Review of Time Lapse (2014) by Quincytheodore — 29 May 2015

The addiction of getting your photo taken. For a low budget flick, Time Lapse has a nifty way to hook interest from audience. Its time traveling premise is pretty unique even though it is done with modest production value. Using only a couple of sets and actors, it pushes the plot one day at a time. As other mind bending movies, the plot twist can be hard to digest at times and the inconsistent acting does hamper the movie at mid-way point, though the photo finish still looks good.

Three friends living in an apartment complex find a secret of their neighbor. What looks to be a prank at first is actually a device to capture images of the future. They experiment with it and soon discover a way to make profit. but the opportunity is short live as other parties are drawn by curiosity and the secret is deteriorating their relationships. The cast contains only several characters which put pressure for the main leads to deliver drama as well as sci-fi narrative.

The actors are mostly known for television shows or supporting roles. Danielle Panabaker (from The Flash series) as Callie is decent but can be a bit rigid at times. She performs well in first half, yet as the movie demands more layers to the character, she delivers different emotions with the same delivery. It's the same problem with the other male leads, the characters development might seem abrupt at times.

Concept of the time travel works well, following a certain interesting pattern. Soon they realize fiddling with time takes a lot of commitment, not to mention they must go to such length to keep it hidden and functioning. The movie creates a good tension as both repercussion and gain from the machine gradually escalate. Problem arises when the concept gets too complicated towards later half, it has to explain the quirky mechanics in relatively short time which may prove to be convoluted.

Time Lapse makes the best from its moderate production value. while it may not be picture perfect, it's definitely a nice shot of sci-fi genre.