Limitless | Review

There’s a popular saying that humans can only access a small portion of their brains. Whether or not this is true, I don’t know. In ‘Limitless’, Eddie Morra (Bradley Cooper) is given the chance to access 100% of his brain, changing his life entirely.

At the start of the film, Eddie is just coming off a series of unfortunate events. Behind on his novel deadline, as well as being dumped by his long-term girlfriend Lindy (Abbie Cornish), Eddie has nothing to lose when he decides to take a drug introduced by his ex-brother-in-law. This drug, NZT-48, allows total access to your brain. The drug makes Eddie not only smarter, but also more focused, active, and successful.

Eddie finishes his entire novel in about four days, does extremely well in the stock market (raising his money from thousands to millions in less than a week), and quickly climbs up the social ladder due to the special drug. However, with all drugs comes side-effects – it’s a given. Eddie’s drug-induced mind constantly moves forward, never resting, and he begins to have memory lapses, in which he can’t remember anything he’s done in the past 18 hours; he starts getting sick, light-headed, and physically-exhausted. Soon, it’s discovered that users of the drug die or become mentally-ill if use of the drug is stopped, and Eddie’s stash of NZT-48 is quickly running out.

‘Limitless’ is a lot more interesting and entertaining than its plot synopsis (and trailer) makes it seem. The film isn’t just about Eddie’s life flipping over from his drug-use. It’s not just about his newfound success or the problem with his dying supply of NZT-48. The film involves the dangers of Eddie’s drug abuse, the responsibility that comes with great power and wealth, as well as a darker and shadier plotline revolving around other users of the special drug. Someone’s murdered during the same time Eddie has his memory-lapse, leaving him unaware if he’s the culprit or not. A stranger is consistently following Eddie, and frequently attacks him. The president of a major business company seems to know something about the drug. Another man who uses the special drug becomes Eddie’s very own intellectual rival, perhaps even greater. ‘Limitless’ truly offers more than it suggests.

I love the change in the film’s color-palette whenever Eddie takes the special drug, compared to his normal state of mind. When Eddie isn’t taking the drug, the tone and overall color of the film is darker, grittier, and duller. But when Eddie takes an NZT-48 pill, the film suddenly bursts with bright and vivid colors, which is extremely pleasing to view. Eddie in a drug-induced state transforms the film into a fast-paced, exhilarating ride. The film is physically exhausting to watch, in a good way, just like how the drug takes a physical toll on Eddie, himself.

Neil Burger (‘The Illusionist’) directs ‘Limitless’ with full-force, creating an effectively-entertaining thriller film with interesting characters, dialogue, actions, and visuals. The screenplay, though written strongly by Leslie Dixon, could have used a bit more work. The film is very uneven throughout with its many plot twists and questions raised. When something new comes up that’s purposely left unexplained for the moment, the film immediately moves forward and forgets about the questionable event until, pretty much, the end. And there are a lot of these questionable events and plot twists. By the end of the film, you probably won’t even realize the film answered its many questions because it’s done so quickly and subtly that it’s difficult to notice! I had to figure everything out from the internet!

The acting in ‘Limitless’ is commendable, with Bradley Cooper (‘The Hangover’) portraying the main character of Eddie Morra impressively. Cooper’s appealing and charismatic persona in the film benefits the film, and it makes him likable. Robert De Niro is good as businessman Carl Van Loon, though he isn’t featured much in the film.

I went in ‘Limitless’ with low-expectations. It received good reviews, but not great. The film surprised me and left me completely satisfied, as well as physically-exhausted from everything that happens in it. Going into ‘Limitless’ with low-expectations for it to not be bad at all probably made me like it more than I should. It has problems, sure, and it’s probably not as smart of a film as it thinks it is, or should have been, but it’s purely entertaining without ever feeling cheap. ‘Limitless’ is not a film for everyone, but personally, I was impressed at how bad it wasn’t.

Three out of four Kents.

PS: The film features some very interesting and creative visual effects and camera shots. The freeze-frame-zooming shots or whatever they’re called are mesmerizing.

PSS: ‘Limitless’ features the best title/opening sequence I’ve seen in a long time.