Happy Thursday, all! I'm glad you're joining me for another installment of Thursday Movie Picks, hosted by Wanderer at Wandering Through the Shelves. Or maybe, you're reading this from the future. Maybe you're from the future and when you landed in 2014 you walked past a computer, and had to stop to check today's date. You may have even journeyed here from the past and are simply stunned that computers no longer take up entire rooms, if they even exist during the time from whence you came.
What am I babbling about?
That's easy. This week's theme is Movies About Time Travel. As has become my usual for this feature, I'm going to explore lesser traveled to pockets of time. That means no going back to November 5, 1955. You figure that one out. So I'll once again try to hip you to some hidden gems.
Deja Vu
(2006)
It's hard to imagine a Denzel Washington vehicle as a hidden gem, especially one released within the last decade. Truthfully, this one did gross about $180 million worldwide. However, only about a third of that came from here in the U.S. and the critics were not exactly singing its praises. That said, I quite enjoyed this movie where Denzel plays an ATF agent who goes back in time trying to stop a terrorist attack and save the life of the key witness played by Paula Patton. Much of the time is actually spent watching her through a device called "Snow White" which enables us to look back roughly four days into the past. Why yes, that is a pic of Denzel watching himself four days prior.
The Jacket
(2005)
We meet Gulf War Vet Jack Starks (Adrien Brody) in 1992 after he's survived getting shot in the head, but now suffers bouts of amnesia. This means he can't recall the facts of an event that led to him being charged with the murder of a police officer. He's found not guilty by reason of insanity, but ends up incarcerated in a mental institution (hey, travel back in time to when that was the theme). The doc there, played by Kris Kristofferson, does what docs in these types of movies do. He puts our guy in a strait-jacket, and injects him full experimental drugs. Next thing you know, Jack finds himself 15 years in the future. This one bends your mind as far as it can without actually breaking it.
Safety Not Guaranteed
(2012)
Of all the movies about the subject, this might have the least time travel of them all, if it really has any at all. Hmmm. Still, it's a wonderful little film about a guy who runs an ad in the paper requesting a companion to go back in time with him and the reporter sent in to see if he's cuckoo for Coco Puffs. It's much more a film about human interaction than about hopping through time, but it does happen. Or, does it? Read my full review here.