Limitless on DVD

The idea of Limitless is fascinating. Eddie Morra (played by Bradley Cooper from Alias), a straggly-haired bum with a serious case of writer's block, stumbles onto a drug that lets him unlock one hundred percent of his brain at once. The average human uses something like twenty percent. So, he becomes incredibly intelligent, able to remember facts he picked up in passing and never realized were still in his brain, able to assimilate fighting techniques he only ever saw on TV. With such power, he has the ability to get rich quick, to maneuver his way to the top of society, perhaps even to become president if he so wishes. All he has to do is keep taking the drug on a daily basis or he goes back to his old bum self.

But the drug is obviously addictive and, therefore, extremely dangerous. Others have taken it before him, and they are now all dead or dying. Someone keeps hunting him down and trying to kill him. Not to mention the thug who gets ahold of one of his pills and then blackmails him to keep supplying. Eddie has a complicated life, and somewhere along the way, it's going to crack.

I thought this was an intriguing concept and a good, though exaggerated, way to get across the message that drugs are really, really bad. But the end kind of ruined the message, and I have to give SPOILERS here, so if you plan to see the movie, I strongly caution you against reading the section in brackets.

[The drug has severe side-affects if you stop taking it, leading to sickness and often death. But if you take too much and don't watch your health in other ways, the drug makes you lose hours of your life, not knowing what happened or where you were. When Eddie gets to the point of collapse, he realizes he has to dose down slowly, but by then, it's almost too late. His pills are stolen, and he's being chased by another guy who's on them. There's no way he can win. Through a very disturbing scene you will undoubtedly cringe away from, he drinks blood filled with the drug and manages to escape torture and death.

Then the movie skips ahead twelve months to Eddie running for senator. The basic gist of the end is this: Eddie beats the drug and manages to retain an incredible amount of intelligence without being on it. He wins, which is what you want your hero to do, right? But it doesn't feel right. For one, Eddie was never really a hero; he was a druggie. He didn't just get off the drug; he manipulated the recipe so that when he finally did get off, his brain would still function at those high levels. He still used the drug to get higher up in life, and in the end, he became something he wasn't, something no normal human is supposed to be. It's kind of cool, but it's also wrong and sends the opposite message about drugs than I thought the movie was sending: if you're smart enough, you can beat the drug. So not true.]

SPOILERS END.

So, even though this movie is science fiction, I would use caution in letting younger viewers see it. It's rated PG-13, but there is some sexuality, violence (stabbing), disturbing imagery (drinking blood, for one), and language.

Three stars.

Winter's Bone on DVD

Winter's Bone was one of the ten Best Picture Nominees for this year's Academy Awards. I don't normally care about the Oscars because they usually celebrate movies that are sort of obscure or ultra-artsy, but this year had a lot of good nominations, movies I was actually interested in, regardless of their Hollywood popularity. With Winter's Bone, I've now managed to see all but one of the Best Picture Nominees, that one being The Kids Are All Right, which I wouldn't be opposed to seeing, though it's not high on my list.

Winter's Bone is, in my opinion, one of the weaker titles to be nominated. Something about its completely depressing nature and the grayness of the story and cinematography must have appealed to the Hollywood populace, but there's not even that much of a storyline. It's dark, oppressive, sometimes morbid, and will leave you feeling like you've glimpsed Hell. So, no, I don't recommend it.

The basic plot is this: 17-year-old Ree takes care of her two younger siblings and mentally-detached mom. Her dad, extended family, and neighbors are all country bums who cook drugs, abuse their wives, and intimidate the law. When the law comes looking for Ree's dad to meet his court date or lose his land, it's up to Ree to find out what became of him and save her home. But no one's talking, and when Ree pries deeper, she gets into big trouble with her dad's rivals. But Ree is tough, "Bread and Butter" as she calls herself, loyal to her people. She won't go to the law for help they can't give anyway, and she'll find her dad, even if she's beaten bloody along the way. SPOILERS follow. In the end, her dad is dead, she takes the bones of his hands back to the police as proof so that she doesn't lose her land, and she goes on living the way she always has, taking care of her family in a miserable hell of a world.

I think the movie tried to put a positive spin on the end. Throughout, you see these two young kids making the best of their life, playing even. Perhaps the movie was trying to suggest that hope exists in the midst of all this, but I think it was just trying to be depressing.

The movie is rated R for good reason: language, mature themes, drugs, violence (though Ree's beating is skipped over in the film). I wouldn't recommend this movie to anyone. I didn't love The Fighter, another Oscar nomination, but it was, by far, better than Winter's Bone though it carried similar themes. Black Swan was a more put-together movie, but I still give it last place for inappropriate onscreen sexuality. However, I have a hard time saying which I disliked more: Black Swan or Winter's Bone. Skip them both.