Released: 2011
Director: Neil Burger
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Abbie Cornish, Robert DeNiro
A great story told pretty poorly
Bradley Cooper was recently named People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, much to the chagrin of Ryan Gosling fans who simply can’t understand why their man has been overlooked. In the past couple of years Cooper has managed to make the jump from TV pretty boy in Alias to Hollywood heart-throb. His roles in ensemble pieces such as The Hangover and The A-Team have brought him to public consciousness and with Limitless
Cooper plays Eddie Morra, a down on his luck would be author. He is suffering from writers’ block, lives in a grotty apartment in a seedy part of town and his girlfriend Lindy has just dumped him. One drunken afternoon he has a chance meeting with his former brother in law who gifts him a new drug, one which will help him access the capabilities of his entire brain. Eddie find that using NZT opens up a new world to him, one where he is ultra-intelligent, successful, popular and rich. He soon attracts the attention of powerful businessman Carl van Loon (yes, really!) who employs him to broker the biggest corporate merger in history. On the downside Eddie finds that he is unable to function without NZT and he has also come to the notice of various bad guys who are keen to harness the powers of the wonder-drug for their own ends.
The story, based on a novel by Alan Glynn, is compelling and I was intrigued by the concept. If, as the film claims, we do only access 20% of our brain’s power the the possibilities of being able to use it completely are mind-blowing. Limitless offers fun but almost believable examples of how we could benefit from this new skill. We would remember the details of books that we had previously only seen in passing, be able to recall news stories from years gone by and develop the ability to understand complex financial situations in an instant. Personally I’d settle for the power to write a best-selling novel in just four days as Eddie does.
Bradley Cooper is a charming and likeable leading man but I’m not sure that this is the film to take him to the top. He’s not quite got the presence required to completely carry a movie on his own. Still, he was probably 100 times better than the original star Shia LeBoeuf who had to withdraw from filming due to an injury. Robert DeNiro plays the same cliched, hard-bitten character that he’s been playing for the past fifteen years or so. It’s getting tiring to see such a great actor reduced to bit parts and bad comedies.
Abbie Cornish as Lindy, Eddie’s ex-girlfriend and Anna Friel as his ex-wife are both purely functional in their roles. The parts are small and under-developed but the actresses are both tolerably good.
The one aspect of the film that totally frustrated me was the direction. I’m sure that some people would regard the flashing numbers, floating words, time-lapse shots and narration as edgy and ingenious. I found it tiring and my annoyance at the direction distracted me from what could have been a great film. The story was high concept and interesting enough without overwhelming it with unnecessary effects.
Limitless was a perfectly decent way to spend a couple of hours, the poor direction stopped it from achieving anything more than that. I’m sure that Bradley Cooper is destined for big things in the next few years, but this wasn’t the star-making vehicle he would have wanted it to be.