Predestination (2014)

Predestination (2014)

7/10

Starring

Ethan Hawke

Sarah Snook

Directed by The Spierig brothers

Twenty minutes into this movie and I was wondering why I was asked to give it a sniff. Soon the all so familiar terrain of a man sharing a tale for a bottle of booze turned to a time traveling or time jumping processes that will finally get you to sit up and go, “What the…?”

Everything about the movie is crazy and it gets crazier still as the movie wraps up making you wonder the huge mess a time loop can present and leaving you the viewer to ponder if such a loop can be stopped.

Based on Robert A. Heinlein’s All You Zombies, the movie exploration of time travel does not come out as slick and gadget intense like the other Hollywood masterpieces we know concerning time travel. What this movie didn’t have in the finances to make a high-class time travel movie, it had in its story and directing.

Their version starts in 1970 with a time bomb ticking away, our hero is trying to disarm this bomb when the perpetrator appears behind him. The man distracts him long enough to delay the timing and when our hero returns to disarm the bomb and place it in a container to contain the explosion, the bomb went off.

The explosion was contained, but the resulting fire was too much for our hero and he was burnt mercilessly.

He was dying on the floor desperately trying to reach his violin case, the case was brought to him and he changed the timer on the case to 1992 and hit a button. The next thing we see is him in bandages from head to toe.

His face was badly burnt and so was his body, a face transplant was done for him and after some major months of healing he was well and the new face (Ethan Hawke) had stuck.

He got commendation for his work, but was sent back in time again to start a chain of events that was crucial to the time-travel bureau a chain of events which will lead to what he called a snake eating its own tail forever in a never-ending loop.

The person that stole the show in this movie was Sarah Snook who played John and Jane. Her portrayal of these characters was paramount to the success of this movie and the critical recognition it got.

I have not seen much movies from these directing brothers, but I'm impressed in the way they took what could have been a wasted showman of gadgetry into a wonderful story stirred just right to deliver the right sight for the eyes.