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Flattering to deceive
Flattering to deceive, This is no Lucy in the sky with diamonds but one who is victimised by her boy friend into being an unwilling carrier of drugs and in the process also changing her entire personality.
Name : Lucy
Cast : Scarlett Johansson, Morgan Freeman, Chou Min-sik & Amr Waked
Direction : Luc Besson
Genre : Sci-fi drama
Rating : **1/2
Like : Editing and Scarlett Johansson
UnLike : The last quarter
This is no Lucy in the sky with diamonds but one who is victimised by her boy friend into being an unwilling carrier of drugs and in the process also changing her entire personality.
Luc Besson’s ‘Lucy’ begins in Taipei, Taiwan where powerful Korean drug lord Jang (Choi Min-sik) holds sway. Lucy (Scarlett Johansson) finds herself forcibly carrying a briefcase (chained to her wrist) with the drugs and told to meet Jang.
There she is made “a mule” or carrier of drugs which are surgically inserted into her stomach and in a bag. It is called CPH4, a highly valuable synthetic super drug which largely increases our brain capacity.
Along with her are three other unsuspecting mules sent to different countries to sell the super drug. Meanwhile, Lucy who has mercilessly kicked by the Korean bodyguards causes a leak in her drug-bag and the chemical leaks into her body increasing her brain capacity alarmingly.
She then enters a hospital and at gunpoint gets the drugs removed. Now she wants to alert the other mules so she meets Jang, after killing a string of bodyguards, and extracts their locations from his brain. With her telekinetic powers (putting “Carrie” to shame) she can do well nigh anything….or everything. This is Besson’s most FX heavy film which he also edits quite well.
In Paris, French cop del Rio (Amr Waked) helps her track the other mules and also drives her through the streets of Paris to provide the physical entertainment.
On another plane we have Prof Norman (Morgan freeman) lecturing on the powers of the brain and how a person uses only 20 per cent of one’s capacity. She then decides to meet him after calling him is instantly at his door, thanks to her super powers.
But Norman’s research is far behind. Lucy’s brain capacity keeps increasing upwards to 99 per cent but the results are unintentionally funny. Now she can neither feel fear, pain or desire as she sets about her mission. But it is the last quarter that is the undoing of the cumulative buildup and by now the narrative has slipped out of grasp.
Scarlett Johansson, however, is as credible as she tries to be and succeeds to a large extent, especially in the earlier half and Choi Min-sik makes a controlled villain. Morgan Freeman is his usual loquacious predictable self in this sci- fi fare which flatters only to deceive.
