Some magical moments undone by an endless trudge that doesn't know when to stop.

Rating: 5/10 (21 August 2013)

I approached About Time with very low expectations. It hasn't arrived with the same fanfare or same star power as many of writer/director Richard Curtis other blockbusters (Notting Hill and Love Actually for example) and the trailer implied something slightly twee rather than truly uplifting. But sometime during the first fifteen minutes I berated myself severely and settled in to what started out as a very sweet, tender and gently amusing film.
Then it stuttered. And the stuttering continued as we edged towards highs and stumbled into elongated lows where nothing much occurred and nobody seemed quite sure of how to lift it again.
On New Year's Eve, 21-year old Tim Lake (Domhnall Gleeson) listens wide-eyed as his dad (Bill Nighy) imparts some fantastic truth about the men in the Lake family: They can travel back in time. There are rules, of course, but the fact remains Tim's world has opened up in a most remarkable way. Much to his father's dismay, Tim decides the best use of his newfound ability is to finally secure a girlfriend. In a longwinded and occasionally funny manner he courts Mary (Rachel McAdams). Mary is insecure and likes to sleep a lot. And other stuff happens, too. Eventually. And some of it even comes about as a result of time travel. Maybe.
The obvious and immediate comparison with About Time is The Time Traveller's Wife, which starred, um, Rachel McAdams. Unfortunately, though the latter was a weak adaptation of a beautiful book, About Time has the feel of what was left on the cutting room floor after they'd excised the humour and protracted subplot.
Ten years ago Hugh Grant would have been cast as Tim and at times it feels as though Gleeson has been forced into Grant's shoes. It's a pity because he is a fine actor and, when allowed to be the Tim in his own head, does a wonderfully charming and understated job. The screenplay sucks but that's hardly his fault. There's also about the same level of chemistry between Tim & Mary as there was between the tomato and chard on my dinner plate last night.
But when Gleeson and Nighy share the screen About Time sparkles. The relationship between father and son is beautiful, it is tender, it is funny and it is the glue that binds the film. I came away not wishing I had the boy/girl relationship but dreaming that the father/son bond was mine. What a pity Curtis didn't have the courage to turn this romcom on its head and make Tim and Mary secondary to Tim & Dad.
There are moments of pure joy where Curtis is on his very best form: The wedding scene is the finest we've seen screen since James Fleet's best man speech in Four Weddings & a Funeral. It doesn't hang around, it is neither schmaltzy nor patronizing but is magically sweet and funny. The theatre sequence, too, is comedy gold. In a completely different way, the last few scenes with Tim and Dad are tender, sensitive and deeply affecting.
And then Curtis undoes the stitching. Take the dress scene; we've seen it in countless films before where girl tries on dresses but can't make her mind up while boy fails to help the issue. It's no longer original and, in this incarnation, is at least five dresses too long. It's so protracted it hurts. It's a problem that persists throughout About Time. It just doesn't know when to stop. Frequently, it even forgets what it is about and suddenly throws in a time traveling scene to justify its name. Inside this lumpy, tedious 117 minute trudge is an 85 minute gem desperately fighting to escape. Was script editor Emma Freud asleep when she held her red pen? Was editor Mark Day afraid of offending Curtis? Black marks to them both.
The supporting cast is a real boon to About Time. Lyndsay Duncan's Mum is just the right side of eccentric while Uncle D (Richard Cordery) is as mad as a box of frogs and delightfully so. Chief amongst them is Harry (Tom Hollander), the self-centered, embittered playwright who takes any glimmer of joy, crumbles it, insults it and stamps on it for good measure. He is used sparingly to crisp the edges of scenes that edge towards tedium. What a pity he wasn't let loose with a flamethrower throughout.
But even with the minor characters and their subplots, Curtis struggles as if he has a checklist of occurrences he absolutely must insert to appeal to everyone and so he throws in a broken sister with alcohol and domestic issues, parental issues with overbearing visiting folks
About Time is too much, too long, too over-egged, and too reliant on previous films. Watching About Time is like swimming through porridge to the occasional pockets of beautifully sweet honey and then struggling onwards in vain the hope of another.
For more reviews from The Squiss, subscribe to my blog and like the Facebook page.