Well Go USA
How many time travel stories have there been throughout the years? More than you can list off the top of your head, with all manner of styles, approaches, and genres. Some are impossible to follow, some are easy and light, and in general they are inherently an interesting sci-fi idea — because it’s a rare person who doesn’t wonder about ‘what if’, changing your past choices or seeing what may be or even truly knowing the past. I know I’ve pondered all three.
Synchronic is a dark time travel tale directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, written by Justin Benson. The movie follows two friends and fellow EMTs Dennis (Jamie Dornan) and Steve (Anthony Mackie) as they encounter a new horror in their city. Dennis is married to wife Tara (Katie Aselton) while Steve is notoriously single — the film thinks it’s portraying him as a ‘playboy’ but it comes mainly in ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ lines of dialogue.
The terrifying mystery the two find is a scourge of unusual deaths, specifically among teenagers in the city — one that seemed to have been on fire, another mysteriously mutilated, etc. At the same time, Dennis’ eldest, his daughter Brianna (Ally Ioannides) is distant and worried about the future — why bother with all that schoolwork if we’re all doomed anyway?
And then Steve discovers an unusual tumor in his brain, highly advanced, to the point where he likely has very little time left. Although it’s not the role of the EMTs to solve such a mystery, the bizarre nature of the deaths has Steve start investigating, until he discovers a common thread: a synthetic drug called Synchronic. And as it turns out, the drug literally lets you travel through time and space, entirely based on your physical location.
We then see a fairly engaging series of experiments as Steve tries to figure out how it works, or at least where he might end up, naturally mostly highly dangerous environments. But it all kicks into high gear when Brianna disappears after taking the drug, and now Steve decides he alone can track her down.
This is a bit of an unusual direction, leaving Dennis behind, but ultimately the movie doesn’t really seem to care much about Dennis and his own connection to his daughter, which feels misplaced. Steve’s investigation and adventure, although a bit slow starting, is a fairly thrilling one, buoyed by Anthony Mackie’s charismatic presence.
There are a few throwaway scenes here and there to set up more connections with Dennis, but it was hard to really feel like that was a real connection. To me, I felt invested enough in Steve’s tale to follow along with him, but the movie would have been better if they could really have connected us emotionally to Steve and Brianna’s relationship, even if it was through Dennis.
But overall, as a time travel thriller story, it’s fairly coherent and consistent, with a kind of time travel that doesn’t strain your mind too much — it’s really there simply to drive Steve on his adventure as he runs out of time, in more ways than one. For the time travel fans out there, it’s not super technical, but it’s entertaining.
Synchronic has a run time of 1 hour 42 minutes and is rated R for drug content and language throughout, and for some violent/bloody images.
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