See You Yesterday

I will always applaud a film for taking a tired storyline and injecting new life into it with a fresh spin. From bizarre sci-fi films to mediocre comedies, it almost seems like film has reached its limit in terms of how many original stories can really be told, without feeling like another film from the past. One of Netflix's newest feature films is a film that takes the time travel idea and flips it on its head. Injecting enough new elements to feel like a new premise, I was hooked just by reading the plot of the movie before watching. Sadly, although admirable, I don't believe this an effective film overall.

Upon research, I found that See You Yesterday is based on a short film of the same name and stars the exact same cast. I was unaware of this at first, but this story may lend itself better to a short film. Following CJ and Sebastian, as they invent time travel, a murder of someone close to them sends them on a mission to bring him back from the past. Although flawed as many time travel films are, this movie sets up the rules very nicely and sticks to them. In terms of the overall story, this movie works very well in blending the fun time travel journey with some very serious real-world issues.

Where this film fails for me is in the outcome. I had quite a bit of fun during the time jumps, but these characters hardly ever pull anything off successfully and there is no real resolution to the movie either. Open-ended movies usually pique my interest and make me think, sometimes making the movie better, but not this time. I found the film's conclusion to be very, very poor, due to the fact that you really have no idea how certain story threads will be tied up. The movie does a pretty solid job at setting the stage and getting you invested, but you never feel rewarded for sitting through it.

Where I found See You Yesterday to be most impressive is in its casting. Having never seen any of these actors before, aside from a small (facepalm-worthy) cameo, they really sold these characters well. Being their first feature film with a wide release, I can say they all have bright futures ahead of them. If not for their dedication, I probably would have found myself bored with this movie.

In the end, See You Yesterday benefits from a devoted cast and a first act that gets you very interested, the real world issues blended with the aspect of time travel was a very neat twist, and the time travel itself is fun at times. Sadly, this is a film that doesn't know how to properly end and ends up making for a very frustrating movie as a whole. I can't get myself to recommend this one. A decent premise with nowhere to go.

The best of the movie was MJF's appearance, and his Great Scott comment.. the worst? Everything else.

....give me a break. Endings like that should be banned. Just bloody lazy.

If had I time machine I'd go back and not watch this. Obvious joke, but not all time travel movies are worth you time. This ain't.

I begins ok, looks and plays like a Nickelodeon-production. Until the f-bombs start coming. Then n-bombs. What the heck is this? It's colorful and with young actors, but they keep swearing, it's pretty weird.

Then one of the characters does something so mind-numbingly stupid and out of character, that I pretty much lost all hope from there. Plus, the weak-ass "political" message: cops are evil and kill black people for sport, is so on the nose it's embarrassing. Even though this movie shows plenty of black-on-black crime, it's still made out to be solely because of racism. Look, racism is real and it sucks, but does EVERY movie with a black cast have to be about the same thing? Come on.

And here's the kicker. This movie is weak with a sucky script, the IMDB-rating as of now is 4,9, but the critics seems to love it! I wonder why. Could it be because of the weak-sauce "politics" on display?

To be fair, the main characters do a good job, acting is pretty alright. They are pretty and charming. And Michael J Fox has a cameo, so watch the first 5 minutes or so, to catch him. Then skip.

I wonder about the intended audience: the atmosphere being very childish, adults get bored chop-chop, probably right from the start; the dialogues being hardly refined and sometimes ridiculous, the children are therefore proscribed. Moreover, the script is messy and repetitious. Finally, the ending (if you ever get there!) rhymes with bitterness. I nevertheless appreciated the reference to Back to the Future (1985), with the furtive presence of Michael J. Fox as a science teacher.