a stretcher on wheels, who pushes himself away with his foot from Frankenstein's Monster, but then gets caught up in the middle of Dracula and the Werewolf, who are using the stretcher to keep a dstance between themselves. The movie needed more of these kind of "proper" comical moments, though it has its moments due to Abbott and Costello's chemistry, even in dialogues ("Why don't you go take a look at yourself in the mirror?" - "Why should I hurt my own feelings?").

Grade:++

Souls for Sale

Souls for Sale; silent drama / comedy, USA, 1923; D: Rupert Hughes, S: Eleanor Boardman, Frank Mayo, Mae Busch, Richard Dix, Lew Cody, Barbara La Marr

Los Angeles. Remember "Mem", a nice woman, hastly married Scudder. On a hunch, while they were on a train, she secretly leaves the waggon on a stop and flees in the desert. There she is found by actor Tom, who was playing a Sheik on a camel of a movie set. Mem settles in at Hollywood, and when an actress is injured by a lighting lamp that falls on her, director Frank auditions Mem for a part. Mem is bad at playing a comedy role, but gets a role in a film anyway. Scudder turns out to actually be a crook who steals the money from the women he seduces. When Scudder sees Mem in a scene in a film at the cinema, he goes to her room and says he wants her back. When a lightning strikes a circus tent during filming, Scudder is so jealous at Frank that he tries to kill him with the propeller of a wind making machine, but dies himself instead. Frank later kisses Mem.

"Souls for Sale" attracted renewed interest when film critic Roger Ebert included it in his "Great Movies" list: while the movie is a really well made early satire on Hollywood, its inclusion in the Pantheon of cinema classics is still a little bit undue and unwarranted. Even though the story is presented as a drama, director Rupert Hughes amusingly refuses to treat it as such, and instead crafts several jokes throughout, including numerous witty examples of dialogues, which is quite unusual for a silent film. In one such scene, a reverend is rehearsing a sermon aimed against Hollywood, lamenting: "Oh Los Angeles, thy name should be Los Diaboles!" In another, when Mem is saved from dehydration in the desert by a man, she asks him: "Are you real or a mirage?", and he replies with: "Neither, I am a movie actor." When an extra is hitting on actress Leva, she melodramatically explains that she is reluctant due to her deceased husband: "My heart is in the grave with Tim." Besides taking a jab at Hollywood, where the actors have to "sell" themselves to the audience, in any way possible, "Souls" is also interesting for giving rare one-minute behind-the-scenes of Erich von Stroheim directing "Greed" and Charlie Chaplin directing "A Woman of Paris", since the heroine stumbles on their set on two occasions while trying to "make it" in the movie world. Several plot twists keep the story moving, yet the very good impression is somewhat ruined by a rather melodramatic (and ridiculous) ending, though the film deserves to be seen and is never a waste of time.

Grade:+++

Robot & Frank

Robot & Frank; science-fiction tragicomedy, USA, 2012; D: Jake Schreier, S: Frank Langella, Rachael Ma, Peter Sarsgaard (voice), Susan Sarandon, James Marsden, Liv Tyler

In the near future, Frank is a retired robber occasionally suffering from dementia. After a divorce, he lives alone in a desolate house and sometimes flirts with Jennifer who works in a nearby library. His son Hunter, who works and lives in the city, buys him a disability robot in order to help Frank about his daily chores. Frank resents this, but quickly finds good use of the robot in robbing the library. They then rob the neighbor's house, snatching diamonds from an arogant 'yuppie'. Frank meets Jennifer once again, and then remembers she is actually his ex-wife. Hunter and the police want to scan the robot's memory in order to find evidence that Frank robbed the house, so Frank erases the robot's memory. Frank is ultimately sent to a retirement home.

The director Jake Schreier's feature length debut film, "Robot & Frank" is a very accessible and fluent little film about the inevitable loss during aging, a light version of "Umberto D.", though with an interesting Sci-Fi take on it. It lacks more inspiration or ingenuity, but compensates this through Frank Langella's wonderful performance, to whom it owes a lot of its identity. Balancing between comedy and tragedy, "Robot & Frank" is sometimes thin, yet mostly charming, without turning too melodramatic when addressing some more "touchy" themes such as dementia (the neat twist about Frank's ex-wife near the end) and helplessness during old age. Also, when it puts some effort into it, it can come up with a few juicy comical dialogues, such as the opening exchange between the robot and the cynical Frank: "Hello, Frank. It is a pleasure to meet you!" - "How do you know!?"

Grade:++

The Beautiful Troublemaker

La Belle Noiseuse; erotic drama / art-film, France / Switzerland, 1991; D: Jacques Rivette, S: Michel Piccoli, Emmanuelle Béart, Jane Birkin, Marianne Denicourt, David Bursztein




Marianne is in a relationship with young painter Nicolas. He decides to go to a nearby castle to visit an old painter he admires, Frenhofer, who has not painted for 10 years. Frenhofer's wife, Liz, helps a friend, Porbus, who has a mild epileptic attack during dinner. Porbus then suggests that Marianne should be Frenhofer's model. Nicolas asks Marianne about it, and she angrily refuses the notion, but goes to Frenhofer's castle the next morning, anyway. Frenhofer starts drawing sketches of her in clothes, but then asks her to be a nude model. Marianne agrees, even though Frenhofer asks exhausting poses. He makes dozens of drawings, until finally settling on the look of the main painting. After completing it, Frenhofer hides the painting by building a wall of bricks around it, with only his little daughter knowing the secret. Frenhofer then announces his retirmenet, and Marianne, Liz, Nicolas and Porbus all attend his closing party.

One of the director Jacques Rivette's last achievements, a rare movie that is a quality dedication to the erotic beauty of the human body, "The Beautiful Troublemaker" is a peculiar art film that devotes a lot of time to its subject — painting — which is not for everyone's taste. With a running time of four hours, it is definitely too long, and yet, it is as if it takes its time to simply enjoy in this intimate little minimalist beauty. "The Beautiful Troublemaker" is a film essay on the process of creating art, on how both the circumstances and the model as the essence of this art affect the artist and influence the final outcome: it is a symbiotic relationship, and both need to show patience and teamwork to pull it through. The opening sequence contains a narrative codification: the heroine, Marianne (excellent Emmanuelle Beart) wants to make a photo of Nicolas, but he does not want that someone takes his picture, and in the second act, Marianne is ironically herself going to experience Nicolas' reluctant stance when she is herself going to be a model for painter Frenhofer. There are a lot of films about making films, yet this one is about how a painter is making a painting. And yet, one can also interpret this as Rivette's own observation on how he directs his actors in order to achieve this film. In the first half an hour, nothing happens. The main protagonists meet at the castle, chat about nothing and have dinner. If the viewers can pass through this segment, they will be met with the main plot tangle. One sequence is badly directed, though: during dinner, a guest, Porbus, has an epileptic attack and his head falls on the table, while only Liz helps him out, whereas Marianne, Nicolas and Frenhofer just remain sitting there, as if nothing happened (?).

Later that night, Frenhofer finally opens up and "slips" what he misses in his life: "I need a masterwork or nothing!" Marianne then enters the scene. At first she is reluctant, but still, something urges her to stand model for Frenhofer, as if she wants to be his masterwork of a lifetime to gain importance herself. At first, the movie spends 5 minutes on Frenhofer drawing a sketch of her in clothes, sitting, but it is no good. When she takes her clothes off, and poses naked, he starts making better drawings, as if this motivates him, as if this stimulates his creativity. Dozens of poses are made, with her lying, standing or sitting naked. There is a precious duality in their relationship: youth and old age; beauty and ugliness; arrogance and humbleness; naivety and wisdom. Frenhofer, it seems, cannot experience sexuality anymore due to his age, and thus the process of painting is his surrogate passion which he still feels. The theme is the therapeutic effect of having beauty in someone's life. Frenhofer's wife Liz is de facto the early Marianne, now an older lady, and she has some of the best lines in the movie: "They say when you are drowning the entire life flashes before your eyes in a second. Is it possible to capture the whole life on the canvas of a painting? It seems unbelievable, but this is what Frenhofer was actually searching for." In another sequence at night, she talks with Frenhofer: "Shooting stars". - "Make a wish." - "It's too late for that." - "Why are you saying that?" - "Because I stopped expecting things." Despite all of these virtues, "The Beautiful Troublemaker" is still a little bit overhyped. We needed more moments where Frenhofer and Marianne bond, such as the sequence where he falls from his chair and she leans forward, worried, but he just tells her not to move because she accidentally made a perfect pose. Is it a very good, gentle and ambitious little art film? Yes. Is it a great film that completely justifies its 4-hours of running time? No.

Grade:+++

Lucy

Lucy; fantasy action, France, 2014; D: Luc Besson, S: Scarlett Johansson, Morgan Freeman, Choi Min-sik, Amr Waked, Pilou Asbæk 

Taipei. Lucy, an American student, is coerced by her boyfriend Richard into bringing a package to mafia boss Mr. Jang, by handcuffing her to the suitcase. The suitcase contains a mysterious drug, CPH4. Mr. Jang's men kill Richard and surgically insert a bag of the drug into Lucy's intestine, as well as three other people, intending to smuggle them into Europe. After Lucy is kicked in the stomach, the drug spills into her body, causing her to start using more and more unused potentials of her brain, giving her telekinesis and super-intellect. Lucy escapes to Paris and contacts Professor Norman and police officer Pierre. By obtaining all the four bags with the drug, Lucy intravenously absorbs it, creating a supercomputer. She gains a 100% use of the brain, gains the ability to travel through time, and then disappears from her chair.

If the viewers do not take the story seriously, and just regard it as a 'tongue-in-cheek', silly superhero comic-book, then "Lucy" is a fun little fantasy action flick. Except that in the end the movie conversely indeed starts to take itself seriously, but did not establish any philosophical foundations that leads up to it or backs it up. Assembled as a feminist superhero film, "Lucy" enjoys in its audacious showing off of a heroine who gets superpowers to gain revenge (and self-confidence as well) against the villains who harmed her, and it gets a lot of support from a "cute-tough" performance by Scarlett Johansson, whereas director Luc Besson inserts some of his trademark outbursts of style: the scene where a shot body slides on the floor until it gets stopped by Lucy's heel who enters the building is equally as memorable as the one where she just "swipes" right with her hand and her telekinesis just blows off a gangster to the right like a toy. However, even leaving the scientific side aside, "Lucy" is illogical at times: would a super-intelligent woman really enter a hospital with a gun in her hand, in front of everyone and in front of surveillance cameras? Wouldn't an intelligent person at least try to hide her gun and put a mask on her head, so that she won't be recognized and chased by the police afterwards? Some of the scenes are also too cheesy. One in particular has Lucy showing up on the TV screen of Professor Norman (Morgan Freeman), and then Lucy goes on bragging about her super-powers and superiority, about how she controls all the cells, that you don't know if it is more cringeworthy when it was written in the script or when Johansson is forced to say these lines aloud. The film creates an ending which it does not understand itself, though it is a motive of numerous other works in which life does not know what to do with all the Universe, yet up until it, "Lucy" works as a fast roller coaster that keeps the viewers engaged.

Grade:++