Not based on the Ray Bradbury novel of the same name.

Rating: 7/10 (12 July 2008)

Not a bad movie at all! A bit convoluted, at one point I found myself reviewing the narrative so that I could be on point with the story, and was able to do it. The main actor gets a chance to show more range of emotion than many actors, or perhaps it is more a tribute to him then to the script. While it has a Hollywood ending there is a bit of a bittersweet quality to it, suggesting that the best of all possible worlds may not be the one that we would most like to inhabit. Another tribute to the scriptwriter to pull off such a feat without being preachy or (other than already noted) overly convoluted.
The cinematography in the movie is first rate; employing a restrained use of dynamic techniques at the right moments. It might have been better with more beauty, but not everyone needs that to be suitably impressed. There was also a quality to the flashbacks that at once was recognizable, and at the same time suggested an urgency that drove the movie forward. Kudos to the special effects crew here for a subtle point well taken.
The actors all did a fine job considering the roles that they were presented with, though not all of them had the impact as the lead. The prison sequences, I think, were most impressive and visceral. The gritty childhood sequences were a bit overly intense (due to the subject matter) and underplayed (due, I suppose, the ratings board). I think that this is one of the places where the script faltered, and could have been fleshed out (ala Pan's Labyrinth) or reworked (the better choice I think) for the better. Still, it works in a better than average way here as well.
Again, overall, the movie was really good! I'd see it again to dissect it with a friend, but don't think I'd want to see it by myself again. Thumbs up.
Plot synopsis: Convoluted mess of journals. The boy is subject to blackouts. These happen at intense moments of his life. We later learn that these blackouts coincide with his future self going back in time and mentally inhabiting his younger self's body, spewing out words and actions that change the future. Never with overtly amusing consequences. It's not that kind of movie, unless you happen to be a sadist, in which case the ending will be disappointing (unless you have nurtured you inner happiness monger).
So the child witnesses events both disturbing and emotionally charged that he blacks out over; and the future self keeps finding himself in different alternate realities. Did I mention that it's kind of convoluted? So there is no linear storyline associated with this picture. Instead there are multiple aborted story arcs that leave various of the main characters in stages of emotional or physical damage. As one example, the main actor goes back in time and stands in front of a powerful fire cracker. When he finds himself in the future, his has no arms from the elbows down. The same firecracker kills his (later to be estranged, no, make that never even flirted with, let alone dated etc.) wife. You get a sense of how convoluted the story line is by these parenthetical asides, so it is a testament to the story writer that the movie was as easy to follow as it was.
These various alternative realities continue to play out, and the main character continues to hold on to the memories of them. The other characters amount to figments of his imagination (albeit flesh and blood ones, with there own hidden desires and life paths) since they are continually moved from one alternative reality to another with out even the whisper of a doubt in their minds that the one that he (or is that He - the stigmata does apply here) is currently inhabiting is the only one that ever existed, and any other ones that he might be talking about are clearly fictional.
The movie ends with the girl happily alive and wearing all white; and he's apparently a businessman (though actually he could be a drug dealer, a gigolo, an antiques salesman or a presidential candidate for all we know; all we really know is that he's done playing with the past (and therefore the future)) just going about his businessman's life.
It's a movie that suffers from this kind of linear, didactic exploration, and would be better suited to a discussion of the themes involved, which I have already touched on.
May you reading this be well and happy.