Even though I don’t typically watch sci-fi adventure movies, I’m happy I branched out and gave “Project Almanac” a shot.
The idea of time travel intrigues me and I was interested to see how the premise would be portrayed in this movie.
While searching through his deceased father’s belongings, David Raskin (Jonny Weston) finds a videotape containing footage of his seventh birthday party, where he briefly sees himself at his current age.
David excitedly shows his younger sister Christina (Virginia Gardner) and two best friends, Quinn (Sam Lerner) and Adam (Allen Evangelista). After searching his house, they eventually find plans left behind by his father that detail how to build a time machine.
One aspect that drew me into the movie was the mystery of how he could possibly visit his seventh birthday and the idea that he might be able to go back and stop his dad from dying. Another is that I have never watched a found footage movie before and I was surprised to see how different the experience is from most movies.
With the fast pace at the start of the movie, the movie was dizzying. The film technique was effective in the sense that I felt as though I was on a big adventure with them. However, the abrupt camera changes hurt my head throughout the movie and, at times, some of the angles seemed out of place.
The movie is fun at first as the friends navigate how time travel works. They go back in time to get back at the mean girls, fix a failed test and win the lottery so that David can pay for tuition to MIT.
Even with a far-fetched concept, the film seemed more believable due to the casting; they genuinely seemed like teenagers who couldn’t believe what their lives had become.
The movie slows down during the middle and that’s when the careless fun ends for the characters and audience. “Project Almanac” becomes a bit cliché when David’s potential relationship with his crush Jessie (Sofia Black-D’Elia) is threatened and he makes dumb mistakes so he doesn’t lose her.
A series of unfortunate and life-altering events occur as a result of David’s actions and he struggles to right them on his own. The logistics of time travel become a bit confusing at this point and the originality the movie had going for it is lost.
It’s pretty obvious that if a person goes back in time to change the past, the future will be altered, but the movie failed to bring a big surprise or twist to this concept.
I did enjoy the first half because of the interesting concept and I was engaged in trying to make predictions. I liked the initial mystery and that there were so many possibilities, I couldn’t figure out what would happen next.
However, the original buildup of the movie peters out and there is no epic, exciting ending. I originally thought that David’s father would play a crucial role in the plot, but was disappointed to see that story line did not play out much.
The movie starts with David anxiously awaiting his acceptance letter to MIT. When he receives it, he is disappointed to discover that he doesn’t receive enough scholarship money to attend. Originally, this seemed like a crucial part of the movie, but it is quickly dropped as the focus.
While I did like aspects of the movie, I wish I would have left the theater feeling completely blown away. Instead, I left feeling only mildly entertained and with no desire to see a found footage movie again.
