It's amazing what a little pill can do. Just ask Eddie Morra (Bradley Cooper), a slobby aspiring novelist with a massive writing block and the ugliest ponytail you ever, ever saw. Before he takes the experimental drug NZT, he's pathetic. Aimless. Behind on his rent. Incapable of washing dishes and/or hair. No wonder his girlfriend (Abbie Cornish) dumps him, the loser.
But one dose of NZT, which amps up his brainpower to superhuman levels, and blammo! "Enhanced Eddie." Within minutes he talks the landlady into bed with him. Then he tidies his apartment, gets a haircut and buys new clothes. Even better, NZT allows him to whip off a brilliant first novel in less than a week, the words tinkling around him in a heaven-sent rush of pure literary genius. After that: he learns to play Rachmaninoff, picks up babes in Puerto Vallarta, turns fluent in multiple languages and, naturally, conquers the stock market.
All of this occurs near the start of "Limitless," a snazzy piece of total nonsense that asks what a hypothetical schlub might do if he could access 100 percent of his brain. Which is kind of funny, because the rest of us schlubs access 100 percent of our brains on a daily basis, just not all of it simultaneously. The old myth suggesting that only 10 or 20 percent of gray matter is accessible to its owners is, just that, a myth.
It makes a great premise, though. It also makes a great excuse to put Bradley Cooper in every scene in various configurations of clothing, grooming, lighting and perkiness. Told from Eddie's perspective, the movie features his own bemused narration as he morphs from boobish slacker to glam jet-setter to something approximating a young Mitt Romney. Cooper is eminently watchable throughout, and his performance should dispel any lingering doubt that he has the chops to carry a movie alone. He even squares off against Robert De Niro (as a financial bigwig) without getting crushed.
The story gets away from itself as it barrels forward. The eensy-weensy bit of sense it makes at the beginning is quickly sacrificed in a conclusion so facile, illogical and cheap that it could use a dose of NZT itself. But until then, director Neil Burger (2006's "The Illusionist") and screenwriter Leslie Dixon (adapting Alan Glynn's novel "The Dark Fields") spin out their tale with restless energy. The visuals are giddy, illustrating Eddie's high with funhouse lenses, over-exposed colors, supersonic edits and, when side effects kick in, dizzying flights through the streets of New York.
For a long and interesting stretch, "Limitless" looks and acts like a high-concept addiction narrative, a Just-Say-No cautionary tale pocked with strung-out ex-junkies and withdrawal symptoms. But it's also a thriller: with that comes some monkey business with a vicious Russian mobster (Andrew Howard), and, with that, an excuse for some rather creative violence later on. It turns out the smart pill enhances every part of the brain, including the part that discerns alternate uses for a grand piano. Amazing.