Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
I
am going to spoil this movie. Brace
yourself.
If
you are familiar with Richard Curtis’ work, you know how sticky-sweet it
is. Love
Actually, Bridget Jones, and Notting
Hill are all date movies in the Nora Ephron tradition. White professionals falling in love
surrounded by ancillary kooky characters.
They are harmless and sometimes they are just what you need when the
news on TV makes you want to crawl under your couch. In About
Time, Curtis took a familiar formula and mixed it with a time travel
element. It worked…mostly well.
I
must get a few observations out of the way.
Rachel McAdams is insanely gorgeous.
She has barely aged since Mean
Girls and I think she could pass for 23 years old, which may very well be
what she is doing in this movie. It is
probably difficult for some people to concentrate clearly when she is
onscreen. She could be one of those actresses
that might not be as talented as their marquee name would suggest; but people
still love her because of her looks. The
rest of the cast is British. Enough said.
Also,
the main character Tim is a 21-year-old man who has never encountered a
problem. His family lives on the shore
at Cornwall, in what an American would describe as a mansion. Tim grew up with
loving, devoted parents and a sister whom he loves dearly. I am never sure why this is such a standard
in modern film. How can your average viewer relate to a guy who literally has
everything? Apparently he’s a bit shy
with the ladies, and being a mix between Martin Freeman and Ron Weasley is a
little tough on him. Boo-hoo.
On
his 21st birthday, Tim’s dad tells him that the men in his family
can time travel. It is a simple as going
into a small dark place, like a closet, clenching fists and thinking about
where you want to go. You stay in your
own life and you emerge from the closet as the person you were at that
time. Your clothes and hair change and
you have all the knowledge as before. What I like about the conversation is that his
father tells him he should have a good reason for going back. His grandfather went back for money and he
was miserable. Tim’s dad was a scholar
so he went back for more time to read.
(Lame. I mean, I love to read
but…lame.) Tim decides the only reason
he would go back is to help get a girl.
Well, mostly for that.
Here’s
how it goes: Tim meets Mary on a blind
date. Tim has to go back in time and
help a friend (for something rather trivial) so he ends up erasing his first
meeting with Mary. He finds her a gain
at a different point and starts over. He
wins her over again. He marries her. They
have a kid. Okay, so perfect childhood, job as a lawyer and you’ve married
Rachel Fucking McAdams. Oh, I forgot, you can time travel as easily as
other people take a piss. So, fuck Tim.
Now,
we encounter some problems. This is
where I liked a few refreshing turns with the genre. The time travel genre, not the romantic
comedy genre. Tim tries to undo his
sister’s crappy relationship by taking he back to the moment she met her
dirtbag boyfriend. However, when he
returns home after fixing things, he goes to see his one-year old daughter and
discovers she does not exist. He has a
son instead. He finds his dad for a time
travel rules update and discovers that disturbing the timeline before a child’s
birth will change the child, because the likelihood of the right sperm at the
right time changes. I like the use of
the subtle ripple effect here. I would
think that this would happen if backwards time travel was real. It is the smaller changes most people
overlook. So Tim undoes his trip with
his sister to get his daughter back.
Truthfully,
the Sperm Rule exists to set up the end where Tim’s father is dying. He can only spend a certain amount of time
with him before his next child is born. To go back and visit his dad before he
dies would change the baby or babies. It’s lovely, but I don’t feel too bad for
Tim. He father gives his some thoughtful
time travel advice in his last weeks:
Live each day twice. Live it the
first time with all the tension and worry and doubt, and live it again since
you know how things will go. I like
that, too. Time travel is used as a tool
for life lessons, not to better one’s life or bank account.
Of
course, the rules for the time travel are a little twisted and glaringly broken
a few times. It makes for a cute ending,
but you are dealing with rules here. A
film can be forgiven for one or two slips, but when the core of the movie’s
premise is changed, viewers will start to scratch their heads. About
Time is still a date movie after all, and joyful but bittersweet endings
overrule any time travel monkeywrenches.
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