LUCY Review

Lucy is lightning fast. As soon as Luc Besson's latest European-tinged philosophical reflection disguised as an action film begins we are in the throws of multiple ideas and unknown situations. There is never a moment as the film begins to unfold where one wonders past what Besson's intent was with the film for, despite Morgan Freeman preaching to a choir of eager college students, we easily become wrapped up in these universal questions and ponderings. Not three years ago the highly regarded Terrence Malick crafted a film Roger Ebert placed on his "Greatest Films of All Time" column that contributed to the Sight & Sound poll. Malick's Tree of Life is a film that attempts to cover the span of not just one human life, but the existence of life on our planet and in some weird, off-beaten way Lucy attempts to explore the same thoughts and ideas with the added-bonus of putting our central human subject in a state of heightened reality. This all may sound quite strange given the trailers for this Scarlett Johansson-starrer made it look like a science-fiction action flick in which Scar Jo kicks ass after being betrayed and infused with a product that unlocks the other ninety percent of the human brain. Still, while all of this is somewhat accurate in the vein all of those things happen and you would certainly classify the film as science fiction, this is a movie more about the endless possibilities than it is who our heroine will fight next. Taking its cues from the myth that says humans only use ten percent of our brains, Besson explores what might occur if we were enabled to use the full capacity of our cognitive reach and he thinks some strange stuff might begin to happen. The thing about Lucy though is that this is a film you can't take overly-serious or become caught up in the semantics of if this could really happen and if it did, what it might actually mean if the entire human race were enabled to do as Lucy. No, what one must be able to do with a movie as (somewhat) outlandish as this is to take it all in on its own terms and enjoy it or leave it alone altogether. For me, I love an interestingly strange premise, the science fiction genre in general and Johansson has been on somewhat of a streak as of late so I was more than willing to look past any breaks in reality and simply enjoy Lucy for what she is: Besson's exploration of the nature of life through the eyes of the kinetic energy with which he directs.

RUSH Review

Upon first hearing about Rush I was under the impression that it would mainly center itself around the wreck in which Formula 1 race car driver Niki Lauda was severely burned and had such a drive to compete and will to win and become world champion that he returned to racing less than a month after his wreck and surprised everyone. Even in that admittedly compact and typical synopsis it is easy to see why this true life story would be ideal to tell on the big screen, especially with the bonus of being a sports movie. I also assumed that Chris Hemsworth would be playing Lauda as he seemed the central point of the project and I had no former knowledge of the world of Formula 1 racing or what type of history they were pulling from here. When I watched the first trailer for the film and discovered that not only was the film about Lauda, as portrayed by Daniel Brühl of Inglorious Basterds, overcoming the brakes his near fatal crash put on his career, but also a famous rivalry between he and the far more adventurous James Hunt (Hemsworth) I was pleasantly surprised there was more to the story. While I've never been a fan of racing it was easy to see why this movie could be an intriguing piece of drama and with Ron Howard (Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind) at the helm it was at least guaranteed to some degree that there would be a level of pedigree to the project, but whether it would stray towards safe, middle ground or exceptional territory was what we were left to determine. Lucky for us, Rush is not simply the movie of a man who drives cars in circles for a living overcoming a set of odds, but it is almost a psychological evaluation of two men who have vastly different approaches to the same thing and how those approaches define them as men and determine every other aspect of their lives that has nothing to do with their job that happens to put them in life or death situations every time they start their engines. It is a fascinating and thrilling film to experience, one I could hardly make any complaints about other than the fact that it didn't have as impressive an impact on me as I expected. Still, this is a well crafted film that defies story convention and features great performances from its two leads that will serve as a true breakout for one and a definitive breakaway for the other.