The Butterfly Effect (DVD)
Starring: Ashton Kutcher, Amy Smart
Written and Directed by: Eric Bress, J. Mackye Gruber
Rating: 4 (out of 5)
Check out Naked's uncensored review as well as images and the trailer on his new website:
THENAKEDCRITIC.COM
Man, this is hard.
I'm no stranger to making embarrassing admissions. I've already admitted to sort of liking "White Chicks". Furthermore, I
recently came out in my journal, admitting to my problems with the glug-glug (like that was a mystery). But this one is the hardest yet.
But, like ripping off a Band-Aid, I figure that it's best if I just get it over with quickly.
I REALLY liked "The Butterfly Effect".
Maybe sobriety is f*****g with my head.
What I do know is this: Morn and I were in a bit of a mood. We were both feeling sarcastic and snatchy. We wanted to watch a
horror/thriller movie, but not a good one. We wanted to watch something that we could sit back and make fun of, in fine, classic Mystery
Science Theater 3000 style. What better choice, we thought, than the much-maligned Ashton Kutcher movie. After all, we both DESPISE
Kutcher. It seemed perfect.
Maybe our sights were set so low, that we saw an average movie and misread it. We expected it to be abysmal, and it wasn't bad, but BECAUSE
we were expecting a "Gigli" level of horrificness (I'm allowed to make up words), it seemed much better by comparison.
But, hey, screw it. We enjoyed it immensely. And if that means I now have to join Tiger Beat Magazine's official "Ashton Kutcher RULES
Fan Club", then I guess I'm putting together a self-addressed-stamped envelope and sending it off to them.
The title is based on Chaos Theory, which most of us know from Jeff Goldblum's wonderful explanation in "Jurassic Park". It's the
theory that the fluttering of a butterfly's wings can potentially affect wind and weather patterns halfway around the world, causing
hurricanes or tidal waves or what have you. This, by the way, is why I kill every butterfly I see. I figure I've saved millions of lives in
Asia by preventing these calamities. You'd think that my Asian brothers and sisters would THANK me for this, but no. No statue, no parades,
no murals…nothing. Ingrates.
As the movie opens, we see Ashton, here playing Evan Treborn, and he's having a bad day. He seems to be dressed in some sort of hospital
garb, and he's on the run. Because this is one of those minimum-security hospitals, he easily smashes a window and breaks into an office.
Then, he pulls the movie-standard defense of blocking the door with a sofa. This has always bugged me. A character can single-handedly
throw a sofa in front of a door, and it then takes the dozen or so people chasing said person to generate enough power to move it again.
Apparently, these are magic sofas, and their mass seems to increase when it's a bad guy trying to move it. I need one of those sofas for my
office, to prevent Bossman from barging in on me when I'm napping - I mean, "creating".
Once he's barricaded, Evan hurriedly scribbles a note that makes no sense to us…yet. But he manages to do it with WONDERFUL
penmanship. That Ashton…not only is he dreamy, but he's a born calligrapher as well. Is there anything he CAN'T do?
And then, we flash back. I'll warn you right now…there are so many flashbacks and flash-forwards in this movie that the fragile fabric
of the space-time continuum is pretty much confetti by the end of it. If Stephen Hawking ever saw this movie, his head would explode.
And when it flashes back, that's when things start to get funky. Evan, as it turns out, had a SHIT life as a kid. In Kindergarten, he draws
nasty pictures and then forgets why he did them. These blackouts continue, and nobody can explain them. So, his loving mother (Melora
Walters) suggests that he start keeping a journal, and writing EVERYTHING down that happens to him, so that they might be able to
understand why he blacks out. And young Evan does this…religiously. Every day, he's writing in his journal. By the way, the first one
of you smartasses that points out that a fictitious child is more diligent about updating his journal than I am is gonna get a good, swift
kick in the pooper.
Unfortunately, the journal doesn't seem to help a whole hell of a lot, and his shitty childhood continues…and it's some seriously
disturbing shit. For example, at the age of 7, he gets coerced into making a nasty, disgusting video at the behest of a creepy
neighbourhood father (Eric Stoltz) who has him play "Robin Hood" with his own friggin' daughter Kayley (played as an adult by Amy
Smart).
A few years later, there's an "accident" with a "firecracker" (actually a half-stick of dynamite) that is brought about
by Kayley's psycho brother Tommy (William Lee Scott as an adult) that seriously messes with the head of another one of their pals, Lenny
(Elden Henson as an adult). Shortly after that, another nasty piece of work at the hands of Tommy results in the death of Evan's dog. And
so on. All of these events are "blocked out" by Evan, so he doesn't actually remember what happened. Much like me and the year
1999.
So, years later, Evan is in college and blackout-free. He's studying to be a brain surgeon or something…it really isn't important
other than to show us how smart Evan is. This is probably because Ashton spends most of his time playing borderline-retarded characters,
and wanted to be the smart guy in a movie for a change. It should be noted, however, that Ashton is no himbo. The good folks at Tiger Beat
Magazine pointed out that he majored in biochemical engineering in university. I have no idea what biochemical engineering IS, but it
sounds smart. Looks AND brains…excuse me while I swoon, please.
(One swoon later)
Okay, back to the review.
By all accounts, Evan's grown up to be a pretty likable, smart kid. Except that he's so dedicated to his studies, he's chick-free. Even his
overweight, goth roommate (Ethan Suplee, wasted in a small and pointless role) gets more somethin'-somethin' than him. Usually.
But, after a night at the local pub, where they intimidated a bunch of frat-boy a**holes, Evan winds up back in his dorm-room with a cute
little college girl. Now normally, this is where a million letters to Penthouse Forum magazine start, except for the fact that I've never
read one that went like this:
Dear Penthouse Forum: I'm a young, hunky guy with a scruffy beard studying medicine at a small, midwestern college. I never thought
these letters were real until I had an experience recently that changed my mind. This young girl came back up to my room after a night at
the local pub. Wasting no time, she sat next to me on my bed. She had lust in her eyes, and her pert, gorgeous breasts were straining at
her top, just begging to be set free. I knew what she wanted, and I was the guy to give it to her. So, I slowly reached down, and my nimble
fingers hit their target…a journal from when I was a kid. Knowing this was what she wanted - no, NEEDED - I started to read about one
of my childhood traumas. Then, before I knew it, I passed out, recovered a long-lost memory, and woke up with a nosebleed. It was the most
awesome experience of my life.
Are you as hot after reading that as I am? Maybe it's just because I pictured myself sitting on a bed next to Ashton…
(One swoon later)
Wow…this swooning is JUST LIKE the blackouts he suffers! It's like…we're CONNECTED or something. I think Ashton is my soul
mate.
But whatever. After this experience, and the reliving of this previously suppressed memory, Evan realizes that, by reading his journals, he
can relive the experiences that he'd blocked out. Not only that, but he can CHANGE WHAT HAPPENED. Of course, this isn't far off from
playing God, but if you ask me, Ashton IS God…the God Of Hunkiness!
Something bad happens, which I won't spoil, and numb-nuts Evan gets it into his apparently smart mind that if he goes back and changes
something, it will all be better. So he does it. And things are kind of better, except that he made a mistake, so then he has to go back
and fix THAT mistake…and so on, and so forth. It's like that episode of "The Simpsons" when Homer invents a time machine and
keeps going back in time, but he squishes bugs and stuff and it changes the future. Only this time, it's not funny. And it becomes a
vicious cycle…the more he changes, the worse things are for certain people…including himself.
It's not the most original premise in the world, but I honestly think that they REALLY thought it out well. Things that make little sense
at first turn out to make perfect sense later. From a technical standpoint, they've crafted a pretty smart, if disturbing, thriller.
And it IS disturbing. I've always been disturbed by movies that put children in dangerous or scary situations, and boy howdy, The Butterfly
Effect REALLY f***s with these kids. I seriously hope that the child actors had something in their contract that would pay for therapy.
Because if the young ones ever see this movie, they'll be pretty messed up. This is NOT a movie for the under-17 set.
As for Ashton, well, he's dreamy. But, beyond that, he does a pretty good job here. I mean, the performance is FAR from Oscar-worthy. But
it's still solid…if nothing else, it shows he can act like something other than a stoned moron. Stoltz is pretty damn creepy in his
smallish role, which is just the way I like him. Callum Keith Rennie manages to steal a couple of short scenes as Evan's mentally unstable
father who may or may not know what's going on with him. Even Amy Smart, who is normally about as entertaining to watch as a piece of
retarded driftwood, is good here.
The performance that sucks ass-water is Melora Walters as Evan's mother. She's horrible. Then again, I've thought she was horrible in every
other movie I've seen her in. For example, she managed to turn in the ONLY bad performance in "Magnolia"…you may remember
her as the overly-dramatic coke-slut who winds up on a date with the cop. She's just as bad here.
Now, I should note something here…I saw this on DVD, and, as a result, I saw the "Director's Cut", which is 7 minutes longer
than the theatrical cut. It's very possible that something was cut out of the theatrical version that was key to the story…and that's
why it got lambasted by critics. I don't know…I didn't watch both versions (how much time do you think I have?) so I can't say for
certain. But I have a feeling that my fellow critics might have been a little more generous if they'd seen the whole thing. After all, I
can't be THAT off base…can I?
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some pin-ups of Ashton to put on my walls. He's so DREAMY!!!! (Swoon)
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