It's an OK Futuristic Dystopian Movie with generic messages

Rating: 6/10 (28 January 2012)

In this movie, time is money. Due to genetic engineering, people require time (i.e. money) in order to continue to live past the age of 25. When the clock starts ticking at age 25, they stop ageing and they automatically get 1 year of free credit. The amount of time they each have is tracked by a tracker in their left forearm, and they earn more the same way people do in real life: they work, steal, gamble, etc.
In general, I liked the idea of the movie, but there are a certain flaws introduced in the movie, and there is one fatal flaw that I didn't like about this movie.
That fatal flaw is that people can get time from man-made devices, and nobody has been able to reverse engineer them. If these devices are made by people in factories, then someone out there certainly has the knowledge to find a method of recreating these devices. This would lead to a black market of devices, and would therefore change the economics, the ethics, and the social ethics of having a time-based currency.
There are a couple more flaws. One being that the time (i.e. money) can be taken so easily without any security measures, especially when it has to do with somebody's life. Another being that the Timekeepers (police) were able to monitor the movement of time from one place to another and from person to person, which lacked explanation and needed to be explored.
Now onto the good things. Two of the better aspects of this movie, although not explored in depth, include the economy of time, and the willingness of people to live to a certain age before they pass away. I did not find the acting exceptional or horrendous. I also thought that the cast was a good fit.
Overall, I think the movie was a low rental in terms of quality. The movie was trying to send out grandiose messages without having substance itself. Had there been more depth to the social, economic, and ethical aspects of the premise, then the movie would have been better.