Amr Waked

CHICAGO – “Lucy” is a piece of high-minded cinematic junk food that manages to be outlandishly weird while still satisfying the lizard brain desires of its audience. It’s a film that knows what’ll get the behinds in the seats, and that appeal can effectively be summed up in one shot.

CHICAGO – In the highly anticipated sci-fi “Lucy,” Scarlett Johansson turns the tables on her captors and transforms into a merciless warrior evolved beyond human logic.

CHICAGO – “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen” is a romantic comedy so lightweight that it threatens to float off into the ether. It has perhaps the least gripping title since Ingmar Bergman’s “Sawdust and Tinsel,” which is strange since the rest of the production reeks of commercial calculation. Yet the film is based on Paul Torday’s book of the same name, so the studio must have considered the title marketable.

CHICAGO – Often when novels with quirky titles get made into films, all that is left of the quirk is the name on the cover. That is exactly what has happened to “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen,” a tome authored by Paul Torday, and reduced to torpid blandness by director Lasse Hallstrøm.

CHICAGO – In the second HollywoodChicago.com Hookup: Film with our new social giveaway technology, we have 40 admit-two movie passes up for grabs to the advance screening of the highly anticipated new comedy/romance film “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen”!