The Case for Limitations

I hadn't originally intended to go to Limitless, but it ended up being an interesting option for a Friday night movie session. I had originally pegged it as a flash-looking but ultimately moronic man against powerful forces kind of actioner - and it turned out, after all my experience going to the movies, that I had it pretty much right.

Bradley Cooper plays, Eddie, a man with writer's block, living in a dingy New York apartment and at his wits end. As happens in these movies, he is offered a way out in the form of a mysterious plastic pill that will allow him to use 100% of his bran power as opposed to the 20% normally used by both mortals (that old line). It's an opportunity he takes. And hijinks ensue.



"What would you do?" is the question posed, and Eddie decides that, with his newfound powers of perception and association, he wants to hobnob with the rich of Wall Street on his way to his ultimate grand plan that will (apparently) benefit all mankind. And have sex with lots of random intelligent and beautiful women who find discourse on the state of stocks a complete turn-on (though I am pretty sure being wooed by Bradley Cooper didn't hurt either).

The storyline doesn't really have plot twists, more plot straight lines. Almost every development is telegraphed a long time in advance. But it doesn't stop the first part of the film being very easy to watch - at least for the first half. Then... well.

It completely jumps the shark (or is it nukes the fridge these days?) when Eddie hides from Russian mobsters in his super secure ultra decked out apartment in downtown New York. Not only does this multimillion dollar apartment have steel rods in the doors that the mobsters completely ignore when they cut out the lock, not only does this apartment not get cell phone reception (wha?), not only are the police not informed when thugs break into a building and smash video cameras and start up a chainsaw, and not only do the windows smash when presented with the slightest internal pressure, but the safe room (I assume it is a safe room) has doors that can be battered down with a mild tap.

What follows from there is just... well, quick, stupid and completely undermines any of the good work laid down at the beginning. Sure the whole idea of this miraculous secret drug that absolurely no one else has access to (who manufactures it again, and why can't anyone else get their hands on it?) falling into this "loser's" hands is typical Hollywood fodder in its incredible improbability, but... I'm sorry, I forgot where I was going with that.

Verdict: Limitless has a whole raft of limitations that make it fall short of using 100% of its brain power to create a film that is actually good. It's not completely painful, but it might be worth leaving before the final 10 minutes to avoid the worst of it. 3 plastic pills out of 10.

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As an aside, Rugby World Cup fever is growing - well, the number of promotional opportunities are. I can successfully avoid a lot of ads on the telly thanks to the joys of recording most of the shows I watch, but there is really no avoiding the stories about Sonny Bill Williams that seem to come out every other day. I wonder if Fair Go will send out "the Chairman" Mau to investigate All Black overload on the NZ populace... but I doubt it somehow.