Los cronocrímenes (2007)

Director:

Nacho Vigalondo

Writer:

Nacho Vigalondo (written by)

Release Date:

27 June 2008 (Spain)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Drama | Sci-Fi | Thriller

Plot:

A man accidentally gets into a time machine and travels back in time nearly an hour. Finding himself will be the first of a series of disasters of unforeseeable consequences.

Plot Keywords:

Time Machine | Scissors | Woods | Binoculars | Blood

Awards:

7 wins & 4 nominations

Cast

Karra Elejalde	...	Héctor
Candela Fernández	...	Clara
Bárbara Goenaga	...	La Chica en el Bosque
Nacho Vigalondo	...	El Joven
Juan Inciarte	...	Héctor Ocasional (as Ion Inciarte)
Miguel Ángel Poo	...	Locución Radiofónica (voice)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Libby Brien	...	Clara (voice)
Philip Hersh	...	Radio Announcer (voice)

Also Known As:

Timecrimes (International: English title)

MPAA:

Rated R for nudity and language.

Runtime:

92 min

Country:

Spain

Language:

Spanish

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

France:-12 | USA:R | Spain:13 | UK:15 | Mexico:B15 | New Zealand:R16

Filming Locations:

Spain

Company:

Karbo Vantas Entertainment

Quotes:

Héctor: [first lines - everything has fallen out of the back of his car] Clara! Clara! Clara! Didn't you hear me calling you?
Clara: You called me?
Héctor: Yeah. You didn't hear me?
Clara: No.
Héctor: This was the one you wanted, right?
Clara: Yeah. And the fertilizer?
Héctor: Up there.
Clara: Put it there.
Héctor: You'll assembled it here?
Clara: Sure.
[...]

Movie Connections:

Remade as Timecrimes (2011)

Soundtrack:

Picture This

One? Two? Three?

The first minutes of this film are a bit on the dreadful side, but don't walk out or you'll miss one of the most entertaining time travel stories ever!!! This one will leave you scratching your head as how the writer pulled it off with a very intelligent, resourceful, and quite clever script. He is aided by a marvelous job of editing which along with a tight direction moves the story forward, backward, sideways, and in any way that might be needed.

Our hero manages to find himself trapped in a time continuum that keeps deteriorating as he tries to find a solution to the original mess that started it all. The challenge is not how he struggles to tie the loose ends and come out of the mess he has apparently created. Messing with the time continuum always has dire consequences, and this film is a perfect example, but one thing that has always proved frustrating is being in the audience and just watching things unravel. The challenge in this film is becoming an active participant, as you try to figure out how the game is played.

Making things more complicated is the scientist who decides to take a jump and test equipment that has not been properly tested. His actions, along with the main character's, put an unexpected twist in the equation, and fixing things might just be a bit more difficult that anyone ever imagined.

What makes the film so spectacular is that everything is the movie is not the result of high tech, computer generated imagery, or dazzling special effects, or an overblown budget. The fact that the film doesn't even have the best actors give it a sense of reality that helps us become more sympathetic or repelled by the various "crimes" committed by the protagonist in order to fix his other "crimes".

I particularly enjoyed the fact that the film has only three settings, a dark woodsy hill, an empty complex, and a home that is being remodeled. This keeps us grounded and aware that anything is possible and has a chance of happening. Never, through the entire film I even doubted the clunky machine could even work. Great science fiction!!!