3/10
Very unsatisfying and rather pretentious
2 November 2009
Warning: Spoilers
*Contains spoilers*

This is a most trying movie. The idea seemed good going on the DVD cover, but the reality is tedious and at time irritating.

It could have been OK if only the scriptwriter hadn't had verbal diarrhoea and if the female lead hadn't acted the part far too often in a fit of hysteria. We have to endure groups having arty conversations that have very little to do with the plot - at times nothing at all that I could see, and worse, are excruciatingly boring.

The heroine is irritatingly dim. She's had a history of loser lovers and when you watch her you aren't going to be very surprised about that. When her futuristic lover turns up, she's unable to listen to him trying to explain his situation because she's just too thick to understand anything much of what he's talking about. She doesn't have to believe him, but she could at least have some grasp of science and time so that the guy could feel he's talking to a woman with a brain. In other words, these two characters are totally unsuited - unless the futuristic visitor really wants just a bimbo? It's somehow not surprising that she has to keep visiting a shrink though she doesn't seem to improve from the visits.

The most worrying thing is why this futuristic guy bothered to come back to find Ruby, but I guess it must be that man thing we women hear about that men fall for a girl's looks, not her intellect. This girl doesn't have much intellect. I have to say this may be due to the frenetic way the part is played. Perhaps the actress could have interpreted the script with something more measured than that style which Americans call zany. Perhaps it was all meant to be hilariously funny but I love funny stories and I didn't find much in this movie that's really funny.

The hero tries, he really does. He acts the part pretty well. You can feel for him. It would have been good to hear more about his future time but we're told so little it's infuriating.

There are a few interesting touches in what's mostly pretty long-drawn-out and disappointing. I particularly liked it whenever we were introduced to other time travellers, particularly the shrink - yes, that was a surprise to me, very clever. But those intro's were so rare and so brief. Once I knew there were others around, I was waiting for them and a few more would have helped liven up the movie.

The solution to saving the hero from his problem re how to "stay" in "now" is one of those tedious ideas that "love will do the trick. It was so, so cheesy. For all we know, it may really be the solution to everything, but I hope not the way it's put over in this movie.

This is a movie based on a quite clever sf idea but the s has nearly all gone missing and it's very short on any interesting f.

Vaguely watchable if you are desperate for something to see and take a liking to the casting.

The issue of what happens if you change history by going back in time is always intriguing. A pity it wasn't treated more seriously in this tale, but I think this movie isn't aimed at sf fans.
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