In Time (Blu-ray)
Nathan Swank
February 20th, 2012
In the future, currency is no longer paid with cash but with time. A cup of coffee costs three minutes of your life while a bus ride across town might cost an hour. Needless to say running late or sleeping in is no longer an option. Everyone lives to be 25 years old, but on that birthday your internal life clock (conveniently displayed in neon green across the arm) starts ticking. The good news is everyone quits aging at twenty-five, the bad news is you only have one year to live after that.
As a science fiction fan, I think IN TIME is a fantastic concept with great social and government parallels. It’s a stretch but let me explain some of the details further.
Because currency is paid by time you can quickly dwindle down your life to minutes or hoard up decades. Society is split up in time zones dividing the poor and the rich. In order to help prevent the poor from venturing over, crossing time zones can cost years. While the rich are immortal the poor live day to day, including our hero Will Salas (played by the man who single handedly brought Sexy Back, Justin Timberlake). Before committing suicide, a depressed rich man who has been 25 for two life times gives Will over a century of time. Unfortunately, Will’s wealth in time run’s short when he is accused for murder. Now on the run and with the help of a billionaire’s daughter (Amanda Seyfried), the two make an attempt at bringing down the system by stealing time from the rich and giving to the poor.
Passing time to another is as easy as putting one arm over another’s. This can be done charitably or forcibly. One way to earn time is by “fighting,” which basically consists of arm wrestling (a little uneventful). The winner gets it all and the loser… time’s out. This world obviously has criminals, people who bully, steal, fight and kill for time. These are called Minute Men and led by a surprisingly good Alex Pettyfer (I AM NUMBER FOUR, BEASTLY). The one’s who are suppose to keep the order are cop like men called Time Keepers headed up by Cillian Murphy (28 DAYS LATER, BATMAN BEGINS).
Since people must appear 25, everyone in the film looks magnificent. Even Will’s roughly sixty year old mom is played by the beautiful but not yet proven talented, Olivia Wilde (TRON: LEGACY, COWBOYS & ALIENS). But even 25 year olds get overweight. I understand the poor since they don’t have time to sit on a couch eating fatty foods but the rich, I think, would become quite gluttoness since they are never in a hurry. And why is Murphy’s character so bent on catching Will? And what does his father have to do with it? But if I start thinking and nitpicking in a film like this I would go insane.
The thing with Science Fiction is it usually leads to many other questions that can never fully be explained. And while I love the LOGAN’S RUN world with a ROBIN HOOD storyline, there are far too many holes. Director Andrew Niccol, who previously wrote some fantastic concepts like GATTACA and THE TRUMAN SHOW, has written another interesting world in IN TIME. And however much I shook my head at some of the absurdities and non-acting by Timberlake and Seyfried, I had way too much fun with the concept. Admittedly, I am being generous to IN TIME and am thankful that I had the time to waste on this guilty pleasure.
BLU-RAY REVIEW
Video: (Widescreen 2.35:1) A crisp and looking picture showing the grit of the slums and the glam of the rich.
Audio: (5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio) Good sound but I believe they missed an opportunity to layer in some cool unusual mixing.
The Minutes (16:35): A short faux documentary interviewing the characters of IN TIME. This should have been more fun but the actors kind of overact the parts and we don’t really learn too much more.
Deleted/Extended Scenes (12:52): Ten short scenes that are mostly unnecessary, usually adding humor that feels a little out of place.
BD Live
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