FAQ About Time Travel

directed by Gareth Carrivick

FAQ About Time Travel is a comedy based on the stereotype of the inadequate geek guy. Ray (Chris O'Dowd) gets the boot from his job as a children's entertainer at a theme park when his Planetary Peace Corps routine proves too upsetting for the kids. His friends Pete (Dean Lennox Kelly) and Toby (Marc Wootton) lead equally unfulfilling lives.

After a humiliating day they meet up at the pub to relax and forget about their awful jobs. Ray holds forth about his obsession with time travel. Toby is a failed writer, brimming with daft ideas that seem unlikely to give him the fame he craves, whilst Pete is a man's man who is far more interested in soccer than science fiction. They're all set for an idle evening of mocking each other when Ray bumps into a woman who claims to be a time traveller, and the men discover a time portal in the pub's loo.

The world's least likely heroes are thrust back and forth in time, messing with time paradoxes and causality and accidentally causing the occasional holocaust. They're helped by Cassie (Anna Faris), who seems to be on their side even though she may not be the most competent of time travellers. However Ray is haunted by the sight of everyone in the pub lying dead. Can he change the future and prevent this disaster from ever happening? And why would anyone want to harm such an unimportant bunch of guys anyway?

This is a mildly funny movie, and Chris O'Dowd's cute nerdiness goes a long way towards making the story more engaging. The effects aren't spectacular, being more the kind of thing you would expect from a low-budget TV series than a blockbuster film. It's absurd and frivolous, like an episode of Red Dwarf. Because it relies on stereotypes a lot it's not funny enough to make you pull a muscle. But it's passable entertainment for those times when the alternative is staring at a blank wall.

20th July 2010