 KSL Movie Show Review:...
JUMPER *** By Steve Salles Standard Examiner movie critic GO: if you think teleporting would be cool. DON’T GO: if you would prefer to take the bus. I can’t remember the last time I was so entertained by a movie and yet came away wondering what the heck it was all about. Frankly the star of this film is the notion of teleportation - the ability to think yourself to another location - anywhere - in the blink of an eye. How cool would that be? The problem is, once you start getting bits and pieces of information about these characters and what they can do, few if any answers are provided. So, for example, when the main character David (initially played by Max Thieriot) discovers he has this gift while in high school, we learn later that he had his first “jumper” experience at age five. Wouldn’t he have remembered that? And why is he just now trying to learn how to use his gift? A few years later, David is now played by Hayden Christensen, but Hayden and Max are only eight years apart in age. I could see it if one was ten and we see him later as an adult, but to go from high school to barely post college, a person simply wouldn’t change that much in appearance. And these guys look nothing alike. That seemed odd to me. Well anyway, David decides to use his new gift to make himself instantly wealthy, since he can teleport inside a bank vault and simply vanish with the money. Not exactly a noble effort and as we see later the older David watches a news report about heavy floods in Latin America with residents in grave danger of being swept away. For a moment, you think he’s going to blink himself there to rescue them, but he does nothing. Doesn’t exactly make him endearing, but here we learn a limitation to the power. Jumpers apparently have to have knowledge of the place they’re jumping to or follow through another teleporter’s “jump scar” - like a trace worm hole they leave in their wake. Which introduces us to Griffin (Jamie Bell) another teleporter who says he’s been watching David for the past ten years, but never has made contact. And we learn of a group called “paladins” that have sought out and attempted to destroy jumpers for centuries. But why kill them? Why not exploit their gifts like every other maniacal group? It seems Samuel L. Jackson is the head headhunter and he’s determined to kill these boys with a special knife kept wrapped in a weird ceremonial cloth but first they have to be trapped in an electronic field so they can’t jump to escape. It’s all quite confusing and somehow we’re drawn into the pure fantasy of it all as these guys jump all over the world on a complete whim. But of course, David has a fatal flaw since he’s in love with the mere mortal Millie (Rachel Bilson) who the Paladins can use to lure David into a potential trap. More confusion will be revealed, I’m guessing to exploit sequel possibilities, but frustration mounts in this all-too-brief (84 minute) movie that could serve to its detriment. We got this same treatment from “Lost,” we don’t need it jumping to theaters. Still, I was mesmerized by the potential here and only slightly put off by the slim realizations as director Doug Liman takes us around the world with seamless precision - likely the crowning achievement of this wildly engaging, but sometimes annoying film.
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Steve