Toronto

[ATTENTION: This review reveals content of the movie.]
This movie earns its high rating mostly from the principle. It does not focus on time travel for the purpose of watching the past, but to see the consequences in the present. The movie unfolds almost like a handful of episodes of the TV series "Sliders" showing how Evan Treborn's present is affected each time he slips into the past to make a "small" change. The movie is dark, gloomy, and filled with disturbing ideas (it even shows a brief scene from the movie "Seven", for cryin out loud! ) While it is not as shocking as it could have been, mostly due to a lack of visual stimuli, the themes are horrific enough at points. It is a unique representation of time travel, and it does well to show how a tiny change could alter the future in drastic ways. The bad points: mainly, the acting. Ashton Kutcher is the new Keanu Reeves of trash. Seriously, this guy's talent level falls somewhere between that of a Star Trek extra and a marble pillar. Needless to say, he sleepwalks through most of the movie with little or no emotion. When he is called upon to show some kind of humanlike reactions, he's about as good as a grade-seven drama student during the dress rehearsal of his school's MacBeth production. He should never have been allowed to set foot off the 70's Show stage. Other actors don't fare much better here either. It seemed as though George Lucas was directing them at points. Also, some of the dialogue was clunky and forced. But, despite these flaws, the movie was pretty darn good. It doesn't patronize the audience and doesn't hold back on the disturbing issues (one scene involves Ashton spewing racial slurs and would probably turn off a lot of the impressionable young teeny boppers who make up his fan base) I highly recommend it, but don't go expecting to see an acting tour-de-force; it just ain't that kinda movie.

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