The Time Traveler's Wife
by Robert Schwentke
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DVD details
Actor: Arliss Howard, Eric Bana, Rachel McAdams, Ron LivingstonDirector: Robert Schwentke
Brand: NLV
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 5.1; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 5.1
Format: Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 1 minutes
Published: 2010-02-01
DVD Release Date: 2010-02-09
Audience Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: New Line
Product features:
- Lose yourself in timeless love with this gloriously romantic story of the journey of two hearts. Artist Clare Abshire (Rachel McAdams of The Notebook) shares a deep emotional bond with Henry De Tamble (Eric Bana of The Other Boleyn Girl), a handsome librarian who travels involuntarily through time. Knowing they can be separated without warning, Clare and Henry treasure the moments they have togeth
DVD Reviews of The Time Traveler's Wife
DVD Review: Soap opera masquerades as science fiction
Summary: 2 Stars
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
While the concept of 'The Time Traveler's Wife' appears pretty clever, the actual execution proves quite inept. Eric Bana is Henry DeTamble, a Chicago librarian, who has some kind of genetic mutation which causes him to skip around in time. The twist is that every time he jumps in time, he loses his clothes. You might think that the image of the naked Henry scrambling around for new duds as he appears in different eras might have the potential for some neat comic possibilities--but humorless director Robert Schwentke opts for a completely heavy-handed, serious approach.
The way the time traveling works is that Henry is apparently drawn back to the significant events of his life. Chief among them is a car accident in which 6 year old Henry survives but his mother is killed. Henry still gets the opportunity to see his mother prior to her death as he time jumps into a pre-accident encounter on a train. Later, he visits his father who is now an alcoholic as he never got over his wife's death. The father knows about Henry's time traveling and berates him for not being able to prevent his mother's death. Henry states that he's been to the scene of the accident numerous times and despite his efforts, is never able to alter the events of what occurs (it's interesting that there are no scenes in which Henry does try and prevent his mother from being killed). Nonetheless, despite claiming that he's unable to change history, midway through the story, Henry jumps into the future where he buys a lottery ticket, providing a five million dollar windfall for he and his wife, and guaranteeing the family's financial security for the rest of their lives.
One of the givens in this movie is to accept the absurd premise of a genetic mutation that can cause time travel. Since the story is a fantasy, it's a perfectly acceptable conceit. But even within the fantasy concept there has to be some kind of internal logic. It's posited that Henry has no control over his time-traveling forays. He supposedly never knows when he'll be leaving or returning to a particular place and point in time. What's more it's not one Henry who is traveling--there appear to be numerous incarnations of Henry (at different points in his life) who pop up all over the place. So how is it, that these different Henry's conveniently know when to pop back up a critical dramatic moment despite the fact that they supposedly have no control over their time hopping abilities? I'm thinking particularly about the wedding scene where the younger Henry disappears right before he's supposed to get hitched and then is replaced by the older, gray-haired Henry at the altar.
In reading various postings on the internet regarding 'The Time Traveler's Wife', a fair number of people are disturbed by the scenes in which Henry visits his future wife, Clare, as a child. To them, the scenes are unsavory as there is perhaps an unhealthy relationship between a child and a grown man suggested. For me, there are no suggestions of an underlying sexual relationship between the characters. Fortunately, the filmmakers did not deal with the problem of the time traveling daughter--wouldn't she have also lost her clothes when hopping around in time? Now that would have been truly disturbing and I can see why the issue was not dealt with at all--despite adding to the entire implausibility of the plot.
Speaking of the plot, there is little tension as the story moves along. Part of the problem is that Henry is such a non-heroic sort of character. One wonders how he can hold a job as a librarian with all his time hopping. And then we see that he's not very industrious at all when he takes the easy way out and purchases the lottery ticket (Clare also comes off badly as she goes against her gut instincts and agrees to keep the ticket and cash it in). Henry never develops as a character and we find out little about him. He's too busy losing his clothes and disappearing all the time. There's a bit of tension when Henry's best friend tells Clare not to marry him but then he disappears until the end of the movie. Also completely underdeveloped is Dr. Kendrick who potentially could have developed some kind of cure for Henry's predicament but never does.
The central moment of the story occurs when Henry decides to get a vasectomy because he fears that his child might end up with the same genetic abnormality. Clare outwits him by having sex with a pre-vasectomy Henry and gives birth to Alba, who of course also is a time traveler. The dark moment occurs when Henry is shot by Clare's Republican hunter father who mistakes him for a deer out in the woods. But since there are still time hopping Henry's out there, he pays a visit to Clare and Alba after he dies and makes them feel better.
The Time Traveler's Wife does have an intriguing premise and holds your interest to the end. Ultimately however, we don't care about these characters precisely because they are not fleshed out as real people. It's a film that failed at the box office as both critics and the public agreed that the fantasy plot had too many implausibilities and none of the characters proved at all compelling. No amount of crocodile tears and whining by the Time Traveler's Wife that her husband never spends enough time at home, can save this flick from devolving into what it is: a predictable soap opera.
Description of The Time Traveler's Wife
Lose yourself in timeless love with this gloriously romantic story of the journey of two hearts. Artist Clare Abshire (Rachel McAdams of The Notebook) shares a deep emotional bond with Henry De Tamble (Eric Bana of The Other Boleyn Girl), a handsome librarian who travels involuntarily through time. Knowing they can be separated without warning, Clare and Henry treasure the moments they have together, imbuing them with the yearning and passion of two people imprisoned by time?and set free by love. Based on the #1 bestseller, The Time Traveler's Wife weaves together destiny and devotion, past and future to turn an extraordinary love into an extraordinary love story.Bestsellers in DVD
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