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‘Things Will Be Different’ Review: Time-Traveling Siblings Can’t Escape Their Past in Serviceable Sci-Fi Debut
Two morally skewed characters attempt to change their future while imprisoned in a mysterious farmhouse in Michael Felker’s intriguing feature debut.
In the aftermath of a robbery — not their first illicit act — Joseph (Adam David Thompson) and Sidney (Riley Dandy), an estranged brother and sister, head to an isolated farmhouse where old manual clocks and a seemingly ordinary closet allow them to travel back in time. But because the narrative gets caught in its intent to conceal as much as possible while simultaneously getting into the weeds of the time-travel mechanics, “Things Will Be Different” feels more akin in approach to Christopher Nolan’s puzzling “Tenet” than Rian Johnson’s more straightforward “Looper.” By the time the film reaches its conclusion, one may need pen and paper to map out where and how the timelines overlap. The movie’s assemblage (Felker co-edited with Rebeca Marques) and enigmatic clues (like a song playing on a boombox or glimpses of flashbacks) succeed at repeatedly throwing audiences off the scent in terms of the identity of the person Joseph and Sidney must eliminate.
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