Be all you can be

Lucy

Crit

Huh! Who knew that watching 2001: A Space Odyssey a week ago was prep for the climactic sequence of this? Is this as ambitious or as smart as Kubrick's take on human possibility and the lifespan of the universe? Well, that's not a fair question; it would be just as fair to ask whether Kubrick was capable of the sort of delightful loony, blissfully faux-intellectual head trip that Luc Besson delivers at his best.

Anyway, it's not just 2001. The obvious jumping-off place for the narrative is D.O.A., with the critical difference that the substance introduced into Lucy's system against her will, contra Nietzsche, will both kill her and make her stronger. Finally, after the cosmic-biography-and-light-show tribute to Kubrick, the film ends with an obvious but nonetheless satisfactory nod to The Grapes of Wrath.

This is not Scarlett Johansson's best role of the past 12 months, or even her 2nd-best, but hey, she's had a pretty terrific 12 (or even 7) months. Here Besson has clearly demanded that, once her character gets the drug, she be as affectless as possible. An interesting choice, and I get it, but it would have been nice had she been allowed to chew a little scenery in a role where ravenous scenery consumption would have made perfect sense. Still, if Luc did not exist . . .

Trailer

• Dracula Untold--It would be hard to overstate my appetite for fresh takes on the Drac story, but this just looks like a dumb, plodding, everything-including-the-kitchen-sink waste of time. Hope I'm wrong.