premonition
I admit, the whole time-shifting, vision-of-the-future genre is hard to pull off. There’s a lot of continuity issues and the characters have to be pretty damn solid for the audience not to give up about half-way through. The writing has to be stellar and there has to be enough timing identifiers so the audience can keep pace. Things like aging actors, different props, change of setting, all help along these lines. I can’t think of a solid time-shifter presently, but that just adds to my point.
But anyway, the reason we’re all here. This one is one of the failures, even if there are brief and subtle shining moments. I can give it credit for two things: it didn’t get as grandios as butterfly effect or as sci-fi as mothman prophecies. It, for the most part, was a realistic scenario aside from the time-shifts. Bullock did a pretty good job of seeming distraught, which she would be, and determined, also an understandable trait. There aren’t any other primary characters really, but the cast supported the film well enough.
The direction was decent throughout, but they didn’t give the audience enough credit. The film had way too many timing identifiers thrown in. It was as if they were dumbing everything down. Well, so I guess this could be the case considering Bullock’s normal crowd, but I don’t mean to offend anyone. The intensity was manufactured and about half way through seemed to push toward absurd. I picked up the sequence, or at least a theory about it, only moments before she did and, unfortunately, from that point on things were fairly predictable. Not overtly, but the general finish was clear enough. Some films are known for their twists and turn endings (see any m. night shyamalan), but this is more of a somewhat sharp right that has a cautionary speed limit sign.
And then they committed a cinematic mortal sin as far as I’m concerned. They took a film that was mediocre, but entertaining and tried to tie an ill-fitting higher meaning to it. They did about as well at it as idle hands.
Don’t have high expectations, but as I quickly mentioned, it is sort of fun to watch. Bullock is usually pretty quality and she doesn’t disappoint. It’s the film around her that falls short.
**