About Time

    I present to you: The film that DIDN'T rip off Groundhog Day. And considering what the plot is, I think About Time deserves credit for that.
    At the age of 21, Tim's (Domhnall Gleeson) father (Bill Nighy) tells him that he has the ability to go back to any moment in his life and change what happens, then come back to the present. When he moves to London, he decides to mainly use his power to try and win over the girl he loves, Mary (Rachel McAdams).

    So About Time had the opportunity to do the same exact plot that Groundhog Day had and thankfully, they didn't even touch it. It's not even the same story style. While Groundhog Day was great at being about going deep into a singular moment, About Time is a long, spiraling romantic Epic that spans the whole length of a relationship and the people who surround it. This movie doesn't even really confine itself to a single plot. After the basic exposition I just described, it really becomes a twisting journey, with its own unique twists.
    In how wonderfully normal and realistic About Time is, besides the time travel, it never takes the obviously melodramatic directions it could have. Like a scene where Tim has the ability to have an affair, but doesn't take advantage of that and leaves. He knows he could have had sex with this woman, gone back in time and had it be like nothing had happened, but decides not to. Instead of taking the used path of having the two of them have sex, the girlfriend finding out, etc., the scene just seems to strengthen the center relationship without doing anything out of character in service of a convoluted plot. The moment just serves as the ending to another funny segment where Tim uses his time travel ability to repeat an awkward situation and fix it.
   The whole movie sort of works in this anthological way. It flies smoothly across about a decade, landing in a first encounter, a proposal, a meet-up with an old friend, a visit from the in-laws, any other real world situations that gets improved by having Tim get to repeat them over and over again until performed exactly right. There's sort of an easy reality to this plot, a relaxation and slow pace not commonly found in movies. It's not based on a melodramatic incident, mysterious characters, big reveals like Nicholas Sparks movies have. it's just people going through the motions of life, with the added touch of time travel to make it its own, to make it funny. And I completely buy the boringness.       That's what's missing in the rom-com genre; normal, everyday life. That's why "When Harry Met Sally" and "Annie Hall" are classics, because they aren't unrealistic and filled with convoluted plot points.
    And yes, there is time travel in About Time. However, it's only used for making memorable scenes out of the awkward scenarios and the difficult forks in the road Tim finds himself in, (well, besides something that happens near the end, but I'll get to that later).  For instance, a choice Tim has to make near the beginning, really the starting incident of the movie. It's when Tim meets Mary for the first time and gets her number. He returns home to his constantly agitated but genius playwright roommate Harry (Tom Hollander), and finds his recent play bombed due to an unprepared actor. So Tim decides to go back in time and help Harry, causing his meet with Rachel to never happen. This works to produce a great comedic scene, to create Tim as a clearer, more selfless character, to strengthen Tim and Mary's relationship as we see them meet up twice more and seem to be soul mates again, and to create a sort of mini-conflict to carry us along for a little while.
    But remember when I said that the time travel isn't used in overly melodramatic situations. Well that's mostly true, until a random pit stop the film makes near the end. Out of basically nowhere, Tim's sister Kit Kat (Lydia Wilson) gets in a car crash while in a drunken state after a fight with her abusive boyfriend. Tim uses time travel to fix this, but that has a negative repercussion, so he lets the car crash happen, HOWEVER, the same resolution that would've happened with the time travel happens anyways. The only thing that happens with any sort of point is when Tim finds out that traveling before a baby (specifically his baby in this case) is born and changing something causes the baby to change. But even that's about a 10 second discovery that does not need an extended, tear-jerking detour in a 2 hour movie. It's not even foreshadowed well. We never see any hints to Kit Kat becoming an alcoholic, or of the boyfriend that we see for fleeting seconds at the beginning of the movie being abusive.
   Fortunately, that scene isn't the actual end. The film returns back to its simply sentimental, charming and warm way at the end, when Tim's father dies. This ending I actually found a lot more in place and emotionally resonant than the Kit Kat car crash. It's more underplayed, it seems more realistic as Tim's dad is obviously old and withering, and it's probably the best possible end to a story that is so episodic and spans so many years without any real plot. Tim gets closure with his dad before he dies, the man who led him and gave him the ability to be happy in life. He has settled down fully with Mary while still having that spark of enjoyability and pure love in their relationship, and Tim fully come to terms with losing his father before it has to happen.
   I'm really glad this movie exists. I'm glad it's not a morality tale where Tim uses his power for selfish advantages and eventually learns a lesson in the end, cause we already have that. We already have "Groundhog Day". About Time is also not the usual, cheesy romantic comedy. It's about average people with average lives, and the added element of time travel to make it original. Besides an unnecessary mini melodrama, About Time is warm, beautiful, and simply nostalgic through how normal it all is. And it's the type of romantic comedy we need more of.
                                                           4/5