(2011) ★★★
Film4: Friday 25 September, 11.25pm
US serviceman Jake Gyllenhaal has eight minutes to find a bomber aboard a Chicago commuter train… Duncan Jones’ follow-up to his impressive debut feature Moon is a gimmicky thriller that’s a bit like Denzel Washington’s enjoyably flaky Déjà Vu – all over again, one might say. (Curiously, there are echoes of Denzel’s Unstoppable, too.)
Starting out much stronger than it finishes, it acknowledges a debt to the high-end hokum of the 90s TV show Quantum Leap by using Scott Bakula for the telephone voice of Gyllenhaal’s dad. Chris Bacon’s score is more impressive when it’s accentuating the extreme urgency of Gyllenhaal’s position rather than his emotional state. The same could be said of the film itself, which is an intriguing ride until it’s sidetracked by a freight-load of sentimentality.
Certificate: 12
Duration: 89min
