Brainless entertainment

Rating: 6/10 (28 July 2014)

There often comes a movie which is based on a ridiculous premise that is somewhat entertaining. Lucy is one of those.
There's no formal introduction of the character of Lucy except that she's living in Taipei. How she got there, who she is, what she does for a living are all left to the viewer's imagination. She somehow gets mixed up in affairs that led her to be a victim of CPH4 (blue crystals) ingestion in large quantities. (We're told by Morgan Freeman that CPH4 is produced by a pregnant woman's body in small quantities to help the foetus develop bones).
The more CPH4 gets ingested, the higher percentage of brain she uses and unfortunately, the more ridiculous the movie gets. Lucy uses her enhanced brain usage to free herself from the captors and "gather" information about whereabouts of the other victims as her body is now craving more CPH4. She can now see the inner workings of trees and people and manages to diagnose her friend as well. She then ends up in France and makes allies with a cop to track down the other victims and contact Morgan Freeman, all while bad guys are trying to hunt her down.
The visual effects and action sequences are good but they can't salvage a poorly scripted movie. One of the ridiculous moments is a call Lucy places to her mother. Any sane mother would have asked "Are you high or on drugs?". I don't know how other audience members kept a straight face through that. Plus there are numerous other hilarious metaphors.
The final moments are over the top where Lucy becomes an all knowing all encompassing monster as she devours all the remaining CPH4, while the cop is trying to fend off bad guys and Morgan Freeman and other neuroscientists are watching in awe. And then as Morgan Freeman suggests, she manages to "pass on" her information.
Scarlett's decent acting might be the saving grace for this movie. If you like movies like Crank, then this might be good entertainment. Regardless, remember to use only 10% of your brain while watching this.