I'm into my 138th film of the year and a few patterns of cinema watching occurred to me when we settled down to see Limitless.
1. Saturday between 8pm and 10pm is a really duff time to watch a mainstream movie at a multiplex. This is the time the once-a-year types turn up or couples go on their first date. Neither grouping will be able to resist chitchat. It is also the time that the screens are most full.
2. The people who arrive late will always be the ones who talk most during a movie. My heart sank when two minutes into Limitless three students filled the empty seats next to us (it was another film I saw with one finger in my ear).
3. Average movies will always have sparkling trailers. Ok, this is a spoiler to the review but the trailer for Limitless had me salivating...the movie didn't match up.
4. Films that show the ending first are just plain dumb. What on earth is the point?
And with that we neatly segue into the review for....(drumroll and wait for females to go weak at the knees), Bradley Cooper's Limitless.
I write Bradley Cooper's Limitless because not only is he the executive producer but he oozes out of the screen so much that all was missing was a pair of knickers being thrown from the audience.
Ok, let's be fair, I didn't mind when Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis were getting it on in Black Swan so I just ought to take lasses swooning over Mr Cooper.
I hadn't quite caught on to the Bradley phenomenon until I mentioned his name in our office the other day. I actually thought one of my colleagues was going to weep.
For those of you who have been living on the planet Tharg, Limitless is the story of a failing writer who is offered a drug which unlocks 80 per cent of his brain which has been hitherto unused.
It enables him to finish his book in four days, become a fascinating raconteur and make lots of dosh on the money markets.
Oh, and, of course, he becomes irresistible to women (it is truly hilarious how they try to make one of the most handsome men on the planet look like a tramp in the early part of the film).
Cooper is in virtually every scene. The other roles are virtually cameos. Abbie Cornish is his rather ineffectual partner, Anna Friel appears briefly as his former wife and then there is Robert De Niro.
I am a huge De Niro fan (we have a poster of Goodfellas over our bed, I kid you not) and so expected, from the trailer, for him to have a prominent and enticingly menacing role. Neither were true. I'd guess he was on screen for a total of ten minutes.
Back to Cooper. I always hate admitting that someone who seems to have everything is good but he does well in holding the movie together. His moods swings are credible and his sense of desperation when under pressure and elation when the drug kicks in are entirely believable.
Director Neil Burger had certainly thrown a fizz at Limitless which keeps it going with a relentless pace.
There is great technique in the way he reflects Cooper's character missing time.
But, there are complicated storylines which are resolved just too easily and corners from which Cooper makes too many improbable escapes.
Also, how come so many scenes surround a home answer machine? Aren't they only used by people without mobiles?
And why, did he tell so much of the story at the very start and then reflect back?
Nevertheless, despite the flaws, it's a solid piece of work and I reckon should be rated at 6.5/10 but it was nowhere near the 9/10 the trailer promised.
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