Director: Andrew Niccol
Writer: Andrew Niccol
Cast: Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, Cillian Murphy, Vincent Kartheiser, Alex Pettyfer, Olivia Wilde, Johnny Galecki, Matt Bomer
MPAA: Rated PG-13 for violence, some sexualty and partial nudity, and strong language
Welcome to a world where money is not anymore the ultimate power and the world divides people based on their social class, each to live in a different area called the 'Time Zone'. Money has even ceased to exist, as time now has become the currency. This happens in the future when over-population has become the biggest concern, and to avoid that, humans are being genetically-engineered to stop aging when they reach 25, and then they will stay forever young. The bad news is, once you reach 25, you have only one more year to live, as the greenish phosphorescent digital clock, imprinted in your forearm since you were born, will start counting down and when it reaches zero, your heart will automatically stop pounding. And you die.
Your time can be added or bought though, the same way you have to trade some of your time away to pay for your necessities. Your wages are paid with time, the same as you pay for everything with time, whether it is a single public phone call that may cost you one minute, a cup of coffee that may cost you four minutes, or a trip by bus that may cost an hour or more. You also pay all services with time, including paying for a prostitute for 10 minutes of pleasure with 1 hour of your life. You can borrow time from other people, or take loans from banks and pawnshops, but with high 'time' interest rates . You can even gamble your time in order to win more time. And all these trades and exchanges can be done as simple as clasping your hands with others or by scanning a metal time reader to your clock. So simple, that your time can also be easily drained away by robbers. It's a world controlled by the rich, who set the system to benefit them by harvesting decades of time (even milleniums) from the poor, while the poor have to struggle day by day just to earn enough extra time to live for another day, or they may die in the streets at anytime with their time life running out.
That's the kind of life Will Salas (Justin Timberlake) lives, a 28-year old poor young man living in the ghetto with his 50-year old mom (played by Olivia Wilde). Will has managed to live another 3 years of his life as 25, the same as his mother who has lived an additional 25 years as 25, without growing old. When Will receives a huge amount of time gift from a stranger, he starts to get into troubles with a notorious mobster gang called the Minutemen, and when his mother fatally miscalculates the bus fare, Will decides to leave for New Greenwich, a place where the rich live in luxurious, in order to take revenge and uphold justice. There, he meets and falls for a beautiful woman named Sylvia Weis (Amanda Seyfried), a daughter of a rich bankers, Philippe Weis (Vincent Kartheiser). But as he is from the wrong side of the world and as the Timekeepers, lead by Raymond Leon (Cillian Murphy), hunts him on account of murder, Will is again forced to run and he takes Sylvia as hostage. And together, they have to trust and help each other in order to survive in a world where time is not on their side.
This is an interesting and unique science fiction movie from Andrew Niccol, the same director who gave us Gattaca (1997). I think the premise of using time as the ultimate currency, which can shorten or prolong people's lives, was such a fresh and original idea. The movie itself was entertaining. However, by seeing the big potentials that this movie has, I didn't think that the movie reached its full potentials. The story was a bit simplified by the actions that it offered, as I expected for much deeper story. This movie actually could offer more. The simple execution of transferring time through merely clasping hands and the minimum amount of special effects also made this sci-fi look rather simple, which was actually not a bad thing. 
Amanda Seyfried was stunningly beautiful in her short brunette wig, which was perfectly suited for her and somehow made her look futuristic. And she has that tempting appearance that made her look so adorable and smokin' hot, running all the way throughout the movie in her sexy dresses and stilettos. Sometimes I couldn't explain the appeals and charms that this actress has, but she just 'has' it, even though I must say that her character was a bit underdeveloped in this movie. 
I think Justin Timberlake played his role well as the street-wise young man whose struggles to earn extra time for his life he deserved and his anger towards the system's injustice made him tough enough to do all the risky and dangerous things. However, even though his motives were strong, I think that his character transition from the normal life to the 'live or die' life did not flow that smoothly, which made some of the actions that he took didn't look believable enough (for example, the high risk gambling scene that he was involved in, or the good fighting abilities that he has). Again, it was not about his motives or his drives, but in my opinion, the movie just didn't give enough backgrounds of what he is really capable of when those scenes happened.
Besides the good-looking leads, the supporting casts were also interesting to watch. I think only in this movie we can see Olivia Wilde played as Justin's mother. While Cillian Murphy gave a good performance as the Timekeeper, who judges things as only black or white. Interesting performances also came from Vincent Kartheiser (Pete Campbell from Mad Men) as the greedy time-loaning businessman and Alex Pettyfer (I am Number Four) as the mobster boss who is infamous for stealing other people's time by force. 
As much as I enjoyed this movie as I enjoyed the beautiful casts and entertained by the creative premise, however in overall, I think the screenplay and execution from Andrew Niccol was felt a bit short from its very promising premise. I actually expected more and I think it could have been better. (MJ)
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