not much red in the actual film

Another SciFi Original comes our way, this time, in the form of a time travel piece that stars Lord of the Rings' Sean Astin. This means nothing to me as the only part of the Lord of the Rings trilogy I've ever seen was at Greg's while I was near exhaustion.

Our story opens with Astin as a narrator who tells us all about how great it would be if time was bendable or totally nonexistent. He does confuse me when he suggests that Outer Space is one big time machine, but it begs the question of what is not time as all things age, no matter how slow or fast. Regardless, the whole space is time thing blows the whole dimensional theories of all of our favorite epics, like the Cube or The Time Machine, right out of the water.

Who cares, right? Astin goes to the bank while he's being trailed by two FBI agents. I guess if you can control time, you'd like to spend it in a bank(?). Astin goes because he wants to get with Maggie, the teller. She's no bombshell, but for a partially European cast, I guess she's alright. She seems very edgy and mean, but Astin likes what he sees, so he goes for it. Our agents look on in confusion as he moves around in time during a withdrawal. Okay, let me clarify that. He's taking money out of the bank, and the agents watch him, confused by what he's doing.

In Groundhog Day fashion, Astin goes through time for the lady, but he messes it up every time, so no dice. Then the bank robbers come-- ha! who knew? They just happened to pick today to rob it, when they have a time traveler. A big stand-off happens with the agents and the robbers, while Astin messes that up too by having his little time travel device go off. This is where it all goes wrong because the action happens.

This is a time travel movie and the time is compromised through direction, when the action scenes are slowed and sped based on situation. Music and speech is also varied in speed, and our swooping circular shots are extra nauseating. My only concern so far is why he's on a plane in the trailer. We've been in the bank for forty minutes already.

There's always something that forbids time travel from being excessive. In Back to the Future it was fate and karma that kept Doc Brown and Marty from meddling, but in this one it's probably some technological issue. I'll let you know when I find out... Anyway, Astin can't turn back time again on the second round of the bank robbery, so the male agent gets shot up by one of the robbers. We didn't get to know him too well, so we don't feel awful, but we don't like to see people get shot by bad guys.

Astin shares the story with the lady agent, and we see a little something start to turn up. After all, it's rare that lead male and lead female don't get involved in a loving relationship. To throw another irony wrench in the system, our robbers get in a big interstate car accident. Woops. Luckily, for them, they are all alive and commandeer a bus for use as a fortress. I'm honest in these reviews, I didn't want to hate this movie. I didn't want to love it to no end, but I didn't want to hate it either. The spectrum is leading in the hate direction at the halfway mark though. We'll see what the future holds...

The director, according to bad research, just gripes about the low budget of the movie. It's more than obvious, but there is more to it than that. I guess the director can't say, "My terrible eye for contemporary film standards made it suck." The thing is, this director has a good alternative eye, but for a full-length picture, it's heart-wrenching.

Ten minutes! That's the limit. This is like that lame ass show that I can never miss, Seven Days. In that the government masters time travel, but they can only go back a week. Hopefully we can currently go back in time, but the government isn't telling us until they master it. Okay, there's so many jumps in time and readjustments that there is no saving it. It's a terrible mess of confusion.

Before commercial, we saw the lead robbers come out of the bus in a rage of gunfire, but now they just took the agent on the bus as a hostage and then killed Sean Astin. What?! I know! So he's dead, but it's a time travel flick, so I guess we can get him back.

...And we did. Now, the robber was touching the agent when she went back, so he went back too. This is where the similarities to Retroactive, the Jim Belushi time travel train wreck, evolve. Now, the funny part is that the robber thinks, well, if I hold the money and go back in time, I can steal the same money and have twice as much. There's a thinker, but that's small time thinking if you ask me. Oh well though. The bad-movie favorite of re-used footage comes into play at least once by the time we're 3/4 the way through. Our robbers sneak off the bus in a fake plea bargain.

Now we're in a parking lot shootout-- still no damn plane. Anyway, our number of robbers is dropping off fast, we're down to two, and then Astin is the only hostage. We're supposed to sympathize because the lady robber is dying and the male is getting sappy and sentimental. Astin, fearing for his life is willing to try and go back to get the lady robber back, but the device is "broken."

Hey-- we're heading to the airport! 25 minutes (tv) left and we're finally to the part that makes up the trailer. With no tickets, Astin and the robber knock out pilots. Great idea seeing as NEITHER of them know how to fly a plane. FBI Agent, Sara, is on to them and she's chasing them through the airport in shots that I would shoot in my first film. Lots of close-ups means low set costs. Great. Astin is in the potty trying to use math to thwart the bad guys. Yowza! Knowledge is power, kids.

Time space jargon leads us to the chance that Astin may get his device to spread to more than ten minutes. When the agent comes out of the potty with a gun out, an Air Marshall pulls a gun on her, terrorism and all, then time slows down again, for cinematic purposes. I thought you couldn't shoot guns on a plane because it was like pure oxygen? Oh screw that, they blew a hole right through the side. Idiots. Plane's going down, no shock there. Astin's like a total moron for a genius. Apparently he's having fun as the plane goes down? He gets the thing going and they go back in time again. All told, they only went back like five times. No Groundhog Day or Retroactive. At least in Back to the Future they went back with substance.

Big surprise, they're back at the bank. The robber decides to cancel the mission, and everybody lives happily ever after. Of course, Astin doesn't get the agent, but we're okay with that. He was after some Maggie tail anyway. That's it. No clear moral, except not to mess with time.