Of course, it still has a lot of the tired tropes of Yankee movies, Big Shooty Protagonist, Male/Female Leads falling in love at the first eye contact, random sex scenes to keep viewers awake, Robin Hood saves the day by himself, Cillian Murphy being anti-social in a leather trench-coat.
But it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a Yankee-ish movie (the director is Kiwi) that actually puts an effort to make a movie be about critiquing capitalism, without some plot twist where the people wanting change secretly eat babies. The time metaphor is so one to one that it becomes corny after a while, and I enjoyed every pun. The title in Portuguese is also better than the original, loosely translating to “The Cost of Tomorrow.”
Ironically the editing is very straight to the point with barely any filler and the budget looked very efficiently allocated, as if it valued your time (sorry). Wholeheartedly recommend.
I saw this back when it came out and several times since. It’s always been somewhat of a secret that I keep to myself because it has Timberlake in the movie. I actually forgot Cillian Murphy was in it, and I thought you confused him with Timberlake. Kinda fucked with my brain for a minute. It’s been too long since I’ve seen it, I suppose. Maybe tonight it’ll get a rewatch (re watch… heh).
I remember the movie being very captivating for me though. I first saw it before I had any inkling of what Marxism was and such. I just saw the basic unfairness of the system in the story. A world that shows the concept of “working to live” in a different way. It’s almost like a sterilized dystopian possibility. A world where the cruelty of police, lack of social services, etc. aren’t required to kill those who can’t work (or can’t work as hard as the ruling class demands). The system kills people directly, uncaringly, and the rich are alienated completely from the realities of the daily grind of working for a few more seconds of life. It removes almost all humanity which is left from our already inhumane systems and puts the desperation on full display. I was anxious the entire fucking movie.
I’m not a film nerd. I often end up watching and rewatching movies people probably would label as shit tier. I think this is one of those movies. No critics are going to jerk off and demand an oscar for Timberlake for this one. If you’re expecting some Hollywood A+, 10/10, producers all sucking each other off production then this probably isn’t the movie. But if you want a depressing movie that really digs into that hatred for the privileged fucks of this world, this one might scratch that itch. I recommend it highly as well.