About Time entertained me more than most of the films I have seen in theaters recently, so before I list the negative aspects which will undoubtedly appear to negate that previous statement, I'll hammer out the good stuff. Maybe that is backwards logic, however; that would be like starting dinner with your favorite food and ending it with your least. I don't want to leave a lingering, nasty sentiment on your mental taste bds, but I am going to try it this way anyhow. It's my blog, not yours. Sorry, that was a very rude digital comment.
The filmmakers and authors out there selecting time travel as a topic need to sit down at a conference table (or at a long table at a coffee shop, since they seem to frequent those), pass around some donuts and coffee, and make some concrete decisions about the technicalities concerning venturing backwards, forwards, upside down and any other theoretical movement through time. As a reader/moviegoer, attempting to keep all of the rules and regs their exceptions straight does nothing short of give me a throbbing headache. I don't like popping Advil mid-movie. Right when you think you know the technicalities like the back of your hand, they throw you an illogical curve ball. I like a curve ball if it will win the World Series for my home team, but not right when time travel starts to make sense.
When the father (who is never named, but fabulously portrayed by Bill Nighy) in About Time informs his son Tim (played by one Domhnall Gleeson, aka Charlie Weasley in Harry Potter) that the men, and only the men, can travel backwards, and only backwards, in time, I nodded and jotted these two rules in my mental notepad. I felt that was easy enough to follow.
Then, my whole mental note was brutally ripped to shreds by the evil screenwriter when every time the son travels back in time, he later travels forward to get back to the original moment from which he traveled. What is this? Some kind of confusing exception? Was I supposed to simply forget about the aforementioned conversation where it was explicitly stated that, while backwards time travel is entirely acceptable, forward time travel defies the laws of physics? It wouldn't have been as bad if this forward traveling occurred only once- maybe the son discovered a rip in time-space allowing him to do so. As if these multiple occurrences weren't enough of a head-scratcher on their own, imagine how I felt when explicitly-stated rule number two, that only men can travel in time, was broken as well.
Ok, so here was the takeaway regarding time travel rules by the end credits: the members of Tim's family with a Y chromosome can travel back in time unless they are holding hands with a female in their family (or is it any female? That was never clarified). They can never travel forwards in time unless it is to a place from which they already traveled back. These two rules and rule exceptions alone caused so many questions to creep up for me. I would list many more confusing rules that came about, but it would mean listing spoilers and I know how panties-in-a-knot people can get about those.
I will end on a positive note after all, the note of D flat. There's a little musical notation humor for you. But seriously, About Time leaves its viewers with a beautifully positive message to mull over. There is one particularly touching moment in the film, the kind that makes sensitive individuals reaching for the packet of tissues that may or may not exist in their pocket or purse or at least lift their shirt sleeve to their watery eyes. Tim's father doles out a touching piece of advice to his son. He tells him to use his gift of time travel to live each day twice: the first time, he instructs him to live the day complete with the stresses on which we normally dwell, and the second to go back to the start of that same day and only notice the little beauties which we typically overlook. What a nice piece of advice. I'm still confused about time travel, though...
The filmmakers and authors out there selecting time travel as a topic need to sit down at a conference table (or at a long table at a coffee shop, since they seem to frequent those), pass around some donuts and coffee, and make some concrete decisions about the technicalities concerning venturing backwards, forwards, upside down and any other theoretical movement through time. As a reader/moviegoer, attempting to keep all of the rules and regs their exceptions straight does nothing short of give me a throbbing headache. I don't like popping Advil mid-movie. Right when you think you know the technicalities like the back of your hand, they throw you an illogical curve ball. I like a curve ball if it will win the World Series for my home team, but not right when time travel starts to make sense.
When the father (who is never named, but fabulously portrayed by Bill Nighy) in About Time informs his son Tim (played by one Domhnall Gleeson, aka Charlie Weasley in Harry Potter) that the men, and only the men, can travel backwards, and only backwards, in time, I nodded and jotted these two rules in my mental notepad. I felt that was easy enough to follow.
Then, my whole mental note was brutally ripped to shreds by the evil screenwriter when every time the son travels back in time, he later travels forward to get back to the original moment from which he traveled. What is this? Some kind of confusing exception? Was I supposed to simply forget about the aforementioned conversation where it was explicitly stated that, while backwards time travel is entirely acceptable, forward time travel defies the laws of physics? It wouldn't have been as bad if this forward traveling occurred only once- maybe the son discovered a rip in time-space allowing him to do so. As if these multiple occurrences weren't enough of a head-scratcher on their own, imagine how I felt when explicitly-stated rule number two, that only men can travel in time, was broken as well.
Ok, so here was the takeaway regarding time travel rules by the end credits: the members of Tim's family with a Y chromosome can travel back in time unless they are holding hands with a female in their family (or is it any female? That was never clarified). They can never travel forwards in time unless it is to a place from which they already traveled back. These two rules and rule exceptions alone caused so many questions to creep up for me. I would list many more confusing rules that came about, but it would mean listing spoilers and I know how panties-in-a-knot people can get about those.
I will end on a positive note after all, the note of D flat. There's a little musical notation humor for you. But seriously, About Time leaves its viewers with a beautifully positive message to mull over. There is one particularly touching moment in the film, the kind that makes sensitive individuals reaching for the packet of tissues that may or may not exist in their pocket or purse or at least lift their shirt sleeve to their watery eyes. Tim's father doles out a touching piece of advice to his son. He tells him to use his gift of time travel to live each day twice: the first time, he instructs him to live the day complete with the stresses on which we normally dwell, and the second to go back to the start of that same day and only notice the little beauties which we typically overlook. What a nice piece of advice. I'm still confused about time travel, though...
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| I guess they also have to put on their best constipated face when they travel in time |
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