What Happens When You Reach 100 percent?

Rating: 5/10 (31 July 2014)

Lucy is a film directed by Luc Besson who is known for bigger action films. In the past I have enjoyed some of his film like LÃ©on: The Professional and The Fifth Element, however recently he hasn't been directing much, only writing for franchises like Transporter and Taken. While his films are usually action packed, this film is a prime example of squeezing all of the action into the trailer. This is my review of Lucy.
Luc Besson not only directs this film, but he also wrote it as well. As I just mentioned above Besson has been writing a lot of big action movies lately like Taken one and two, and also 3 Days To Kill. I enjoy all three of those films, some more so than others, but they are generally fun. This film lacked that fun especially in the script. The characters are not developed well at all, and frankly caring for Lucy never really happens. We just want to see action, and instead we are forced an insane plot(nothing wrong with that in a film like this) and far too much useless banter. With a short runtime, this film suffers even more. With lack of character development and such a short runtime, its a wonder we understood anything Besson wanted from this film. So in the writing department Besson gets a below average rating.
Now onto the directing, also done by Luc Besson. While Besson has taken some time off from directing action films, he generally knows how to do it. The same can easily be said here. While his script fails to bring in much action at all, when the action does hit(mainly towards the end of the film) it is filmed amazingly. The acting that Besson helps guide on the screen is not bad, but not great. Scarlett Johansson as Lucy and Morgan Freeman as Professor Norman lead this cast with some fine secondary actors like Amr Waked and Min-sik Choi(who plays a fantastic bad guy). Sadly as I mentioned in my comments about the script, the characters are so poorly progressed that caring about them never really happens. Jonansson delivers a nice performance and I will give her credit for that, and credit as well to Besson for leading her in the right direction with this film. So, overall Besson does a passable job directing as he leads a nice action scene towards the end of the film that looks amazing, but sadly the action is almost not there minus a couple very short scenes.
Eric Serra composed the score for this film, he has previously scored such films as Arthur and the War of the Two Worlds and The Lady, both directed by Luc Besson. This score is generally forgettable. When the action heats up(it happens so seldomly that don't expect much) his score gets much better, and is passable. As a whole the score is nothing to brag about though.
Overall if you were expecting a bigger action film, then you will be disappointed. If you were looking for a film with at least a somewhat good story, then you will also be disappointed. The film however is really short(just over eighty minutes without credits) and moves by pretty quickly without much drag, so if you feel the need to waste some time, then this film may be worth it.
5/10