Time is something you always think you have enough of. You probably waste a lot of it by doing unimportant things. To some time is money. In this movie time really IS money. Is this science fiction movie worth watching?
Society has changed and people have been genetically modified to not age beyond 25. Under their skin they have a green clock counting down those 25 years and once it gets to 0 you die. It’s possible to live longer though as you can work to be paid in extra time (or steal it), but at the same time everything you buy has to be paid for in time. So in theory you could be living forever if you manage to just acquire lots of time. It’s something which happens to Will Salas (Justin Timberlake) who lives in one of the ghettos of a big city (which is bordered of by zones, which you have to pay for to leave). With all the time in the world on his hands he decides to see if he can change the system. When someone suddenly has a lot of extra time he stands out and it means a lot of people are after him. During his journey Sylvia Weis (Manda Seyfried), daughter of a very wealthy man joins him and the two slowly turn into Bonnie and Clyde.
I liked the concept of the movie, which initially reminded me a bit of Logan’s Run, but it has its own unique twist with time being used as currency. Annoyingly though you hear the word “time” being said so many times that it slowly becomes too much. I was interested to see where the story would go, but about halfway through it started to lose its focus and it became unclear why the two did what they did and I slowly lost interest.
Visually I loved the world that was created for this. It’s a convincing world where it seems those who have cars have these cool custom muscle cars (a lot of the same ones though) without door handles. The clocks under the skin look good and it’s a believable system. It’s not enough though to make it a good movie and by the end of it I became disappointed.
Score: 5
Yeah, this one looked real interesting for its premise. Thanks for the heads-up, Nostra.
No problem!
Man, think I’m the only person that really liked this. I’m a total sucker for the ‘ticking clock’ scenario – drama 101 – and this film was nothing but that. I also totally bought in to the concept, which seems to be the biggest failing on most people’s reviews (i.e. nice for a while then zzzz). Thought JT was great. Like you say, the future looked awesome. How cool were the shirts?!!?!?
May have to re-watch and re-assess!
Well, I don’t mind a ticking clock scenario and the concept was original, just the way it was executed could have been better. I didn’t notice the shirts, were they that different?
Yaaaiii…another one who didn’t enjoy the movie 🙂 I am not alone.
I wouldn’t even watch the movie if Cillian was not in the movie. When I saw it in the theater, I ended up playing more with my mobile than seeing a movie with plot I can easily guessed. I took my eyes away from my mobile when my man showed up.
Your review is milder than me.
Thank you for that Cillian’s photo 🙂
I really wanted to see it as I think JT can act. I would never use my mobile during a movie as it might be annoying for other people.
There was no one behind me…the studio was deserted, there were only 10 people at that time. If the studio was full, I wouldn’t use my mobile too.
In Time was totally overlooked by people…even by me if not for you know who.
I actually really enjoyed In Time, though it could have been developed a bit further. Cillian Murphy was great and, to be fair, I wasn’t that disappointed by Murphy and Seyfried but I think if Timberlake was swapped with DiCaprio and Seyfried for, perhaps, Cotillard, then I would have enjoyed it a whole lot more.
Hahaha, some cast changes and you’d be happy. I thought the cast was good, but the story missed something.
Like you, I was really excited to see this film as it is a brilliant concept it’s just very poorly executed. I was also expecting more from the cast as I normally enjoy Cillian Murphy films, but I thought he was only really average here.
I only know Cilian Murphy from Batman, so really have no idea about his other roles
You should see his Irish movies to know his real talent, try finding Breakfast on Pluto and see his real talent there.
Will try to get my hands on that one. Thanks Novroz!
I may give this one a go, the plot sounds intruiging enough. To me, Justin Timberlake has the potential to be a good action film star, he just needs to right film to launch him, like how Bruce Willis needed Die Hard. Terrific review
Nicely put and you are probably right. Willis was only known for things like Moonlighting and Die Hard really made him an awesome action star.
If you played a drinking game while watching this film and took a shot every time the word time was mentioned you’d probably be in need of a hospital in the first 20 minutes! It drove me up the wall too – did they think the audience wouldn’t “get” it?
I think it was ok, just not what I was expecting from Andrew Niccol, who gave us the absolutely amazing Gattaca.
Yes, that is what I was thinking as well. The word time was mentioned so much that it really started to annoy me too!
Have not seen Gattaca….
We seem to be watching the same movies lately 😉 a similar thought about the movie from me too which I reviewed recently as well. I think they missed out on something great, but it does look great, too bad the story is weak.
Hahaha, great mind think alike 🙂
I saw this one back in November. Some it was impressive – but most of it was ordinary. The initial concept was very interesting – but the film devolved down into something far less interesting.
Loved that line you wrote comparing Will and Sylvia to Bonnie & Clyde. Wish I had written that. Beyond our writing styles – we ended up with a similar view on the film.
jmm
The concept could have been a lot better indeed, but I must say that I had an ok time with it…
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