Review – About Time

Now, I did make it very clear that this blog is all about my FEELINGs

Lots and lots of feelings involved in About Time.

The premise is Domnhall Gleeson is told on his 21^st birthday by Bill Nighy that he can turn back time for some reason. He meets lovely Rachel McAdams and there will be some rom and some com and then the film will end.

What’s really remarkable about About Time is how incredibly slight it is. It’s charming, funny and really entertaining. Richard Curtis is a very good writer and he’s got a great cast of attractive and charming people and it’s nice to spend some hours in their company. However, if you think about the film at all it does completely crumble. There is so much that is at best illogical and at worst nonsensical about the plot.

It establishes rules which it then ignores about time travel. Now, the film isn’t about time travel, it’s about sentiment, but why establish these irrelevant rules? They’re not really helpful. The sentiment can sometimes be a bit undermined as well, by the lack of any consequence, because you can go back in time and ignore it.

It’s also notable for possibly being the only film I’ve seen that fails the sexy lamp test coined (I think) by Kelly Sue DeConnick. “If you can replace a character with a sexy lamp, you’re a fucking hack”. Rachel McAdams is the sexy lamp. Her input has almost no effect whatsoever on the plot. Her lack of agency is almost frightening. It’s covered up quite well because McAdams is super charming and has all the movie star charisma but it’s pretty odd, particularly in a scene where she makes Domnhall Gleeson make all the decisions about their wedding.

Despite this, the film does pass the Bechdel Test (just) and Lindsay Duncan and Lydia Wilson are fab as Domnhall Gleeson’s mother and sister. Both of them actually have a bit more of a personality than poor Rachel McAdams.

The film is overlong, spending too much time on pointless plotlines that get reversed due to time travel and distracting from its actual heart, which is the relationship between Gleeson and his dad who is Bill Nighy, who is, unsurprisingly brilliant because he’s Bill Nighy.

The most remarkable thing about About Time is just how good it is despite its numerous glaring flaws.  It’s incredibly easy to ignore them and get swept up in the story and the nice people being funny and witty and having feelings. Sentimentality is often attacked and seen as something terrible, but Richard Curtis is a real master of sentiment. You feel everything you’re supposed to and you don’t feel pushed into feeling things (like the Notebook). It’s undeniably touching and achieves what it intends excellently.

Also, Tom Hollander is there and he’s pretty fantastic.