A welcome surprise to counter low expectations

Rating: Null/10 (27 January 2004)

As a young man, Evan (Ashton Kutcher) experiences blackouts during key events in his life. These blackouts leave holes in his memory, that his mother and doctor try to restore by encouraging him to keep a journal. When the chain of events leads to the loss of someone near to him, Evan finds that he can relive these events, and even change their outcomes by reading his journals. However despite his good intentions, each permutation seems to lead to a negative outcome for someone in his inner circle... thus The Butterfly Effect.
The idea that reading a journal can change the past is silly, but required for the premise of the movie. If you can put that aside, you'll see that this movie is quite a gem in the same vein as 'Donnie Darko'. The directors of this movie do a wonderful job of telling the story. They take seemingly insignificant details, and patch them together to make a rewarding puzzle for the viewer to put together. Through each variation, you want to see Evan succeed, but you also hope that he doesn't as the terrible consequences of his actions are what drives this movie. This movie is definitely not afraid to be dark. While the whole plot sounds contrived the story moves very smoothly, and in the end it will all make sense.
Ashton Kutcher is believable and even at times funny as Evan. Amy Smart, William Lee Scott, and Elden Henson do a nice job of acting like different people with the same core in each variation. The music is well done, the direction thoughtful, and the transition sequences are pretty intense.

I thought this movie was going to be a flop, mainly because I was prejudiced against Ashton Kutcher's acting ability. While it isn't going to win him an Oscar, it's certainly not bad. I went to the movie anyway in the hopes that it would look as good as the previews suggested, and I was pleasantly surprised that it did.
Overall I would give this movie an 8 out of 10.