Watching this movie again after 15 years feels like experiencing a completely different film. As a teenager, I was captivated by its central premise: what if you could correct that one mistake in your life? I was also thoroughly entertained by the time travel elements.
Now, I perceive the film as a form of therapy where you revisit your childhood errors as an adult and learn to respond differently to the same situations. Even if you can't alter the past, you still possess the power to change how you react to it and, in doing so, mend yourself. We all have the ability to time travel in our minds and reshape our past experiences.
Worth seeing. Even if you aren't a fan of Punk'd or Dude Where's My.. you'll enjoy seeing Kutcher in this role. The story is very gripping and almost makes you review how things could have changed in your life had some different events altered it.
This film gets better every time I watch it, just never goes right for (Evan Terbon) The butterfly effect is reality in many different ways..
I don't know how but luckily i watched this film without analizing everything of it (which i do almost always) and i have really enjoyed it. Time travel is so fcking messy so surely there are a lot of things wrong with the script but if you sit willing to watch an entertaining and good movie this one is for you.
The video game, Life Is Strange, took a lot of notes from this movie if you ask me. I will admit, this movie definitely calls for a quite a bit of suspension of disbelief, there's one plot hole that sorely sticks out, but despite that it was still very intriguing and entertaining, the ending even caught me by surprise (I watched the director's cut). I will have to watch this one more than once.
Buena y triste, recomendada para los amantes del misterio.
I don't know what to say (in a good way)
It relies a character blackout for everything. That's basically the movie. The problem is that it goes down the logical path... So Evan didn't know what happened after the mailbox because of blackouts, but what happened would have been unavoidable gossip in the town, and even newsworthy. Outside of the basic blackout mysteries, and Ethan's confusion, there's nothing going on. Well theres a trip to a fortune teller, which seems pretty cheesy filler. Later on, and between the teenage drama, the whole plot is supernatural time wasting. Quantum leap meets Dawson Creek lite. And every time he changes the future, this complex butterfly effect, he just so happens to be around the exact same people and he himself is the same. Even his haircut is the same. Same weight. Everything. Even his journals are at hand. Apart from one time, but fear not. SPOILERS His old birth video has the same effect as the shaky letters. Who knew? What are the odds? So yeah, he goes back to when he was a baby in the womb and strangles himself with the umbilical cord. Then he (presumably) sees how life plays out, even though he wouldn't have been there to witness it.
Movies like this should be smart and the mystery should could from a gold script not a constant crutch of the character.
Very thrilling and with some nice plot twists.
Really interesting, yet really sad concept...I guess you never know what you've lost, if you haven't had the opportunity to lose it...
Watching the movie with my 14 year old son tonight, 20 years later. Still so great. Love it. In my top 20 movies, ever.
Fairly well executed with some shortcomings, but an enjoyable ride.
Even though the director’s cut has the hilarious “baby hangs itself in the womb” scene, it was pretty ridiculous and absurd. Theatrical cut has a much more sensible ending, albeit too happy.
This is a less-than-good movie, with several uni-dimensional characters, an abundance of beaten movie and TV tropes, bad pacing, and unable to decide if it is a rom-com (the whole storyline about frat life) or a murder thriller (the first few scenes, with some not-really-creative use of sound for scare jumps). It ends up being nothing, or at least, nothing remarkable.
What tries to pose itself as a complex, sophisticated storyline of multiverses is just a mumbo jumbo of shaky letters, unremarkable graphic effects (even for the time), and bad writing. If you want to be challenged intellectually by the concept of multiverses and walk down memory lane, there are so many better movies.
I remember hearing a lot about it when it came out (probably because it has scenes of Ashton Kutcher without a shirt) and then never hearing about it again, and now I understand why. I just wish I could go back in time like the main character does and prevent myself from watching this movie.
What an innecesary movie. Overrated. I understand the hype tho, it came out in 2004. Aged like milk, that's it.
This movie is the origin of the baby from Death Strading.
I still think it was all inside his head and he’s actually stuck in that mental hospital
Directors cut
https://boxd.it/33zcFh
"You can't play God, son."
I watched the Director's Cut of this and it was much darker and sadder than I remember the original being. Highly recommend people watching that version. It's a pretty great premise that can almost be confusing but they handle it pretty well.
Rewatched this for the first time in years and I thought I was losing it when the end came up. One youtube search later and I found out there are 4 different endings and I guess the director's cut was the one in the version I watched. Not a fan. But I liked how it gave an explanation for the stillbirths. Which I guess is an added scene/detail in the director's cut version cause I definitely don't remember too. I don't know if it's because it's literally the first thing that comes to mind when I think about this movie or hear Stop Crying Your Heart Out, but I will always love "the theatrical cut" ending of them passing each other by as strangers.
Come on, I know they wanted to make clear what is the butterfly effect, and the idea from this movie is very interesting, but why do they have to make the protagonist do the dumbest decisions? Why don't he simply stayed away of the bomb, for example? This movie is one exemple of good idea, but bad execution.
Review by echelon_fourBlockedParentSpoilers2013-08-03T12:55:20Z
The movie is just kind of stupid a lot of the time.
The rules in this movie change so much, first nobody knows Evan changed, and he can't remember the new world, then the prisoner notices the wounds in his hands appear (which disappear for the rest of the movie), then Evan remembers the changed world, but the new memories don't alter his personality at all.
Also, the father was always lamenting his "family curse" but attempts to have 3 kids. Kind of a silly thing to do.
Also you don't get sent to federal prison as you await a trial, you either wait on bail or (if you are a risk of skipping the trial) in minimum security county jail.
Also, every time Evan goes back in time to fix something, he fucks up the moments he has. Like standing next to the mailbox he knew would blow up, or lighting a bomb that he knows has a 3 second fuse. This isn't "going back always makes things worse", this is going back and making things worse then. Think of how badass the universe would have been that he stopped the bomb from killing the kid, but also didn't needlessly destroy himself.
Also, in the final timeline where he was in the looney bin, why did the doctor dismiss his ideas about different universes, something that shouldn't have been experienced by the Even in the that timeline until just then.
Also why did Even go back to his classroom and draw a picture of a knife murder? Just for consistency? That isn't as important when he stabs himself in the hands seconds later.
All of these complaints are with the script and story, and they are a little nitpicky. Everything else in the movie is ok (actors, visuals, ect). The story is just lacking.