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Limitless

year 2011decade 10sdirector Neil Burgergenre Thrillergenre Mysterygenre Science fiction

105 minutes

Cast

Selected cast credits · Film reference

Bradley Cooper Eddie Morra
Robert De Niro Carl Van Loon
Anna Friel Melissa Gant
Johnny Whitworth Vernon Gant
Andrew Howard Gennady
Tomas Arana Man in Tan Coat
Richard Bekins Hank Atwood
Robert John Burke Don Pierce
T.V. Carpio Valerie
Ned Eisenberg Morris Brandt

Limitless | The Rewatchables

host Bill Simmonshost Chris Ryanhost Shea Serranoproducer Craig Horlbeck
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Roger Ebert's review

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:23:01Read transcript
  • Roger Ebert gave it two and a half stars, calling it not terrifically good but with an intriguing premise, and saying it uses only 15, maybe 20% of its brain, which is still more than a lot of movies do.
  • Ebert did not anticipate the film's impact on streamers and cable; it is called one of the most rewatchable movies of the last 15 years, one you keep watching once he takes the drug.

Most Rewatchable Scene

Cooper versus De Niro ending; the come-up with the editor's voicemails; the knowledge montage

In the discussion (19)
Approx. transcript time · 00:27:40Read transcript
  • The opening, with him on a ledge saying that for a guy with a four-digit IQ he must have missed something, is nominated as a hook that works even though telling viewers where the story ends often fails; it is called good but not the most rewatchable scene.
  • Vern is loved as a great drug dealer who seduces Eddie and then immediately becomes unavailable. — Chris Ryan
  • Vernon Gant is identified as Johnny Whitworth, the star of Empire Records.
  • The dealer explains the drug to Eddie in a grimy, perfect way; Eddie takes it, has sex with the woman down the hall, cleans his room for three days and says he was blind but now he sees.
  • Asked how close someone would have to be to get them to take NZT, the answer is that it would be taken after side-effect questions if a trusted colleague offered it; one late-night Camel Light while writing once felt like a small NZT kick.
  • A runner-up choice is the tablet-a-day title line and the montage in which he finishes a book in four days, learns piano, plays blackjack, has sex with models, diagnoses tumors, learns languages and kung fu, holds court with business elites, cliff dives and trades stocks, all in about 10 minutes.
  • The cliff dive did not look CGI'd, and it is a jackknifed, non-professional dive slamming into the water.
  • The holding-court scenes are loved, though things-are-going-well sequences are always hard to pull off; a joke imagines Chris holding court about the 2022 World Cup with seven experts.
  • The short subway fight, with five people wanting to fight him at once, shows Cooper could have had his own Jason Bourne version, but he never made a straight-up action movie and got artsy.
  • The Bourne Legacy may have misfired choosing Renner over Cooper; the Limitless TV show likewise had the same material without Cooper and did not work.
  • Abbie Cornish's park chase, where she takes a pill to think her way out of a knife attack, is nominated; the film keeps surprising, as when she slices the bad guy's face with a little girl's ice skate or Eddie drinks the bad guy's blood.
  • Asked whether he lived in New York, he says Brooklyn rather than Manhattan and jokes that cabs drive through Central Park every day like in Die Hard with a Vengeance. — Chris Ryan
  • Eddie fighting Russian gangsters and drinking NZT blood is nominated; his vocabulary grows through the film, and the suddenly blinded villain who is still a threat is a favorite trope, as in Halloween and Big Trouble in Little China.
  • The sterile New York arms-dealer apartment is a real fantasy spot.
  • One pick is the Cooper-versus-De Niro ending, with 'I see everything, Carl,' the predicted car accident and his diagnosis of Van Loon's heart; it is also De Niro's best scene.
  • Most action movies end badly, as Taken does with its coda; a 'Bill Simmons cut' ending movies when the villain dies is floated, and this film pulls off not needing another scene, with the lunch ordering scene as dessert.
  • Another favorite is the come-up after he gets the stash, especially the editor leaving three increasingly excited voicemails about his first pages, which is what a professional writer is after.
  • A joke recalls Chris leaving Shea three messages about his eighth-grade football team diary.
  • The pick is the montage where he cures Helen's cancer, learns to play piano and starts day trading. — Chris Ryan

What’s Aged the Best?

Eddie finding the drugs; writer satire; biohacker relevance; pill color scheme; Carl Van Loon's name; knockoff market; weight of the pill bag; NZT community; the premise and Vern's pitch

In the discussion (11)
Approx. transcript time · 00:42:32Read transcript
  • Eddie finding the drugs is a classic what-would-you-do dilemma, and most people would try one.
  • The film stealthily rips on unsuccessful writers; Eddie resembles late-2000s bloggers, and his sci-fi novel as a personal manifesto is bar talk.
  • The film fits the biohacker era of the last 15 years, now a cottage industry, as the ultimate version of maximizing potential.
  • When Eddie takes the pill the film turns up the contrast and maybe changes the stock, an effective trick similar to little tricks in Fight Club. — Chris Ryan
  • Compared with Gordon Willis's Godfather II, it is way too bright.
  • Carl is short for Carlos, so Van Loon can be imagined as a Mexican businessman, and Mora is a Spanish surname: a win for Latinos. — Shea Serrano
  • De Niro's one great speech about Eddie's unearned powers is played as a clip; he seems on autopilot, maybe with cue cards, but nails it.
  • A Limitless knockoff market of fake supplements and YouTube videos, like cure-all CBD pitches at a flea market, could also count as aged the worst.
  • The weight of the pill bag found in the oven ages well, as do clever small setups like the stove search and Vern's line that the pill works better if you're already smart; taking it would just mean tweeting faster. — Shea Serrano
  • Discovering the NZT community, with other users dead and the realization that Atwood is on NZT, is effective because the film doesn't belabor it. — Chris Ryan
  • The premise ages great every year, and Vern's NZT pitch is the best: no notes.

What’s Aged the Worst?

De Niro's autopilot performance; PG-13 rating; Eddie's smart-sounding speeches; Abbie Cornish's running; the TV show

In the discussion (12)
Approx. transcript time · 00:49:27Read transcript
  • De Niro is the pick: after Jackie Brown and Meet the Parents he made paycheck movies, doesn't seem fully into this one and scales it back like Gene Hackman's autopilot in The Replacements, though it works.
  • A disagreement: not a top-20 De Niro performance, but he brings gravity to Carl Van Loon, is better than Paul Giamatti would be, and has an affinity with Cooper while letting him chew the scenery.
  • De Niro could have met Cooper's final threat with a stare and a Heat-style reply; De Niro scales back on autopilot while Pacino gets big.
  • The biggest aged-worst item is the rating: this should have been rated R, with more violence and sex.
  • PG-13 is liked as is, because kids walking through the room are no problem and adults still get the drug and sex material. — Shea Serrano
  • PG-13 suits the TNT, USA and Paramount cable universe with few edits; the TV series was canceled after one season.
  • Eddie's smart-sounding speeches are rough on inspection: the Portugal salt-cod and Brits lines captivate an audience of nine people, and he sounds like he could have run Germany better than Hitler.
  • The basketball version of Eddie sounding smart would be saying threes are worth more than twos, or the Process's bottom-out logic.
  • Abbie Cornish runs pumping her fists; a track coach should have been hired for that scene.
  • There is not much aged-worst; the disappointing TV show is the one item, despite excitement that Cooper pops up in it. — Shea Serrano
  • An R version is wanted to see Cooper break an arm; older movies like Jaws are cited as more leniently rated, countered that a shark is a naturally occurring phenomenon, unlike Total Recall's violence.
  • CBS should have made the show with an older lead, a 62-year-old CEO taking the drug.

Casting What-Ifs

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 00:57:15Read transcript
  • Asked which actor signed on in 2008 and dropped out, the guess is Will Smith, who would have been so good. — Shea Serrano
  • The guess is rejected: it is not Will Smith, though a good guess.
  • The answer, as transcribed, is Shia LeBuff. — Chris Ryan
  • LaBeouf was getting good parts around Disturbia and Eagle Eye, but the movie doesn't work with him because his face is too kiddish, like a child in a suit after Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.

The Ruffalo / Hanna / Rubinek / Partridge Overacting Award

The running bad guy

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 01:00:31Read transcript
  • The running bad guy gets it for trying to look evil while running, short of the Terminator 2 standard.
  • He is a fun bad guy who is just doing a job; after his boss dies he helps Eddie get the pills and wants nothing in return.

The Dion Waiters Award for Best Heat Check Performance

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 01:01:15Read transcript
  • One pick is Johnny Whitworth.
  • Another pick is Cornish, the female lead.
  • Another pick is Gennedy, as transcribed, played by Andrew Howard, with uncertainty over how to pronounce the name.
  • The Gennady pick is liked for when the drug kicks in for him: nicer clothes, a slightly better vocabulary, more of a thinker who wants an import-export business.

Recasting Couch

No recasts; Brie Larson in the Abbie Cornish part

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 01:01:47Read transcript
  • Improving on De Niro was considered, but having him is still liked, along with Cornish and basically everybody; no part would be recast.
  • Brie Larson could slide into the Cornish part and bring a better run.

Half-Assed Internet Research

Visual effects for the drug

In the discussion (1)
Approx. transcript time · 01:02:27Read transcript
  • The film's wonder-drug effects use fractal zooming, jump cuts, out-of-body scenes and motion-control photography, including the multiple Eddies cleaning his apartment.

Apex Mountain

Abbie Cornish; little-kid ice-skate attacks; Paul Leonard Morgan's score

In the discussion (10)
Approx. transcript time · 01:02:52Read transcript
  • Cooper's Apex is American Sniper, which he funded and which is his action Apex; it is not this movie.
  • Relativity Media is raised: they gamed the system, turning a $40 million movie into $170 million and proving their formula.
  • Abbie Cornish gets a yes; she seemed to be having a moment, also with Ryan Philippe, before Brie Larson, in a garbled line, corrected her out of it.
  • Little-kid ice-skate attacks are definitely a peak: choosing the eight-year-old's skate over gardening shears or a baseball bat is crazy.
  • For skating-rink attempted murders The Good Son is chosen over this; a riff imagines the dad explaining the afternoon to his wife.
  • Fake Russian accents are up there but not the top; Malcovich (as transcribed) in Rounders is in the conversation, preferred over Connery's 'one ping only' for quotable lines. — Chris Ryan
  • Subway fights get a no: not even a podium finisher behind The Warriors, Fast and Furious 6 and Neo versus Agent Smith in The Matrix.
  • Drugs that give all-being powers are floated as an Apex candidate without a stated answer.
  • The guy version of the Pretty Woman glow-up montage, from extra-looking to perfectly fitted suit with sit-ups and great skin, is raised as a candidate without a stated answer. — Chris Ryan
  • Composer Paul Leonard Morgan's score is called his Apex: it sounds like what becoming smart would sound like inside your head.

Picking Nits

Unfrisked at the murder scene; New York Post profile; fast Van Loon hire; Van Loon recognized in restaurants; unpaid loan shark; loan math; helpful running bad guy; three dead men before his campaign

In the discussion (7)
Approx. transcript time · 01:08:48Read transcript
  • The biggest nit is that the police don't frisk Eddie at the murder scene despite his cash and off-market chemicals, and calling the police beside a dead body would bring follow-up questions.
  • The New York Post profiles him after only about four days of trading success.
  • Carl Van Loon hires him after one meeting, and restaurant patrons announce who Van Loon is and his fortune.
  • If Eddie were so smart, he would have paid off the Russian loan shark on time; he makes mistake after mistake.
  • The loan math fails: starting from $800 and quintupling it five times in a row is already like $500,000, so why borrow $100,000; he is using maybe 78% of his brain.
  • The running bad guy freely takes Eddie to his dead boss's place out of spite toward the lawyer, after also working for Atwood as driver and assassin.
  • Three dead men in Eddie's apartment are tied to an arms dealer who used to live there, yet a year later he runs for office with no scrutiny despite being a person of interest in another murder.

Sequel, Prequel, Limited Series, or All-Black Remake

Limitless sequel or 10-episode Netflix series with Bradley Cooper

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 01:12:50Read transcript
  • After the failed CBS show, the options are a Limitless 2 sequel with Cooper 11 or 12 years later, or a prestige Netflix series that could pay him; Cooper has to be in it either way.
  • Cooper could become the Carl Van Loon figure facing a new guy on a new drug, or face Jesse Eisenberg, who would get even smarter on NZT.
  • Unlike unwanted sequels, this world merits a return: post-presidency life, early Bitcoin, taking on Haralabob, drafting Luca, or buying an NBA team that goes 75-7.
  • Cooper is busy directing and starring in a Leonard Bernstein film; Limitless 2 should come after that.

Probably Unanswerable Questions

Best actor ever for Limitless; oven as the NZT hiding spot

In the discussion (9)
Approx. transcript time · 01:15:34Read transcript
  • Asked for the all-time best person to star in Limitless, Will Smith is the first pick for his charm and emotional attachment. — Shea Serrano
  • Given 2002 Will Smith or Firm-era Tom Cruise, the choice is Cruise, with early Michael J. Fox as an interesting alternative after Alex Keaton's diet pills. — Chris Ryan
  • Another vote goes to Cruise, who would have learned skills like flying a helicopter or winning at race-car driving; no one loses.
  • An amendment requires putting Cooper into the swapped star's movie: take 2004 Will Smith after Bad Boys 2 and swap out I, Robot for Cooper.
  • Cooper as Mike Lowrey in Bad Boys with Martin Lawrence is offered as the obvious swap; Cooper in The Firm is another, and Cruise didn't make enough Limitless-type movies, unlike Keanu.
  • With cops coming, the oven is questioned as the best hiding place and called underrated for money, drugs or guns.
  • A childhood memory recalls an aunt who hid drugs in the microwave; anything oven-related is endorsed.
  • An old-fashioned air-conditioner vent, as in No Country, is always great.
  • The alternative is to take all the NZT and make yourself police commissioner.

What Piece of Memorabilia Would You Want From This Movie?

Fake bag of pills; Senate campaign t-shirt and poster; Eddie's novel

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 01:20:12Read transcript
  • The choice is between the prop fake bag of pills and a t-shirt and poster combo from his Senate run (transcribed as 'give me some more a'); his novel is also suggested.
  • Taking one from the bag of pills would be irresistible; the fake bag of pills is chosen because the t-shirt could be made for the holidays.

More from the conversation

A Ringer network plug mentions The Watch and No Skips, whose biggest response came from the My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy episode.
Approx. transcript time · 00:01:17Read transcript
The film came out in 2011 and feels timeless; it is ranked with John Wick one and two as among the most impactful action movies of the last 10 years, with Den of Thieves as an optional addition.
Approx. transcript time · 00:03:09Read transcript
The premise is called unassailable: a kind-of-loser writer finds a drug that transforms his life.
Approx. transcript time · 00:03:09Read transcript
Taking a pill that makes you super smart is all the premise needs; even knowing most users die, taking it for a six-month stretch to write a sci-fi novel in four days would be worth it.
Approx. transcript time · 00:03:53Read transcript
Limitless is framed as a 'certified copy' of Fight Club, like Den of Thieves to Heat and Boiler Room to Glengarry Glen Ross; such copies can be more entertaining on cable than the originals.
Approx. transcript time · 00:04:43Read transcript
After The Hangover made Cooper a phenomenon in 2009, audiences gave him leeway on a premise, compared with Julia Roberts following Pretty Woman with Sleeping with the Enemy; his in-between roles included Case 39, All About Steve, Valentine's Day and The A-Team.
Approx. transcript time · 00:05:20Read transcript
The role is called a Keanu part; Cooper's Wedding Crashers turn as Sack Lodge showed his charm and likability.
Approx. transcript time · 00:06:59Read transcript
The best part is when the pill kicks in, and that stretch should have been longer instead of montages; cleaning his apartment first is what everybody would do.
Approx. transcript time · 00:08:01Read transcript
The title is said in the movie, which is a favorite feature.
Approx. transcript time · 00:08:01Read transcript
One host recalls feeling like the Limitless character at the London Olympics, walking 15-16 miles a day, writing columns fast and weighing 163 pounds afterward.
Approx. transcript time · 00:08:59Read transcript
A college rec-league pregame shooting streak felt like the vivid Limitless colors, followed by going about 0 for 13 in the game.
Approx. transcript time · 00:11:21Read transcript
Recreational Ritalin while working retail at Newbury Comics produced a feeling of recommending Fugazi to a Limp Bizkit fan's mom as a life-changing move.
Approx. transcript time · 00:12:12Read transcript
The film has no lesson or emotional backstory: he figures out how to game the drug, becomes smart without it with no repercussions, and heads toward the presidency.
Approx. transcript time · 00:13:31Read transcript
Cooper is called perfect and the number one pick, with Keanu a good dark-horse; Cooper works because he can play both dumb and smart and you could see him taking NZT himself, recalling his Inside the Actors Studio audience clip and his acting opposite De Niro.
Approx. transcript time · 00:14:13Read transcript
Jeremy Strong and Jake Gyllenhaal would be good in the part; Mark Wahlberg would be horrible, lacking self-parody, as in The Gambler, with Shooter the exception.
Approx. transcript time · 00:15:38Read transcript
Shooter has not yet been done on The Rewatchables.
Approx. transcript time · 00:16:52Read transcript
Cooper sells the line about having an actual recipe for grandeur; Leo would be too much firepower and Tom Hardy too intense.
Approx. transcript time · 00:16:52Read transcript
Eddie never uses his powers for societal good, only to enrich himself; the film is called the tail end of an era of power-and-money wish fulfillment dating to 80s movies like Wall Street, with doubt that a 2021 version would take that angle.
Approx. transcript time · 00:17:30Read transcript
The greed is part of the fun because viewers would do exactly the same; the gag of him instantly being good at things never gets old, and a modern version would still be made the same way as wish fulfillment.
Approx. transcript time · 00:18:49Read transcript
The film works because the drug follows an addiction with a limited supply, putting a clock on him as he chases the dragon and stretches his stash.
Approx. transcript time · 00:19:22Read transcript
Sports gambling would have been the preferred use of NZT; ordering in restaurants in the native language is the favorite of his learned skills.
Approx. transcript time · 00:20:31Read transcript
The film is based on Alan Glenn's novel The Dark Fields, directed by Neil Burger (ASR 'Berger'), from a Leslie Dixon screenplay; Dixon asked to be made a producer rather than bought out, and the film was retitled Limitless in December 2010.
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:17Read transcript
Dark Fields is the name of the novel Eddie writes and would have been the wrong title.
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:42Read transcript
The film had a $27 million budget and made $161.8 million.
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:59Read transcript
Cooper's next run included the Hangover sequel, The Place Beyond the Pines, Silver Linings Playbook, Hangover Part 3 and American Sniper, making him one of the three or four biggest stars; Limitless mattered most after The Hangover because he carried a B movie into an A movie.
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:59Read transcript
It is one of the most rewatchable movies of the last 15 years: walk in as he takes the drug and you watch the next 25 minutes; unlike The Purge it stays fun to the end without teaching a lesson.
Approx. transcript time · 00:23:01Read transcript
The later TV show did not work, missed the streaming bump by two or three years, and was a CBS show when the premise needs to stay racy about sex and drugs.
Approx. transcript time · 00:24:24Read transcript
After the De Niro speech clip, a joke casts Chris as Cooper and Bill as De Niro when Chris tries to leave for The Athletic.
Approx. transcript time · 00:45:44Read transcript
Chris is urged to pitch Shea on a prestige-TV podcast about Mayor of Kingstown; the show is described as in the middle of a two-episode prison riot, and prestige is assigned.
Approx. transcript time · 00:59:22Read transcript
Asked whether he knows what Mayor of Kingstown is about, the answer is yes, as a big Taylor Sheridan guy.
Approx. transcript time · 00:59:22Read transcript
The mid-tier star-driven movie like Limitless is lamented: no franchise or backstory needed, in and out in 90 minutes and rewatched on cable; today it would cost about $90 million and need to be a $300 million movie, with Frank Grillo now the default lead and Bernthal preferring good movies.
Approx. transcript time · 01:03:18Read transcript
Most big-budget Netflix action movies disappoint except Triple Frontier, called a masterpiece; a Triple Frontier episode is requested and deferred, since Limitless sat waiting for years.
Approx. transcript time · 01:04:20Read transcript
Starz (or Showtime) played Limitless constantly for about two months; Starz knows its audience.
Approx. transcript time · 01:05:13Read transcript