Predestination

German-born Australian filmmakers Peter and Michael Spierig (they’re twins) had an unheralded success in the US with their vampire flick Daybreakers.

With Ethan Hawke as leading man again, they have adapted a short story by iconic sci-fi novelist Robert Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land was perhaps the book of the 60s counterculture) for their latest brain-breaker.

The phenomenon of Doctor Who is evidence of the ongoing appeal of time-travel, but in a movie it comes with the inbuilt problem of how can you change something that has already happened? Fate, after all, is unarguable – the first person you will see tomorrow morning will be the first person you see.

But that hasn’t stopped the Spierig brothers from having a crack at the imponderable (and impenetrable) question of determining history through pre-emptive actions.

There is a homegrown terrorist known as the ‘fizzle bomber’ whose blasts have been/will be responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians in America.

Hawke, whom we first meet as a bartender, is a Temporal Agent who has been pursuing the bomber through different decades. A bloke who turns out to be the writer of a confessional column in a women’s magazine (Sarah Snook) comes in for a drink one night.

They get to talking… and it becomes a feature of an extremely convoluted narrative that there is regular need for a voice-over to explain what is happening, and who is who.

Noah Taylor gets a start as Mr Robinson, the head of the bureau, and he is suitably creepy.

I did my best to stick with the story and thought I was pretty much on top of it until about the three-quarter mark. After that I lost the plot and had no clear idea of what was going on.

If you liked Inception (for mine, it was a wank) you’ll probably like this too. It is well done with a number of devious twists and Snook (bearing an uncanny resemblance to Jodie Foster) is terrific.

~ John Campbell