I like The Rock because he always manages to steal every scene he’s in with that huge on-screen presence; you can’t deny him that. However, some of his films are goofy and tired; d0es anyone remember “The Tooth Fairy?” I hope not. With that said, I walked into this film not expecting much at all and thought the 3D effects were going to be non-existent. I walked out pleasantly surprised and with a smile on my face.

We were first introduced to Sean Anderson (Josh Hutcherson) four years ago in “Journey to the Center of the Earth,” based on the classic Jules Verne tale. Now, Sean has matured into a handsome, determined teenager whose hormones are raging as he eagerly awaits another exciting adventure.

Sean’s mother (Kristin Davis) is newly remarried to Hank (Johnson), who Sean can’t stand and refuses to get along with. One night, Sean starts to decode a distress signal he relayed from a local satellite and convinces himself the message must be coming from his long lost grandfather Alexander (Michael Caine). Hank barges into his room and offers to help Sean with the message, thinking this would be the perfect bonding activity for them.

By determining the longitude and latitude coordinates, they find that the S.O.S. is being broadcast from the foreign waters of the South Pacific. Sean immediately wants to embark on a rescue mission and mother says he can go to the island, just as long as Hank accompanies him.

When they get to their destination across the globe, Sean and Hank run into tour guide Gabato (the hysterical Luis Guzman) and his daughter Kailani (Vanessa Hudgens), who agree to fly them to the island on their rinky-dink helicopter. Of course, Sean and Kailani have a corny, predictable tween romance, but that’s expected in a movie like this and it doesn’t hurt the film. One thing that hinders the proceedings, though, is the midriff-bearing, sweaty tank top Hudgens wears throughout the film. This is supposed to be a kids’ movie, and her choice of outfit is a bit too much for young audiences.

Johnson and Guzman hit their relationship right on, and it truly makes the film. The two actors have great chemistry, and their hilarity just bounces off of each other and offer plenty of amusing exchanges onscreen.

With all the incredibly beautiful CGI created landscapes we’ve seen in movies like “Avatar,” “Thor” and “Planet of the Apes,” it becomes a challenge to top cinema’s best. “Journey 2“ may not exceed the backdrop of “Avatar,” but it sure is fun to watch the actors gallop around in it. In one especially well done CGI scene, the group rides gigantic bumblebees to get up a mountain. Yes, Caine and Johnson ride bumblebees, and even if you’re not impressed with the CGI, this scene will certainly give you a few chuckles.

Where “Journey 2″ gets lost is the horrible stepson and stepfather subplot. Why can’t the scriptwriter just let the movie be funny, goofy and even corny? But the several sappy, sentimental moments between Hank and Sean were completely unnecessary. At least Johnson does the famous “pec pop” in one.

“Journey 2″ is certainly a fun hour and a half in the theaters, and if you can get through the useless family drama subplot, you might come out surprised and with a few laughs, too.

The story, based on true events as recalled by survivors in a 1991 book, begins in a Jewish ghetto in the Polish city of Lvov in 1943, where occupying German soldiers and their Ukrainian allies are slaughtering men, women, and children in the streets with the casual barbarity that was a hallmark of Nazi derangement.

Polish director Agnieszka Holland presents some of this depravity (in one scene, a Ukrainian officer takes a break from shooting Jews to exchange greetings with a friend, then happily returns to his hideous work) in an almost offhand way, as part of the day-to-day scenery in that awful time and place. This slight distancing serves to deepen our horror.

The central character is a sewer worker named Socha (Robert Wieckjewicz), a Polish Catholic who moonlights as a burglar in order to sustain his small family. Like many of his neighbors, Socha has idly concluded that the Lvov Jews must somehow deserve their fate; he has other worries of his own. Then, one night, he and a fellow burglar glimpse a group of naked and terrified Jewish women being herded through the forest by soldiers. After they disappear from view, the two men move on—and before long come upon those women again, now shot dead and clumped in piles among the trees. Later, at home with his family, Socha listens as his wife (Kinga Preis) expresses a Christian empathy for the Jews of Lvov, and is surprised to learn from her that Jesus, too, was a Jew. We feel a small light begin to kindle in Socha’s mind.

Read the full review at Reason.com

That’s the dilemma facing Leo (Channing Tatum) after his wife Paige (Rachel McAdams) recovers from a serious brain trauma wiping out all memories of their marriage in “The Vow.”

The film, loosely based on a true story, tells the standard tale of a young couple who meet, fall in love, get married to live their happily ever after until one of them falls out of love. It’s just not in the way you expect.

When Paige wakes up from a medically induced coma following a car accident, she thinks she is currently engaged to ex-boyfriend Jeremy (Scott Speedman), still in law school, and is in close contact with her estranged parents (Sam Neill and Jessica Lange). Paige resumes her old life, the one she lived before meeting Leo and becoming a completely different person.

So artsy Leo hardly seems her type, and her parents seize the opportunity to re-enter her life again. Can Leo win back the heart of the love of his life?

What happens when your loved one loses the last five years of her memory and can’t remember you at all? Well, it probably wouldn’t go down exactly the way it did in this film, but director Michael Sucsy does a sweet job trying.

I know this is only “based on” true events, and whenever that pops up in the trailer, it means the scriptwriter has taken an idea from a true story and used plenty of creative license. I was very much in love with “The Vow” until it took an unexpected turn midway through. Paige becomes extremely whiny and annoying after starting out as likable, fun, and relatable! I just couldn’t sympathize with her anymore.

One minute she wants to be with Leo, then the next she’s fighting her feelings for ex-fiance. This story’s been said and done and frankly, we didn’t need all this mixed feeling nonsense in the middle. We should’ve seen more of Leo and Paige’s back story and struggles the couple face while trying to reconstruct her memories. It would’ve been much more of a realistic touch than how the film eventually plays out.

McAdams is a talented young actress, but don’t expect to see her charismatic character from “The Notebook” here. She does what she can with the part; I just didn’t agree with the scriptwriter’s wishy-washy tone.

As for Tatum, the handsome star certainly has impressed me this year kicking butt (literally) in Soderbergh’s “Haywire” and coming off strong with his film performance. If nothing else, it’s he who really carries the heartfelt tale all the way to the end.

“The Vow” isn’t this year’s best romantic drama or the Valentine’s Day film girls were hoping for, but Sucsy tells us an unusual story in a very pleasant and watchable way. If only certain subplots were left out altogether, the film could’ve been remarkable to watch versus just mediocre.

But all is now forgiven.

“Transformers: Dark of the Moon” is not only a terrific piece of popcorn entertainment, it’s far and away the best of the trilogy. And the best news is that Bay’s delivered another pro-freedom, pro-American, pro-military blockbuster that made somewhere around a billion dollars. We don’t get too many of these, and we should embrace and support the good ones.

The film isn’t perfect. In most cases, I still can’t tell an Autobot (the good guys) from a Decepticon (the bad guys), which makes it difficult to understand who to root for during the many action sequences, but unlike its predecessor, “Dark of the Moon” has a story that sets up and explains the stakes well enough that you don’t feel like you’re watching someone else play a video game for two hours.

Length is another problem. This is a four-act story instead of the standard three-act, but the too-long climax really is jaw-droppingly well done and on Blu-ray the only thing that surpasses the fantastic picture quality is a sound design that made my archaic 5.1 system do things I never thought possible.

Though I hate him in almost everything else, in this particular franchise, Shia LeBeouf is perfectly cast as the every boy who’s not only unwittingly thrust into a secret war between giant robots from another planet, but also into the deepest recesses of America’s national security apparatus, which Bay always portrays with humor but also respect. Moreover, while the boyish LeBeouf is the star and hero of the film, he is always surrounded by the American military, which — and God love him for this — Bay always portrays as selfless and heroic. In other words, Bay portrays our service men as they really are.  

Liberals will love that LeBeouf’s Sam Witwicky is smitten with meeting President Obama and conservatives will get a huge kick out of the humor-mileage Bay, with the help of a very game Frances McDormand,  milks out of Senator Barbara Boxer’s unfortunate “Ma’am controversy.

Leonard Nimoy returns to voice Sentinel Prime, a character who gives a powerful voice to the film’s important theme, that of human liberty and why that’s something worth fighting and dying for. And when the fight is over and our heroes gather to take inventory of what just happened, it is the tattered stars and stripes that waves prominently in the background.

As big a treat as the film is the four-disc package it comes in that was just released last week. You get a 3D copy of the film, a digital copy, a regular DVD copy, and another Blu-ray disc that includes hours and hours of extra features to dig into. This is probably the first time ever that I thought watching at home in 3D might be kind of fun.

After my experience with the first sequel, I was soured as hell on the franchise and hit “play” with some real trepidation. But I had a blast watching Michael Bay redeem himself and I suspect you will, as well.

‘Transformers Dark of the Moon’ is available at Amazon.

Yes, it does sound like a “Bourne” movie, doesn’t it? But no, this is “Safe House,” with Denzel Washington taking over for Matt Damon, Sam Shepard replacing Scott Glenn as the steely Agency overseer, Brendan Gleeson in for Brian Cox as the dodgy controller, and Vera Farmiga stepping into the Joan Allen role as his straight-shooting subordinate.

The picture has a familiar swarming hand-held visual style, thanks to cinematographer Oliver Wood (who shot all three “Bourne” films) and editor Richard Pearson (who worked on “The Bourne Supremacy”). At one point, an agitated spook even yelps out a demand for remote surveillance with the words “I want eyes on this!”—a line previously yelped by David Strathairn’s agitated spook in “The Bourne Ultimatum.”

“Safe House” may be faux Bourne, but for those counting the moments till the release of “The Bourne Legacy” next August, it might seem better than no Bourne at all. Swedish director Daniel Espinosa has a flair for action staging—the one-on-one fight scenes, agreeably many in number and often set in confined spaces, are smashingly effective. And first-time screenwriter David Guggenheim has usefully adjusted the Bourne template. Here, Washington’s character, Tobin Frost—nominally the Jason Bourne figure—isn’t an unwitting innocent being set up by his shadowy CIA masters; he’s an actual traitor who has been selling Agency secrets for nearly a decade.

Read the full review at Reason.com

You are already aware of whether or not “A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas” interests you. “Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle” is a bit of a stoner classic, possessing the sort of random logic that strings the best weed-fueled movies together. The sequel, “Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay,” was raunchier and had some hilarious bits, but never really came together as a complete product the way a lot of modern comedies fail to do. This third outing fares better than the second, adding a Christmas-driven plot to the stoned “After Hours” shenanigans.

This time around, Harold & Kumar have gone their separate ways as friends. Harold is a big-shot executive on Wall Street and lives in mortal fear of his father-in-law, which is completely understandable since the in-law is played by Danny Trejo. Trejo’s fearsome father has an intense love of Christmas, with special attention reserved for the magic of his homegrown Christmas tree.

While his wife is out with the family for midnight mass, Harold pledges to decorate the tree, hoping to make into a magical display and win the respect of his in-laws. His hopes are dashed when Kumar, still a bloodshot walking disaster, shows up to give him a mystery package, which contains a magical joint. One thing leads to another, and Trejo’s Christmas tree is destroyed in a freak accident, leading Harold & Kumar on an evening excursion to replace the tree, even if it means getting attacked by Russian mobsters, going on a claymated acid trip, or having yet another run-in with Neil Patrick Harris.

Again, you know what you’re in for with a Harold & Kumar movie, and while not as fresh as the original, it’s a more coherent sequel than the last film in the series. Inserting them into a Christmas setting gives it a sweet holiday flavor to go with the raunch-factor, which is always almost cranked up to John Waters levels of nasty in these films. A Rankin/Bass-style sequence of claymation high jinks allows them to indulge the Christmas-special vibe the story already has, while showing stuff you probably otherwise couldn’t get away with in an R-rated comedy. I giggled like an idiot through the last two films, and I did the same through this. Unlike a lot of stoner comedies, you don’t need to be high to enjoy them.

The Blu-ray ain’t loaded in terms of extras, it features an extended cut, as well as deleted scenes, which is par for the course. There’s a segment on realizing the claymation sequence, but it’s just a storyboard-to-film comparison. The only bits that are really worthwhile are some short “interviews” with Tom Lennon, where he crafts an argument that “A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas” is superior to the work of Dickens, Hemingway, and Faulkner, asking whether or not they thought to depict showering nuns in their work. He does admit that Victor Hugo explored some of their ideas first in “Les Miserables,” though. Can’t win ‘em all.

I find it strange that they’ve decided to go ahead and release it in February, as most Christmas movies don’t get their home video release until the next Christmas season is upon us. Not that I mind, I don’t need to be in the Christmas spirit to chuckle at some good ol’ fashioned stoner antics. This ain’t a candy cane for the easily offended, but I’m sure most of you know better than to put it on during the next family gathering, because we all know this is more of a treat for an ugly Christmas sweater party with some friends.

Available on 3D Blu-ray, Blu-ray, DVD, and Amazon Instant

Other Noteworthy Releases

The Twilight Saga – Breaking Dawn Part I: I’ve never seen any of these, but one day I plan to get loaded and have a marathon once they’re all available for home consumption. Anyone care to join me? Mark Kermode described this movie as “bonkers,” which sounds promising on several levels. Look for it on Friday, February 11th.

Available on Blu-ray, DVD, and Amazon Instant

Lady and The Tramp: I watched this movie a lot when I was a kid, which is why I’m shocked I remember hardly anything about it, apart from the memorable spaghetti-date scene and the “we are Siamese if you please” bit with the cats. Time for a refresher.

Available on Blu-ray/DVD combo

Anonymous: Roland Emmerich took a break from Irwin Allen films writ large and sub-Spielberg/Cameron offerings to do a movie about nutty conspiracy theories regarding whether or not Shakespeare actually wrote his plays. The movie drew the ire of Shakespeare experts and plain ol’ film critics alike, but it’s interesting to see a guy who loves to blow stuff up as much as Emmerich does take such a dramatic turn.

Available on Blu-ray and DVD

It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World: If you were alive in 1963, and had ever appeared on film with the intention of making others laugh by that point, chances are you were in this movie.

Available on Blu-ray

Casino Royale: Not the Bond debut of Daniel Craig, but the Bond spoof with the likes of David Niven, Woody Allen, Peter Sellers and Orson Welles.

Available on Blu-ray

Love Story: No, moron, love DOES mean having to say you’re sorry.

Available on Blu-ray

The Sunset Limited: A two-man show written by the great Cormac McCarthy, starring Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones, who also directs. I’m in.

Available on Blu-ray and DVD

Project Nim: A man versus beast documentary about an ape raised as a human, directed by “Man on a Wire” filmmaker James Marsh, which goes well with a side of “Rise of the Planet of the Apes.”

Available on DVD

A Fish Called Wanda: Kevin Kline’s Oscar-winning turn came from this unlikely Monty Python-populated film, which gets its Blu-ray release this week.

Available on Blu-ray

La Jetee/Sans Soleil: I own this set on DVD for “La Jetee” alone, which is one of the more interesting science fiction films out there, even if it is comprised almost entirely of still photographs and voiceover. Speaking of Monty Python earlier, one of their veterans, Terry Gilliam, took the plot of “La Jetee” to new heights by remaking it as a feature with “12 Monkeys.” Mark Romanek also referenced it heavily in his video for David Bowie’s “Jump, They Say.” This set showcases the most significant film work of Chris Marker, whose work has found much renown across various mediums.

Available on Blu-ray

A Star is Born: The film likely to win big at The Oscars this year, “The Artist,” owes its basic plot to this film directed by “Wild Bill” Wellman, starring Janet Gaynor and Frederic March. Kino is presenting it just in time for the Academy Awards, with all the bells n’ whistles they’re wont to give.

Available on Blu-ray and DVD

This piece originally appeared over at Parcbench.

A few years have passed since Harold and Kumar escaped from Guantanamo or killed time hanging out together smoking their beloved mary jane. And sometime over the course of the last few years, the boys went their separate ways and became estranged. They’re now two completely different people who haven’t seen each other in over a year and probably wouldn’t become friends were they to meet for the first time today.  In fact, they would probably hate each other.

Harold now works in high finance. His is now THE MAN and even has to deal with Occupy Wall Street-types who protest outside his offices. Harold also enjoys an upper middle-class life in the suburbs with a nice car and an even nicer fiancée. Kumar, however, is still Kumar — an unemployed burn-out who smokes weed all day and avoids responsibility like he does a shower. Closing in on 30, sadly, the reefer’s become an escape for Kumar, a way to avoid coming to terms with the emptiness of his life and the loss of his girlfriend. What had been recreational and rebellious in his youth, is now a pathetic crutch.

It’s Christmastime and Harold’s smoking-hot fiancee’s rather large family has come to stay for the holidays. The most important thing to Harold’s future father-in-law (Danny Trejo), a man who’s crazy about Christmas and someone with whom Harold is desperate to make a good impression, is the perfect tree. Harold promises everyone that when they return from church, the perfect tree will be decorated and waiting for them. They leave. Kumar shows up. Mayhem ensues.  

The story is only sporadically funny. In-between bits that are truly clever, like a clay-mation sequence and Neil Patrick Harris riffing on his public persona, the jokes tend to be more miss than hit. The more vulgar (very vulgar) stuff meant to shock mostly falls flat, but some of the less politically correct moments involving race do hit the mark. It’s all good-natured and, in this day and age, pretty refreshing.

While this third chapter is definitely an improvement over the one-note Bush-bash that was chapter two, you can still sense The New Production Code at work. Some targets are safe. Some are not. Muslims and gays take no satiric hits and I still don’t understand a Hollywood that crusades against cigarettes but builds a trilogy around two sympathetic protagonists who, without any health consequences, love to smoke dope.

In the end, though, this is a story about two estranged friends who have gone their separate ways, grown apart, and are now uncomfortable in each other’s company. The emotional spine of the story involves them finding a way to become friends again, and this is something many of us can relate to. There are also some mature themes involving family and the reality that you actually do have to grow up eventually.

If you’re a fan of the genre or the first two, you’re going to enjoy the further adventures of… Others should probably stay away.

‘A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas’ is available at Amazon.

There’s a lot to like about “The Rebound,” available on DVD and Blu- ray tomorrow, but it ends up too much like typical rom-com fare than it needs to be. Director Bart Freundlich (who has directed some great episodes of Showtime’s “Californication”) talks about how he was inspired by the New York set films about relationships by Woody Allen in an interview on the DVD, but “The Rebound” never lives up to that kind of potential. It’s tame when it needs to be excessive and excessive when it needs to be tame.

Sandy (Catherine Zeta-Jones) is living a typical suburban life with her two kids and husband when she stumbles across a tape of her husband cheating on her with a neighbor. After packing up the kids and heading to the city, she meets Aram (Justin Bartha), a young coffee shop employee living in the apartment beneath hers who agrees to start babysitting for her as she works late and goes on disappointing dates. As Aram becomes more and more responsible for the children, Sandy realizes she enjoys spending her late nights at home with the mature-beyond-his-years nanny than spending them with dates who have a bad habit of talking to her while they utilize a porter potty (Eh, it’s the city. Who can judge?).

Sandy and Aram begin seeing each other but have to face a world that scoffs at the idea of their 15-year age difference. Sandy’s friends see Aram as nothing but a rebound, and she becomes confused as to whether he is or isn’t. Thus, “The Rebound” presses forward trying desperately to be the next Woody Allen pic; the problem is there’s none of the subtlety or depth of Allen’s work.

“The Rebound” had great potential. Both Zeta-Jones and Bartha are talented actors and inhabit their characters well. The attraction between them is believable, but the film never delves into the relationship or that attraction enough for us to take it seriously when it wants to be taken seriously. The script should’ve taken us into Aram and Sandy’s relationship further and not been so tame as to why each wants the other. The films isn’t afraid to show a party they attend with excessive drinking and some drug use, but it’s afraid to delve into the mental complexes which must be drawing them to one another.

The character of Sandy is also pretty underdeveloped. Her love of sports is never really fully understood or realized by the script. It never becomes anything more than a quirk. And her ex-husband has about one scene that is ruined by horrible dialogue and unrealistic actions. “The Rebound” seems to want to get down and dirty when it comes to relationships and New York City, but the relationship between Sandy and Aram is treated so tamely, like a lesser romantic comedy with lower sights would’ve treated it, and the only time New York City is given much of a thought is when the film feels like it’s ready for a gag (usually literally). Freundlich does photograph the city quite well, but we know from his work on “Californication” that he is capable of much more.

“The Rebound” also loses what little footing it had towards the end when it throws a too-long montage towards us and tries way to hard to dig into the “meaning of it all.”

The only special features included are a series of interviews with everyone from Freundlich (who gives some great bits about the making of and the inspiration for the film) to the kids in the movie.

Overall, “The Rebound” is much better than most romantic comedies that get released these days, which is why it’s a bit of a surprise that it skipped theaters entirely (though that is not the same curse it was years ago). But ultimately, it can’t live up to its high goals. Zeta-Jones and Bartha are both great actors (as are the supporting cast) and Freundlich is one of the most underrated directors working today, but the film can’t overcome its fear of being exactly what I’m sure it originally set out to be: an intelligent and very funny take on how the right person will always show up even if we are not ready for them (especially then) and that the end of some things only mean the beginning of many others.

“The Rebound” is worth renting or streaming if you and your spouse (especially if he/she is fifteen years younger) are looking for a cutesy tale to pass the night that isn’t entirely trash, but hopefully everyone involved will give us something better in the years to come.

Sucker Punches: None.

The picture has a rousing spirit and an unexpected emotional warmth. It features good (if little-known) actors, a solid genre plot, and surprisingly slick effects that are especially impressive for being so seamlessly woven into the film’s low-budget look. The movie hustles by in less than 90 minutes, and it’s a lot of fun.

The story, by director Josh Trank and screenwriter Max Landis—both feature-film first-timers—is a clever riff on the superhero theme. Andrew Detmer (Dane DeHaan, a True Blood alumnus) is the kid with the video cam—a lonely nerd documenting his miserable homelife with an abusive father (Michael Kelly) and bedridden, dying mother (Bo Petersen). Andrew is a high-school senior, shunned by the cool kids and tormented by the usual crew of varsity troglodytes—all the more so after he starts bringing his new camera to school. His only semi-friends are his amiable cousin Matt (Alex Russell) and, for reasons unclear, the gleamingly popular Steve Montgomery (Michael B. Jordan, of Friday Night Lights).

One day, out in the woods, these three happen across a large hole that leads deep underground. Descending into it, they find something very strange, and soon after clambering back up to the surface discover that they’ve suddenly developed nifty new telekinetic powers. At first they use this gift for fun and pranks—floating little Lego bricks up into the air, baffling car owners by shuffling their vehicles around in parking lots. Then, with continued practice, they discover that they can rise up into the air themselves, and soon they’re swooping around through the clouds.

Read the full review at Reason.com

Social classes are not determined by income, but by the amount of time a person can live. The humans are genetically engineered to stop aging when they turn 25. At that point, their clocks begin ticking and they must earn or steal more time to stay alive. Lower classes work menial jobs for pay in days, while the upper class hoards centuries. Gangsters prey on the weak to steal their time. “Timekeepers’” or law enforcement’s primary concern is to make sure the “wrong people” – the lower class – never have too much time.

Will Salas (Justin Timberlake) is from “the ghetto,” where people live hour to hour. He meets Henry Hamilton (Matt Bomer) in a bar flashing around a wealth of time – 100 years. After Will rescues him from gangsters, Hamilton gives Will his entire store of time. Sadly, Will can’t get home in time to prevent his mother (Olivia Wilde) from “clocking out.” In retaliation, Will travels to the top “time zone” on a mission to take as much time from the wealthy as he can.

However, possessing time that you didn’t earn is illegal. Timekeeper Leon (Cillian Murphy) catches up with Will and takes back what time he’s managed to accumulate. To avoid capture, Will takes wealthy Sylvia Weis (Amanda Seyfried) hostage and goes back to the ghetto. He realizes it’s not enough to take time from the wealthy, he needs to redistribute the time to the poor. Sylvia falls in love with Will and joins him on a crime spree to spread the wealth of time around as much as they can before they are caught…or their own clocks run out.

We’re lead to believe that a small portion – the one percent? – of the population not only controls the vast majority of wealth, but is actively engaged in preventing the 99 percent from ever progressing outside of their “time zone” by strategically raising taxes and interest rates whenever people start accumulating too much time.

The only option left appears to be playing Robin Hood by robbing the rich to give to the poor. The viewer forgives Will and Sylvia for living a life of crime because they never keep more than a day’s worth for themselves, giving away the rest to those in need.

Several times throughout the story, we hear references to “maintaining the system” of the haves and the have-nots. Leon isn’t concerned with catching murderers or other violent criminals, only time thieves. Philippe Weis (Vincent Kartheiser) tells Will and Sylvia that there’s no beating the system of “Darwinian capitalism” that he loves, and yet he is consumed with “keeping the system from crumbling.”

“In Time” works as a contemporary political allegory if one actually believes that a small handful of bankers and corporations personally control all the wealth in the world preventing any possibility of upward mobility from the middle and lower classes. But there are flaws in the execution of the storytelling. The amount of dialogue devoted to stating obvious plot points is painful. When asked why he’s traveling to New Greenwich, the rich district, Will responds with essentially, “I’m going to take all their time!”

The Minutemen, or gangsters who steal time from the poor, at first appear to be central to the plot but end up nothing more than a pointless loose end waiting to be tied up. And the rookie Timekeeper we initially think will bring a conscience to the law enforcement team never serves much purpose except to ask questions, giving Leon a chance to throw some exposition into the conversation.

Seyfried’s breathy monotone and glassy-eyed delivery is, for once, perfectly suited for her character, a sheltered young woman whose life is characterized by monotony. Timberlake has never been able to pull off “thug” for me, and his bravado feels skin-deep. Murphy never gets to utilize his creepy side, and seems bored from start to finish.

The DVD features a fair amount of deleted and extended scenes, most of which offer good character or culture insights.