"Hit Girl" meets "The Incredible Shrinking Man"

Rating: 9/10 (6 September 2014)

"We've codified our existence to bring it down to human size, to make it comprehensible, we've created a scale so we can forget its unfathomable scale" says Lucy (Scarlett Johansson) by way of summation of the insights she has achieved under an accidental overdose of a new and powerful synthetic drug.
This is to date Johansson's best performance, full of tight close-ups on her face as her character nonverbally radiates a dimensionality seldom seen on the screen. I suspect that Evan Rachel Wood's Dolores Abernathy character in "Westword" was influenced by Johansson's take on her title character. Both characters drift seamlessly in and out of a distanced robotic mindset. Especially remarkable is Lucy's overseas phone call to her mother.
"Lucy" is a philosophical film being marketed as science fiction - action adventure. Since it worked for "2001: A Space Odyssey" back in 1968 I guess they thought it would work here. But the mismatch has caused "Lucy" to miss much of Luc Besson's intended audience and to disappoint those looking for Scarlett doing a "Leon" inspired "Kick-Ass" number in tight shiny "Black Widow" latex.
The mismatch between the film and its promotional campaign is my only major criticism. A minor criticism is the poor quality of the digital effects (the car chase doesn't hold a candle to the old fashion way, insert 1998's "Ronin" here). Given the budget limitations, the POV, and the transforming mental condition of the title character; the film would have been far better served had Beeson substituted expressionism for realism. Cinema greatness was there for the taking.
As in "The Incredible Shrinking Man" and "2001: A Space Odyssey" the existential theme is not anti-God (or even pro Übermensch), but anti-ego. With a character slowly losing their connection with humanity, finally connecting with the infinite at the moment they become infinitesimal.
"Man's task in life is the paradoxical one of realizing his individuality and at the same time transcending it to arrive at the experience of universality. Only the fully developed self can drop the ego."
-Erich Fromm
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.