BEFORE: If you want to know about a film that's been on my list for a VERY long time, possibly even THE longest, that would be "The Butterfly Effect 2". As long as there's been a list, this has been on the list. I started this blog back in 2009, but before that, in 2004 I was at the Sundance Festival for the premiere of the first "Butterfly Effect" film. Ashton Kutcher, the star, and Demi Moore were in attendance for that - I was blown away by that film, it was quite the time-travel movie.
So the big question then, why did I wait 16 years, no, wait 19 years, to watch the sequel? Well, OK, maybe I didn't think about it much in 2009, but it made its way on to the list at SOME point, and then, just look at the cast list, it's nearly IMPOSSIBLE to link to, once I finally got my system of linking down. Over five thousand films viewed, and I haven't seen ONE other film with Eric Lively in it - must be a good reason for that. And Erica Durance, same deal, I've only seen her in ONE other movie, what's the deal there? Didn't she used to be famous for being in "Smallville"?
Chris Gauthier carries over from "Monster Trucks".
THE PLOT: Nick Larson discovers a supernatural way to alter his life and travels back in time to key moments in his life by looking at photographs.
AFTER: If you haven't seen "The Butterfly Effect", it's a twist on time-travel movies when a teen gains the ability to travel back to key moments in his life when he blacked out, and by taking control of his younger body, he can change the present by taking action in the past, however he learns that while improving his situation is quite difficult, making things worse is the easier and more likely result. So if you have seen the first film, same effing shit tonight.
Maybe this one's on me, because by avoiding this sequel for nearly three decades, I sort of built this up to carry a certain level of importance, at least by way of justifying all my expectations, and there's just not enough here to satisfy that. Really, how could any film live up to twenty years of expectations?
The trouble starts when young tech guy Nick is celebrating his girlfriend Julie's birthday with their friends Trevor and Amanda. Nick pulls Julie aside to discuss their future (big mistake, never do this, man, just let the future happen) and Julie is having trouble deciding about going to art school or just heading to New York to start her own photo studio, and Nick is, well, less than encouraging and rather self-centered, if you ask me. We're about to find out where Nick stands on the state of their relationship when he gets a phone call from his office, and decides to cut their camping weekend short because he's up against Dave for a promotion, so he simply has to attend the meeting. (big mistake #2, never answer a call from work when you're away for the weekend with your girlfriend, especially if it's her birthday weekend.)
So they cut the weekend short, and while driving down the mountain, a tire explodes and the car spins out, placing it right in the path of an oncoming truck. Nick wakes up in the hospital a week later and learns he was the only survivor of the wreck - he recovers but suffers from bad headaches like his father once did, and a year later, he discovers that by looking at photos of that camping weekend, he can travel back there, or at least his mind travels back there and enters his younger body, I guess. Now you might think that given a second chance, he might replace that tire before it explodes, but I guess that would make too much sense - instead he knows how to steer into the skid, and also get the car out of the path of the truck, but I think not having the accident in the first place would have been a simpler solution.
Anyway, Nick's propelled back to the present, only this time Julie is still alive, and they're living together. However, Nick's co-worker Trevor gets himself fired due to budget cuts, and Nick makes the mistake of backing him up, getting himself fired too. Well, simple solution, just find a photo of the office Christmas party and time-travel back to it, and take control of the deal that Dave was about to make, and take credit for it. Easy peasy, what could POSSIBLY go wrong when you mess with your own timeline? Well, everything, really.
Back to the present, and Nick's moved up to the corner office and is now a VP at the company, however Julie is nowhere to be found, and he's apparently having a long-term affair with the boss's wife. Hey, nice work if you can get it, I suppose. The new Nick might have broken up with Julie, but the old Nick is still in love with her, and just recently brought her back to life. But she's now a successful photographer with her own studio, working the fashion shows, and she's got a new boyfriend who apparently knows how to listen to her when she talks about her needs and feelings, and Nick just didn't.
Well, it doesn't really matter because Trevor's still bad news in the new reality, he took on an investor who's tired of waiting to see some return on his money, Nick offers the investor a personal check from his own account, but this just illogically leads to the investor killing Trevor for some reason. One of the investor's goons shoots at Nick but hits Julie instead, so it's back to the old drawing board, I guess.
Nick's got one last jump in him, so he travels back to that camping trip, and this time he breaks up with Julie, for her own good, since he figured he brought so much trouble into her life in the long run, when he succeeded at business but couldn't make the relationship work. I know, I know, the logic breaks down here, but being a good boyfriend is HARD, guys, Nick just wants to take the easy way out, and since Julie's going to end up in NYC with her own studio, breaking up with her is just going to put her on that career path sooner, so this makes perfect sense. JK, it makes no sense at all.
Julie speeds away from the camping trip by car, and only then does Nick remember about the tire failure and the tractor-trailer truck. So naturally he drives after her and puts himself in harm's way to try to save her. But, NITPICK POINT, telling her to pull over isn't going to change the tire to one that isn't about to explode, and all it does is put him in the wrong lane, with traffic headed right for him. Sure, Nick, drive the car off the cliff, that should fix everything.
The solution was simple, and it's kind of shocking that Nick just couldn't see it - jump back to that camping weekend, and instead of breaking up with Julie, just DON'T ANSWER the phone when his office calls, just stay at the campground with her and try to have a good time, then just tell your co-workers you were in the mountains and didn't get good cell service. Who cares if Dave gets the promotion? Let him have it, you can always blackmail him later and take his job. Nick was just a bad boyfriend all around, and very misguided if he thought that breaking up with Julie, or sacrificing his own life would make her life better. Why not stay with her and learn to be a better life partner? Or is that too basic?
By the way, there is a "Butterfly Effect 3", but as you might imagine, there are no actors that are shared by this film and that one - so I should be able to link to it some time around 2042 or so. 2045 at the very latest.
Directed by John R. Leonetti (assistant director of "Fever Pitch")
Also starring Eric Lively, Erica Durance (last seen in "Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie"), Dustin Milligan (last seen in "The People We Hate at the Wedding"), Gina Holden (last seen in "Code Name: The Cleaner"), David James Lewis (last seen in "How It Ends"), Andrew Airlie (last seen in "The Company You Keep"), Susan Hogan (ditto), JR Bourne (last seen in "Girls Trip") Lindsay Maxwell (Last seen in "Good Luck Chuck"), Zoran Vukelic, Jerry Wasserman (last seen in "Black Christmas"), John Mann (last seen in "The Chronicles of Riddick"), Tom Bulmer (last seen in "The Big Year"), Veena Sood (last seen in "Connie and Carla"), Brad Kelly (last seen in "Shooter"), Caeli MacAulay, Malcolm Stewart (last seen in "Miracle").
RATING: 4 out of 10 splitting headaches
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