ERIC BANA - MOVIE REVIEWS THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE

MOVIE REVIEWS THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE

"Preposterous" is the way Roger Ebert describes The Time Traveler's Wife in the Chicago Sun-Times . "If you allow yourself to think fo r one moment of the paradoxes, contradictions and logical difficulties involved, you will be lost. The movie supports no objective thought." Yet he finds much to like in the performances of Eric Bana as the time traveler and Rachel McAdams as his wife. They "play their roles straight and seriously, have a pleasant chemistry, and sort of involved me in spite of myself." Peter Howell in the Toronto Star remarks that the movie "would amount to little more than a (vanishing) hill of beans where it not for the strong connections between Bana and McAdams, who rise above the shaky material with performances worthy of the Oscar contender this movie aches to be." On the other hand, Michael Sragow in the Baltimore Sun writes that both Bana and McAdams are so strenuously and generically ardent here, I wondered what they were thinking of when they were miming passion and woe a favorite pet? A high school crush? Or maybe some missing pages from the book?" Joanne Kaufman in the Wall Street Journal offers little sympathy, however. "Mr. Bana, who seems to have two modes of acting, shaven and unshaven, and the ill-used Ms. McAdams don't generate much heat. But clearly, the two of them are suffering mightily. Their situation is hopeless and so is their dialogue." But Mick LaSalle in the San Francisco Chronicle figures that despite its clumsiness, the movie "does something significant. It takes, as its subjects, the sadness and grandeur of life and the mystery of time, and it offers a full experience to those who find its wavelength."

15/08/2009