Early reviews of Scarlett Johansson’s new movie Lucy are piling up ahead of its theatrical release, and it’s looking like the film is an entertaining, if mixed, bag.

Scarlett Johansson
Scarlett Johansson plays the lead in forthcoming thriller Lucy

Directed by Luc Besson, Johansson plays Lucy, a woman living in Taipei and forced to work for drug gangs as a mule. After the drugs she is carrying absorb themselves into her body, her brain begins to use more than the normal 10% of its capacity and becomes close to superhuman.

Thematically, Lucy is in a proud lineage of science fiction films dealing with expanded consciousness and our interactions with the universe around us. Many have remarked upon its explicit similarities to 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Matrix and, most obviously, Limitless.

MORE: Lucy bears a strong resemblance to the brilliant Limitless

But these similarities hinder the enjoyment of the film according to some. Variety is one of the harsher verdicts, saying that Lucy is “virtually an anti-thriller - devoid of suspense or any real sense of danger due to the fact that its heroine is more or less invincible”. Less Limitless and more Transcendence, then.

LucyScarlett Johansson in 'Lucy'

Many others have enjoyed the film despite some its weaknesses. IGN entertainment said “more of Lucy works than doesn't… …even if its 'science' more than strains suspension of disbelief”, while The Guardian praised it for its fundamental daftness: “the end of the movie goes completely off the rails, but in a way that is charming in its stupidity”.

So it would seem from the initial reviews that what you take away from Lucy will be largely down to how far you’re prepared to suspend your disbelief and let the film carry you away. Furthermore, Johansson has been a compelling screen presence for years now and Besson represents something of a safe pair of hands for any script. And it has Morgan Freeman in it, which is never a bad thing.

Watch the trailer for ‘Lucy’ here