Could have been good

Rating: 5/10 (29 October 2006)

If there is any one thing that REALLY holds this movie back, it's probably MTV eye-candy Ashton Kutcher. Sure the script is weak and smacks of late night pot sessions, sure the direction is alternatingly sloppy and overwrought, and sure I reached the movie's end thinking 'why the hell should I care?'...but all these considerations are nothing compared to the mess that is Kutcher's acting! The kid can not act his way out of a paper bag, and I don't know what would possess anyone to put him in such a demanding dramatic role (more demanding, honestly, than popcorn fare like this should ever expect). The only reason I can see to have put this guy -- whose previous credits included portraying the chowderhead on 'That 70's Show' and HIMSELF on the idiotic 'Punk'd' -- in this role was to get ANYONE to see it! Seriously: would anyone have gone to see a movie about the paradoxes of time travel if some schmuck nobody knew was in the lead role? Almost certainly not. At least with Kutcher on the posters you'd at least snag the poor suckers who thought 'Donnie Darko' was the deepest thing ever... Aside from they abysmal Kutcher, this movie had certain things going for it. It is, essentially, a clever premise, but a tough one to tackle. A writer could never be certain how far to go when trying to calculate the changes one could effect in one's own life and the world if able to go back and change key events in one's past. And the creators of 'Final Destination 2' are not necessarily up to the task. But why should they be? Nobody expects much of them, and this movie will assuredly become another short-term classic for high-school/college half-thinkers to hash over as they play it again and again, searching for greater meaning than will ever be there. See this movie only if you're a time-travel nut...or a 13-year-old with pretensions toward genius. Otherwise, anyone could sit this one out, and spend the time changing their own life.