Premonition (2007)

Director: Mennan Yapo

Writer: Bill Kelly

Tagline: It's not your imagination.

Actors: Sandra Bullock, Julian McMahon, Shyann McClure, Courtney Taylor Burness, Nia Long, Irene Ziegler, Kate Nelligan, Marc Macaulay, Amber Valletta, Peter Stormare

Runtime: 1h 50m

Category: Psychological, Thriller

Synopsis: Linda and Jim Hanson have just bought a new house and are looking to start over with their two beautiful girls, Megan and Bridgette. One day, after dropping the girls off at school and doing everyday housework, her day takes a turn when she receives an unsettling voicemail from Jim, who is away overnight on business. Just then a police officer raps on the door and breaks the bad news that her husband has died; only yesterday! Now sinking into a state of deep sorrow, she breaks the new to the girls after school. Tomorrow will be better…tomorrow. Linda wakes up the next morning only to find that her husband’s wake is in her living room! What’s going on!?! These two realities intertwine and influence each other while Linda is on a desperate search for the truth…and her sanity.

Review: I was not expecting anything from this movie…and I think I was smart to do so. I’m not saying that this movie was bad; it’s just that it wasn’t anything really special. I did enjoy the movie, and so did my wife, but it was not what I thought it was gonna be. I was expecting a Dark Corners (2006) kinda movie; instead I got something like Final Destination (2000) meets The Butterfly Effect (2004) meets Memento (2000). It sounds weird, I know.

The story, honestly, was the only thing I really cared for. The control and subtle nuances of the story made it a joy to watch. Plus, since I was expecting a Dark Corners (2006) type movie, I was surprised to see that instead of the two stories running parallel…they ran against each other. I’ll explain this for those of you who didn’t get it: the story with Jim still alive ran sequentially…while the story where Jim’s dead ran…let’s say…counterclockwise. That’s how this story went; one story going forward, the other going backward. Got it?

The acting was surprisingly dull. I’m not a fan of Sandra’s in the first place (although I wouldn’t kick her out of bed for eating crackers…Funyuns yes…crackers no), so I wasn’t expecting too much from her. Now that I think about it, if I wasn’t expecting too much from the main character, that doesn’t bode well for the rest of the cast, considering most of the movie will focus around her. Yippee! Acting sucked.

The gore and effects, or lack thereof, weren’t too bad; although the explosion at the end did make me all tingly inside. There really wasn’t much more to this area…so I guess this one will be brief. Sorry.

Ok, I must say something about this movie and all others dealing with this type of phenomena: if you have a premonition about death…death will win. You can’t stop the predetermined death of any human being. And just because you’re meddling in and trying to stop the premonition from coming true, doesn’t mean you’ll succeed. The premonition is going to happen eventually…that’s what happens when you get a glimpse of the future! The future happens because of your actions, thus you caused the premonition. I know most of you won’t want to hear this, and some of you won’t even get this, but this is the truth. This is not like high school when you decide what to be when you grow up, thereby changing your future; this is like trying to become a taxidermist while studying parapsychology. You can’t change what’s already written. This is the opposite of The “Back to the Future” Rule.

Rating: I’m very torn here: I liked the story very much…I didn’t like the acting or the promotions for the movie either…they were misleading. So let’s go with a 15. I know the acting wasn’t par and the effects could have been better, or more numerous, but the story was very compelling; had what I like to call The Sticky Factor. So I would suggest this movie when you have nothing better to do and have $3.50 laying around. (15of25).