Michael Kelso shows us he's better than that!

Rating: 9/10 (26 June 2005)

Every once in a while I pick up a movie from our neighborhood video store on my way home from work. So one night I really had no idea what I wanted to get and the girl at the store suggested "The Butterfly Effect". I looked at the cover and saw Ashton Kutcher's name on it. I said "...well I never heard of that one before - so is it a comedy?" - "umm...no, uh.. not really, it's more like the Twilight Zone!" she replied.
I took it home and wondered what the heck Ashton Kutcher was doing in a movie like that. I had spent countless hours laughing about his air-headed "Kelso" character on the 70s show, but seeing him do well in a more serious role, in a mystery movie even, wasn't really something I would have had on my list of things to hope for. Simply put, he absolutely kicks butt! Given his resume as an actor so far, it looks like he is a lot more versatile than meets the eye!
The movie itself gives you quite a few brain teasers to chew on. What if you found a way to switch back and forth between parallel universes? What if you had the chance to make whatever you did wrong in your past unhappen? However, what if things still wouldn't work out, and every time you threw yourself into another parallel universe, things would just become even more complicated and new problems would arise? This is pretty much the storyline of the movie. Ashton Kutcher plays a young college kid who has found a way to warp himself into many different parallel universes and even into the past; initially, in doing so he just tries to prevent the suicide death of his junior high crush. He then wakes up in an alternate universe and everything seems to be going great - he is a frat boy, and he is with her, now a sorority girl as opposed to being a greasy spoon waitress in the "original" universe. But things take a turn for the worse, and he has to switch universes again and again - and so it goes on, like he says in that one scene: "Everytime I try to help someone everything just goes to s**t".
This movie is really one of the greatest mystery movies I have seen in a long time, and since I'm a real mystery nut, it might tell you a little something. An interesting premise, wrapped into solid storytelling that still just every now and then keeps viewers guessing - and at the edge of their seats throughout, like any good mystery movie should. A painfully underrated gem of modern mainstream cinema, maybe because the audience and critics had the same doubts about Ashton Kutcher as I did.
Just a few days ago I bought the DVD, and I strongly recommend you do the same. The 2-DVD version features the Director's Cut on the second disc. Do yourself a favor and go for the Director's Cut. Aside from being 25 minutes shorter, the theatrical version has an ending that probably earned the producers a few more dollars at the box office, but then again it's too much like your average "hollywood ending" and therefore the movie's only true disappointment.
Guess what I'm going to do tonight, now that I've finished writing this comment - I've already put the Director's Cut disc in my DVD player :-)