About Time

8 October 2015

Source Working Title Films
He can go back and change his love life as much as he wants. It takes a lot of do-overs to get things just right.

There is no other way to describe my relationship with this film than love. I love it, I love everything about it. I have written about it on a previous blog of mine, which no longer exists, and I am so happy that I get to write about it again now that it has made it's move onto Netflix. I must admit though, I am not sure I necessarily agree with the Netflix description but hey-ho.

[Just quickly, I promise not every week will be a romantic film, I do branch out and will do all sorts of genres - next week will be the crime thriller A Walk Among The Tombstones starring Mr Liam Neeson.]

One of the main things I love about this film is the relationship between Tim (Domhnall Gleeson) and Mary (Rachel McAdams). It's with incredible credit to the writer that this love story develops with a realness, and without melodrama yet still being engrossing and engaging. There are no dramatic moments when you feel the two are going to break up, these two are going to get together and be in it for the long haul and it is really beautiful, and hope-inducing, to watch.

The film develops, and suddenly you are readjusted to be watching a film that is no longer a boy meets girl story. The film concentrates on all different family relationships, particularly that of a father and son, as well as a person's relationship with their home and where they live, as well as the decisions they make.

Time travel never feels out of place in the film and feels, paradoxically, shocking real. The perimeters of the time travel are set, and while this does lead to a twist (which I will not spoil), to be honest the time travel feels a part of real life as much as him taking the tube to work.

Here is where I will tell you to stop reading if you don't want WEDDING SPOILERS.

Source Working Title Films

The wedding is a particularly gorgeous scene. For starters, the dress! I previously wouldn't have personally considered a red dress but the way they put it together with the family feel and colour scheme, it makes for a really beautiful sentiment and I am now more than open to trying one on! It is also full of all the little personal things that make a wedding so special, for example the song she walks down the isle to. The wedding also shows how wrong things can go on a wedding day, things that are outside of your control and the best men's speeches in particular (there are a couple due to the time travel) are a really lovely comedic moment.

And finally, I want to finish on the sentiment of the film. Would we all love to be able to time travel in our own lives for endless do overs? Probably. Would it take away the magic of life? Absolutely.

"The truth is, now I don't travel back at all, not even for the day. I just try to live everyday as if I've deliberately come back to this one day. To enjoy it. As if it was the full final day. Of my extraordinary, ordinary life."

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