About Time (2013 film)

About Time
Teaser poster
Directed by	Richard Curtis
Written by	Richard Curtis
Produced by	Tim Bevan Eric Fellner Nicky Kentish Barnes
Starring	Domhnall Gleeson Rachel McAdams Bill Nighy Tom Hollander Margot Robbie
Cinematography	John Guleserian
Edited by	Mark Day
Music by	Nick Laird-Clowes
Production companies	Working Title Films Relativity Media
Distributed by	Universal Pictures
Release dates	27 June 2013 (2013-06-27) (EIFF) 4 September 2013 (2013-09-04) (United Kingdom)
Running time	123 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Budget	$12 million
Box office	$80,586,804

About Time is a British romantic comedy film revolving around time travel where a young man tries to change his past to have a better future. Written and directed by Richard Curtis, and starring Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel McAdams and Bill Nighy. The film was released in the United Kingdom on 4 September 2013 and in the United States on 1 November 2013.

Plot

At the age of 21, Tim Lake (Domhnall Gleeson) discovers he can travel in time. Tim's father (Bill Nighy) tells his son that the men in his family have always had the ability to travel through time. Upon learning this, Tim goes back to the night of a recent New Year's Eve party where at midnight he was too shy to kiss someone and goes for the kiss instead.

The following summer, Tim's sister, Kit Kat's friend, Charlotte comes to stay with the family. Tim has an instant attraction and come the end of her stay, decides to tell her. She tells him that he left it too late to do anything, and so Tim travels back to the middle of the summer and tells her earlier. This time, Charlotte says that they should wait until the end of the summer and talk again. Tim realizes she doesn't like him back and that time travel will not be able to help change her mind. He watches her leave, heartbroken.

Later, Tim decides to move to London to pursue a career as a lawyer. He moves in with an acquaintance of his father, Harry, who is a struggling playwright. After some months living in London, Tim's friend comes down to visit and they visit a Dans le Noir establishment on a night out, where Tim meets Mary (Rachel McAdams). They seem to be attracted to each other; and, outside when Tim gets to see her, he falls in love. He gets her phone number and returns home to find out Harry's play's opening night was a disaster as the lead actor forgot his lines. Tim then goes back in time and attends the play and, after many complications, eventually ensures the play is a success. Later, Tim attempts to call Mary only to find her number is not in his phone. He realizes that by going to the play instead of the blind date means he never met Mary. Remembering something from the date, Tim eventually locates Mary and learns that she has a boyfriend (met after the night of the play). Tim decides to go back to the point where she met her boyfriend and ensures she never meets him, instead going out on a date with Tim. They become a couple, with Tim eventually moving in with Mary. At one point, he meets Charlotte again. He walks her back to her apartment and she invites him inside. Tim turns her down and runs back to his apartment and proposes to Mary. She accepts, and they learn later that she is pregnant with Tim's child. Months pass and Tim sparingly uses time travel to help alter minor details of his life to benefit himself.

On the 1st birthday of Mary and Tim's daughter, Posy, Kit Kat crashes her car after a row with her boyfriend Jimmy, who has been nothing but bad news for her since they met at the New Year's Eve party Tim first travelled back to. Tim, deciding it best she never met him, tells her about his ability to time-travel and takes her back to the party to make sure they indeed never meet, but upon returning to present time finds the butterfly effect means that Tim never had Posy. Instead, a boy was born in her place. After speaking to his father, Tim learns that once his child was born travelling back to a time before the child's birth will in fact stop that child from ever being born as time will happen differently in every aspect of his life. Tim thus reluctantly has to watch Kit Kat go through the pain of breaking up with her boyfriend to ensure Posy is born. Kit Kat and Tim's friend become a couple and eventually have a child together. More time passes and Tim has another child with Mary.

One day, Tim learns that his father has terminal cancer and learns that this is also something time travel cannot change. Tim learns his father has known for quite some time but kept travelling back in time to effectively extend his life and spend more time with his family, but is now ready to die. Eventually his father dies, but Tim keeps travelling back into the past (when his father was still alive) so that he may see and speak to him. Eventually, Mary says she wants another child. Tim also wants another but knows doing so means he won't be able to visit his father in the past again after the baby is born. After speaking with his father, Tim decides it is the right thing to do. After visiting his dad for the following nine months until the time eventually comes for Mary to give birth, Tim goes back one last time and lets his father know that this is the last time he will visit him. They then both travel back in time together when Tim was a small boy and relive a fond memory of them playing on the beach. Before Tim travels back to the present, his father tells him to re-live each day, once with all the stresses as a normal person faces, and then the second knowing what to expect from the day, and to embrace it and enjoy the day for exactly what it is. Tim does this for some time but then comes to realize that it is better to live each day once, as if it was his last, and to try and enjoy his life with his family like everyone else does. The film ends with Tim getting his three children ready for school, joyously relishing in the wonder of his world.

Cast

• Domhnall Gleeson as Tim Lake
• Rachel McAdams as Mary
• Bill Nighy as James Lake, Tim's father
• Lydia Wilson as Kit Kat, Tim's sister
• Lindsay Duncan as Mary Lake, Tim's mother
• Tom Hollander as Harry
• Vanessa Kirby as Joanna
• Margot Robbie as Charlotte
• Tom Hughes as Jimmy
• Catherine Steadman as Tina
• Matt Butcher as Courtroom Observer
• Lisa Eichhorn as Mary's Mum
• Richard Cordery as Uncle Desmond
• Will Merrick as Jay
• Joshua McGuire as Rory
• Jon Boden and Sam Sweeney as Buskers
• Richard Griffiths as Sir Tom (final film released after his death)
• Richard E. Grant as Actor
• Matthew C Martino as Commuter

Zooey Deschanel had been in talks for the role of Mary but ultimately the role went to McAdams.

Production

Curtis has said this is likely to be his last film as director, but that he will continue in the film industry.

The film was initially scheduled to be released on 10 May 2013, release was pushed back to 1 November 2013. The film premiered on 8 August 2013 as part of the Film4 Summer Screen outdoor cinema series at London's historic Somerset House. It was released in the UK on 4 September 2013 and in the US in limited release on 1 November 2013 and in wide release on 8 November 2013.

Reception

Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 68% based on reviews from 136 critics, with an average rating of 6.3/10. Metacritic, which uses a weighted mean, assigned a score of 55/100, based on reviews from 34 film critics.

Catherine Shoard of The Guardian compares the film to Groundhog Day noting it "is about as close to home as a homage can get without calling in the copyright team" and describes Domhnall Gleeson as a "ginger Hugh Grant" which "at first, is unnerving; as About Time marches on, Gleeson's innate charm gleams through and this weird disconnection becomes quite compelling." Ultimately it is not the familiarity but the "uncarbonated script" that deadens the comedy. Shoard gives the film 2 stars out of 5. Robbie Collin of The Daily Telegraph praises the comic timing of McAdams and Gleeson, but criticizes the film, comparing it to a quilt, calling it "soft, frayed at the edges, and oh so comfortable" and gives it a score of 3 stars out of 5.

Leslie Felperin of Variety magazine calls the film "reassuringly bland" and says there is sense of déjà vu especially for anyone who has seen The Time Traveler's Wife also co-starring McAdams. Unlike that film she has no knowledge of his powers, resulting in a "fundamental lack of honesty in their relationship". Felperin notes British reverse snobbery would put many off this and other Curtis films but that is less of a problem among American Anglophiles and those willing to suspend disbelief, taking the characters are British "versions of Woody Allen’s Manhattanites (but with less angst)". Felperin praises the chemistry of the leading couple "that keeps the film aloft" and the supporting cast while also criticising the stock characters as being too familiar.

Plot holes

Critic Mark Kermode observes that writer Curtis "sets up his rules of temporal engagement, only to break them willy-nilly whenever the prospect of an extra hug rears its head".

The rules as explained to Tim by his father are:

1. Only male members of the family can travel in time.
2. Only backwards travel in time is possible.
3. You cannot travel back to before you were born.
4. Travelling back to a time before your child is born will cause a different child to be born and the original child will be lost.

The film's internal logic about time travel was also criticised in other reviews:

The Independent says the explanation of time travel is "shockingly inadequate" and that "Curtis keeps leaving questions unanswered – time and time again".

The Movie Waffler notes "Whenever Tim uncovers a new time-travel problem, his father is on hand to deliver a new piece of exposition, laying down rules that the film goes on to either ignore or contradict."

Flickfilosopher remarks that there are "arbitrary and inconsistent rules of time travel in aid of creepy romantic manipulation and temporal stalking".

The Irish Post refers to Tim travelling backwards and forwards in time and says "it's riddled with plot holes".

Megan Gibson writing in Time says: "...sci-fi fans out there likely won’t be able to see [the film's] charms through the gaping time-travel plot-holes".

Critic Matthew Turner points out the "big problem is the unsightly pile-up of plot holes and logic problems".

Kate Erbland of Film School Rejects states "the rules and limitations of Tim's gift aren't exactly hard and fast, and the final third of the film is rife with complications that never get quite explained. Rules that previously applied suddenly don't apply... the time travel rules aren't exactly tight and are occasionally confusing".

Soundtrack

Track listing

1. Ben Folds – "The Luckiest" (About Time Version)
2. Jon Boden, Sam Sweeney & Ben Coleman – "How Long Will I Love You?"
3. Paul Buchanan – "Mid Air"
4. Groove Armada – "At the River"
5. The Cure – "Friday I'm in Love"
6. Amy Winehouse – "Back to Black"
7. Ron Sexsmith – "Gold in Them Hills"
8. Nick Laird-Clowes – "The About Time Theme"
9. Nick Cave – "Into My Arms"
10. Jimmy Fontana – "Il Mondo"
11. Nick Laird-Clowes – "Golborne Road"
12. The Killers – "Mr. Brightside"
13. Sugababes – "Push the Button"
14. t.A.T.u. – "All the Things She Said"
15. Barbar Gough – "When I Fall in Love"
16. Sebastien Klinger, Jürgen Kruse – "Spiegel im Spiegel"
17. Ellie Goulding – "How Long Will I Love You?"

The trailer contains the song "Lakehouse" by Of Monsters and Men.

External links

• Official website
• About Time at IMDb
• About Time DVD Release Dates