The end of my birthday [week] I was surrounded by friends and a movie I'd been waiting three months for! Bradley Cooper uses a superdug to access 100% of his mind but brings trouble on an epic scale when he starts using his "powers" to investigate the drug's mysterious origins and achieve wealth and power at the same time. It is based on the book
The Dark Fields by Alan Glynn and directed by Neil Burger.
Thing is, everything opens up to Eddie. Infact I thought that would make a good title for this movie besides "Limitless", "Open", maybe even "100 Percent". Everything Eddie's ever been interested in or could be interested in, focusing on it he can flesh it out just by working harder at it but with total focus on
it. By listening to the basics of a language like once, he becomes fluent!
The sky is the limit!
The tension comes from that fact that Eddie Mora (BradleyCooper) needs more and more of The Pill, one a day to be precise (though he does up it to twice a day briefly) in order to stay 100%. And what I like is watching him get more darring in order to maintain his new lifestyle and what he's willing to risk. A scene near the ending is especially incredible when Eddie is pushed to fight or die to be advanced forever!
Also the movie makes me ask, is it risky because the boost is sort of unnatural? And what would it be like to be
limitless and devoid of say greed? Is everyone prone to wanting only money and power? What about love? Or could one focus so intently while on The Pill, known as NZT-48, they could redefine medicine and religion or unlock the secrets to the human condition? What other possibilities could exist?
That's the great fun of the movie: you are
limitless, it all depends on your bend and what you want to do in your life. There are so many applications and Eddie's narration of the movie makes this reality more personal. I haven't seen a movie at least from an "I" point of view in a while + narration, not like this anyway.
On a technical note, Jo Willems' direction on cinematography is amazing! The fish-eye and zoom effects used to give the sensation of seeing over infinite space and extreme clarity I found so enjoyable I really felt like I was in the movie, like it was my story.
And the fact that the characters on NZT didn't develope powers but became somewhat like say Batman, tacticians and quick thinkers, made the movie seem more plausible and accessable. No one could suddenly perform great feats of strength or anything, save for one scene when Eddie uses memories from Bruce Lee films and other fighting memories to fend off some thugs. But even that sequence fleshes out more the idea that NZT and remind one of anything they witnessed in the past and take it out of their subcounscious. The things we look at once but never focus on, NZT grasps at anything and diects it to where ever your surface focus might need it.
Another thing I liked was the score to this movie. One of the songs plays often times when Bradley is on his A-game and its memorable and nice to hear, let's you know he's about to get the upper hand; most of the time lol.
Anothet technical note is whenever one takes NZT for the first time the color scheme changes and becomes vibrant and the sounds become more noticable. Its like the whole world is buzzing and clear. As Eddie says in the filmd, "I was blind but now I see" and that's literal.
I liked seeing other characters on The Drug too like his girlfriend at one time, then his ex-wife who's just been demolished by abusing it for longer than Eddie has, and even a Russian thug. It feels so much more real to see others experiencing 100% of themselves and how they respond is fun to watch and interesting.
Which brings me to the different relationships. Its tough to figure out who's on NZT and who isn't. Eddie at one point wonders if every tycoon out there started off as a nobody and then got their hands on the wonder drug. He wonders if he's next and whether that's a good thing or bad thing. I like how mythological he made it sound, as if no honest man may have ever earned an office but drugged himself into it. He thinks that of Robert de Niro who mentors him later. One of my favorite things in the movie is when de Niro goes into a speech about how Eddie has lucked into his newfound success and lists off all of the things he hasn't experienced yet that are supposed to make good business men, good business men. The creativity in the things de Niro spoke of were spot on and sounded sooo realistic, I was put in my place just sitting in the theater haha.
My other favorite parts deal with Eddie starting off as a writer. I know what its like to have bad writer's block but I really felt for Eddie when he's trying to force out some creative genius. They really captured that claustrophobic feeling writers get when the words just won't flow + there's a deadline to think about.
Its pretty late as I'm writing this and I have to be up early so I'll begin to close. Rottentomatoes.com has given it about 64% freshness so far. However, that is not a bad thing. I don't know but there is something special and classic about this movie. It and
The Adjustment Bureau reall got me thinking this week. The boundaries could've been pushed further in
Limitless, just like I said earlier I wondered what else a NZT addict would aspire to do, or is wealth and power all human's crave? Even Eddie's ex-wife couldn't escape the temptations.
But the things that the movie did well, it did well. It makes you think... or rather it makes you dream, about what you would do or about what you could or should do next. It even got me and my friend thinking about faith. Can our faith be limitless? Can faith in another, even God be limitless? What about not even for things or other people but in ourselves. After Eddie's girlfriend uses the drug to escape the hit man, she states that the person NZT turns you into, isn't really you. Eddie thinks he becomes the "perfect version of [himself]). Who is right and who is wrong? What or who do these people really look like? And what is 100% or experiential perfection?
Go see this movie readers, pour your dreams out and drink them in as you do and consider and re-evaluate, for the year 2011 or maybe just for the first time in a long, long time.
"Given the risk? What would you do?" -Eddie Mora.
EL FIN
"Honor"
