Remember what the Dormouse said > Feed your head

Rating: 7/10 (27 July 2014)

This was inexplicably recommended to me by one of my movie-expert friends, an expert who I think doesn't watch any films older than brand new. If there's a next time I'll make sure I'll tell him my opinion on this one and that The Wizard Of Oz is one of my favourite smart films, he may have heard of that one.
Bradley Cooper plays a loser who gets to pop a mind-expanding pill that changes his life; as in one pill makes you larger, one pill makes you small blah. It's all slickly and sickly handled, Cooper begins his rise to wealth and power on the back of a limited amount of the drug, whilst brutal gangsters and other assorted thuggish users are out to nobble him for his stash. It's an engrossing plot for the most part with only a couple of gross-out bits â€“ didn't see the slurpy bit coming with the Russian gangster, but didn't want to either. Cooper puts in his usual sterling performance as the main man and he's in almost every scene. As with all fantasies you're forced to take a number of plot turns for granted and follow the relative outcome algorithms along to the end, either to the end of the film or more likely to the end of the supply of drugs. At least the spice on Frank Herbert's science-fictional Dune set ten thousand years in the future was inexhaustible! But as with all things, the ending comes and with it the only twist possible: however if you're not prescient reference the result of Paul Muad'dib's junkie experience on Dune. My report back on this is it's well made violent hokum but just not my cup of tea.