Lucy (Luc Besson, 2014)

Ah, the old "we use only ten percent of our brains" fallacy that has got so many sci-fi dreamers drooling about the what-ifs of using more. Because this is Luc Besson at the helm once again, despite his promises to retire, the individual endowed with ass-kicking superpowers is of course a tasty starlet in the form of Scarlett Johansson, and there are the obligatory countless guns and car chases as well as Oriental gangsters, ultraviolence never more than a scene away.
Limitless may have been silly, but it was a model of hard science and restraint in comparison to this as Johansson develops god-like powers, preposterously first learning languages without any exposure to them. Then she's suddenly able to manipulate all matter, while becoming more and more estranged from mankind in a Lawnmower Man fashion, which is shown by her acting as blankly and ruthlessly as in Under the Skin. Besson was always cited as a key figure in the 'Cinéma du look', but now there really is nothing beneath the gloss, as impressive as the veneer may be.

4/10