Project Almanac (2015)
Directed by Dean Israelite
A group of teens discover secret plans of a time machine, and construct one. However, things start to get out of control.
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15 films that influenced Project Almanac
What critics say influenced Project Almanac
Fans of the genre expect no less, and this movie name-drops “Groundhog Day,” “Looper” and of course Marty McFly.
Israelite and screenwriters Andrew Deutschman and Jason Pagan name-drop numerous time-travel staples throughout their movie, referencing everything from Rian Johnson’s Looper to Groundhog Day and Bill & Ted.
The smart and super-slick teen time-machine picture Project Almanac is the latest incarnation of this would-coulda-shoulda pipe-dream — a movie so knowing that its characters reference Looper, Groundhog Day, and maybe five other films that lay out the pros and cons of rewriting the past.
Quinn wants better grades, so he goes “Groundhog Day” on his chemistry exam.
It also is smart enough to reference its predecessors, such as "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure," "The Terminator," "Timecop" and "Doctor Who." (At one point, one of the characters uses "Groundhog Day" as a verb.)
In addition to pulling tricks on those who have bullied them, the kids help their friend Quinn (Sam Lerner) pass a Chemistry test in an over-and-over sequence that is sour instead of funny, comparing poorly not only to Groundhog Day but to its recent copycat, Premature.
“Project Almanac” isn’t “Time After Time” (1979) or “Back to the Future” (1985) or “12 Monkeys” (1996), but the new release does turn out to be a surprisingly jaunty trip for jaded Gen-Y kids.
The film self-consciously name-drops "Looper," although it probably has more in common with the comparatively no-frills "Back to the Future."
Maybe every time-travel movie can’t use a souped-up DeLorean, but “Project Almanac” may leave you wanting to pull out your old copy of “Back to the Future” instead.
Now Hollywood is trying its hand at a “Back to the Future” wannabe for the iPhone generation by masking bad writing and poorly-developed characters with shaky camera techniques and awkward improv.
Yes, the kids are primarily inspired by the footage of David's father, but they're just as fueled by "Back to the Future"—to them, it's all movies.
But we have to go Back to the Future for that kind of time-travel staying power.
The film self-consciously name-drops "Looper," although it probably has more in common with the comparatively no-frills "Back to the Future."
Fans of the genre expect no less, and this movie name-drops “Groundhog Day,” “Looper” and of course Marty McFly.
Israelite and screenwriters Andrew Deutschman and Jason Pagan name-drop numerous time-travel staples throughout their movie, referencing everything from Rian Johnson’s Looper to Groundhog Day and Bill & Ted.
It's intriguing material, but nothing we haven't seen before, and the film makes the mistake of bringing up past time travel offerings that were either more fun (one of the "Bill & Ted" flicks is briefly seen) or more compelling and better made (there's a reference to "Looper").
One sequence is built around a character's love of "Looper," while another sequence shows them watching "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure."
“Project Almanac” wants to be a smart film playing with the paradoxes inherent in the science fiction idea of time travel and, just like one of the movies it cites–the disappointing 2012 film “Looper”–it never fully engages with the concept.
It also is smart enough to reference its predecessors, such as "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure," "The Terminator," "Timecop" and "Doctor Who." (At one point, one of the characters uses "Groundhog Day" as a verb.)
It’s inevitable here that time traveling will cause ripple effects (as the concept did in movies like The Terminator and Back to the Future) but those effects— that are so important to the third act— are so haphazardly thrown together that their genesis is confusing.
Despite their forced references to various films that involve time travel or parallel universes – Timecop, The Terminator and Groundhog Day all get mentions – the teenage protagonists have not seemed to learn from past human abuses of time travel in their entertainment.
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The " Paranormal Activity ” franchise that began in 2007 cleverly brought faux-amateur cinema out of the woods and into our very homes with the rare and mostly welcome use of mostly stationary cameras.
It borrows the found footage conceit from horror romps like Cloverfield, Paranormal Activity, and The Blair Witch Project, even though it’s a sci-fi teen romance, not a horror film.
But what worked just fine for the already-minimalist horror genre (Paranormal Activity) and sort of worked for the monster movie (Cloverfield) and the superhero flick (Chronicle) doesn't work so well for the time-travel subgenre.
That’s crucial, since the movie is filmed completely in iPhone and video-camcorder footage, a technique that we now can see peaked back when it first hit, in “The Blair Witch Project” (1999).
When “ The Blair Witch Project ” entered our consciousness in 1999, the nausea-inducing horror film didn’t just shaky-cam its way into the primordial ooze of our psyches.
It borrows the found footage conceit from horror romps like Cloverfield, Paranormal Activity, and The Blair Witch Project, even though it’s a sci-fi teen romance, not a horror film.
It was only a few years ago that the “found footage” concept soared in its usage in The Blair Witch Project.
“Project Almanac” isn’t “Time After Time” (1979) or “Back to the Future” (1985) or “12 Monkeys” (1996), but the new release does turn out to be a surprisingly jaunty trip for jaded Gen-Y kids.
Evangelista seems to be channeling Aaron Yoo from “Disturbia,” and Black-D’Elia and Gardner are mostly decorative feminine additions to the crew.
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Project Almanac is Primer for the Cloverfield crowd.
Once there was a scrappy little time travel movie called Primer.
While earlier in the 20th century popular culture more frequently imagined the camera as a voyeuristic tool (see Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window ), the reality of recording has been far more normalized today, even if it hasn't lost its insidious potential.