The Time Traveller's Wife - A great film (but only if you haven’t read the book... apparently)

Okay, how many times have you heard someone say, ‘The film’s not half as good as the book?’ Well, this is definitely one of those times.  However, seeing as I haven’t read the book (or possibly ANY book since I was at school) I really can’t compare the two.  However, what I got was a pretty good little film.

I’m into sci-fi, so I kind of expected the ‘time travelling’ element to take centre stage.  Yet, what this really is is a romance story, masquerading as science-fiction (think the way ‘Ghost’ was basically a love story disguised as supernatural).  Now, I normally don’t tend to go for ‘tear-jerkers,’ but I actually quite liked this one.

One half of the film is about the titular time traveller (Eric Bana) who has an undetermined condition that forces him to travel through time to a random moment... completely naked.  Rachel McAdams plays his long-suffering wife, who has to put up with a husband who disappears every now and again, only to return at an equally random moment.

Unlike most films involving time travel, there’s no real ‘antagonist.’ The ‘problem’ the characters have to get through is truly accidental and no one’s fault and it’s about how (and whether) they can get through this, especially when talk of children comes into play.

Like I said, I don’t know the difference between how the book portrays the characters, but the two main leads here have chemistry and you’ll probably find yourself rooting for them to get through this.
It’s not action packed.  Basically, if you haven’t read the book and you’re thinking of watching this, you’ll need to be in the mood for a slow-moving love story with an incidental sc-fi element.  I might even go as far as to describe it as a film designed more for women, only I enjoyed it more than pretty much every woman who I know who’s seen it!

8/10 The Force is definitely strong with this one