In Time Review

There are a lot of things wrong with In Time. In some cases it’s poorly scripted, it doesn’t put its fictional world to use in all the ways it should, the visual effects are far from stellar, and it often takes itself too seriously. Take a second to put these problems aside, and you’re left with a perfectly enjoyable, intriguing thriller that mostly delivers where it counts during this slow time in the Hollywood year.

The film is set in a dystopian future where time is the new currency. Humans are now genetically engineered to stop aging at twenty-five. From there, they get one year to figure out what to do with their lives and to get their hands on some more time, or die when their clock hits zero. Justin Timberlake, fresh off his stellar performance in last year’s The Social Network, takes on the role of Will Salas, a twenty-eight year old living day-to-day on his clock, earning enough hours each day to survive the next. Everything changes when, through an admittedly unexpected turn of events, Will finds himself with a century to spare and an anger at the unfair system that the world now knows. He takes off with rich dame Sylvia (Amanda Seyfried) to spread the wealth to all twelve of the setting's “time zones”, each representing a distinct social class. Soon the duo’s being pursued by the equivalent of both cops (timekeepers) and robbers (minutemen), lead by Raymond Leon (Cillian Murphy) and Fortis (Alex Pettyfer) respectively.

Right off the bat some obvious problems become apparent. The film’s sporadically breakneck pace makes for some timing of events that’s a little too perfect. For example: Will and Sylvia get in a car wreck and are both knocked unconscious. Seconds later, they are looted by minutemen. Seconds later, they simultaneously awaken and then immediately run away from the scene. Seconds later, the timekeepers show up and inspect the wreck.

There are also some amusing screenplay-related hiccups such as, and I am not making this up, a rich time kingpin keeps 1,000,000 years, the real-world equivalent of billions - if not trillions - of dollars, locked away in a safe. The combination? Charles Darwin’s birthday, whom the safe owner regularly quotes. What’s also rather puzzling is the ease with which Will and Sylvia are able to break in and obtain these hours.

As the film progresses Will and Sylvia become more and more wanted by the timekeepers, with a reward for their capture topping off at 100 years. Oddly enough, Leon seems to be the only one of the timekeepers (whose world-enforcement authority figures total in at about a half dozen) doing anything about it. Also, travel between “time-zones” is seamless and uncrowded. Odd considering that, assumedly, the entire world population lives within these twelve zones. 

These and numerous other inconsistencies in the film’s world kept me from really accepting it as a legitimate fictitious future. Having said that, it didn’t really matter. An hour into In Time, I’d pretty much gathered that, hey, this movie isn’t flawless. But its brilliant premise and the alien practices of the world’s inhabitants kept me interested to see what would happen next. The very concept of time literally being money is one that carries the film through many a rough patch. The unbelievability of the events at hand made it every harder to predict where any given scene would go, and the motives and tricks each characters may or may not have up his or her sleeve. 

Timberlake’s performance isn’t as great as it was in The Social Network, but he still shows promise as a major Hollywood name. Seyfried acted a bit too sporadically mushy-gushy in the film’s dire times, but she displays a strong outlook and, by the film’s conclusion, is too likable to dismiss. 

We get so many cliched rom-coms, horror remakes and cash-ins around this time of year that you’ve got to give a movie credit when it tries to do something different. While genre conventions still exist in the film, which has its fair share of noticeable problems, many of these hiccups do nothing but add to the enjoyment factor. At the end of the day, In Time is a very enjoyable, imperfect motion picture with a premise that should alone be commended for its ingenuity.

Final Score:

7.0/10
"Good"