Aporia

This was an impromptu watch, so I had no expectations for it, decided to watch it when I noticed it was playing at the cinema. It took some time for me to figure out what the storyline was gonna be like. The film was off to a poignant start, yet its impact kinda sucked due to the lack of a gradual buildup that would've given an emotional connection with the characters. Even how Sophie was persuaded to take part in the subsequent events seemed too easily/quickly done. More so, the film fell into the trope where a computer-savvy character solves all these complex calculations or hacks in mere seconds which is always hard to believe.

Despite its intention to evoke emotions, the movie failed to establish a bond between me and its characters. The sci-fi elements lacked complexity and allure, with the core concept being hastily explained and while the plot itself was decent, the narrative suffered from a lack of depth and sentiment, causing me to feel detached from both the characters and the overall cinematic experience. That coupled with how the story progressed almost mechanically from one scene to another.

It was also pretty anticlimactic and it was difficult to see how the movie was gonna play out in the end; and that's not in a nice mysterious suspenseful way, it was just dull and I was waiting for it to end. Sure, the plot twist was a pretty big one but still too little too late. The film needed a deeper emotional connection to the characters, deeper exploration of its sci-fi elements, and deeper dive into the moral dilemmas they faced. Ultimately, it was the emotional weight that the movie most needed in comparison to the latter two aspects, leaving it incomplete in the most vital part.

I'll save you the time: it has no resolution. I hate non-endings, open endings or whatever it is called when writers/directors can't commit to an ending. Don't know what to write as an ending? Let's make it super cool and make the audience figure it out!!! Argh. I am very much annoyed by these "endings", so I wanted to warn you so that you can skip it or at least have realistic expectations.

Imagine the ending of "The Good Son" where you don't know which kid the mom decides to drop at the cliff scene. That they just cut to her pondering her choices (unknown to you) at the end. Lame, right? Anti-climatic.

Pros: I really enjoyed seeing Judy Greer as the main character because I love her acting, but other than that, meh.

I love time-travel stories and I'll suspend belief in whatever you tell me the workings of the machine/ mind time travel entail. I did like the premise of it and found it interesting but with no ending, all the build up comes to nothing :(

I have the impression that this film wouldn't have the same charm if it wasn't super indie like it is. The story is about someone who invents a time machine and I imagine if there was money, this prop would be terribly sophisticated, the soundtrack would be present from beginning to end (something that really irritates me in Hollywood cinema) and there would be an all-star cast.

So, we have a well-known actress and others a little less so, but they don't do a bad job. I watched the film from beginning to end without getting bored at all, the story is well told and there are moments of tension and mystery. I would like to not reveal anything that would spoil the experience for those who haven't seen the film yet, but I repeat that it's not bad at all and I don't think anyone will regret watching it. It's a relief to watch a film that doesn't need the usual Hollywood gimmicks.

Whoever reviewed this and called it "repetitive" does a disservice to the movie.. I personally would call it anything but!

You have a simple structure that expectedly raises the stakes of using a "time machine" for personal purposes, specially when the effects are as impactful. There's no buildup, but it is more "revelative" as it develops. It does become predictable, though. It's also a tad too long, the pacing is somewhat slow in many parts, and lacks in engagement. But I can't see it ending in any other way, as it accomplishes what it sets out to do.

If it raises any questions, they are for the viewer to ponder, as the movie isn't interested in saying anything else nor has the room for it. And if the film's budget is preventing you from enjoying the story, then you probably shouldn't be looking at low-budget sci-fi.

I would compare this to a Black Mirror episode, and was enjoyable as such.

All time travel stories require varying degrees of suspension of disbelief. The only fully self consistent plots involve "closed loop" stories, like Predestination, but those require us to give up on the concept of free will. Some are just incredibly stupid (Looper comes to mind). On the scale of things, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure isn't all that bad.

The good thing about this movie, is that it puts the really implausible stuff right at the beginning, and once it establishes the rules, it mostly sticks to them.

Two randos build a (sort of) time machine out of what looks like a Commodore 64 and a pile of literal junk (seriously, this movie gets a solid F for prop design). Rather than send people back in time, it has one and only one capability: it allows the users to kill a specific person in the past, as long as they can locate that person at a specific time, and of course this tees up a classic morality dilemma.

This changes the present and everyone in it, but because "yada yada yada quantum mechanics", anyone in the room with the machine will remember the original timeline - and NOT have any of the memories they should have in the new timeline. This is actually an issue for a lot of time travel movies, they generally just sweep under the rug rather than confronting it outright.

They start with a pretty clear case where killing a bad person in the past will save the life of a innocent person, but it won't be a spoiler to tell you that this has unintended consequences and that their attempts to set things right will just make things worse, or at least put them further and further from their original world.

So in the end, it's a mix of the butterfly effect, the multiverse, and the Trolley Problem. In spite of some of the other reviews, I found the acting and emotions pretty good. I think it would have made a good Twilight Zone or Black Mirror Episode, but stretching it to a full length movie got a little thin.

I didn't hate the ending, but a lot of people did.