In case you missed it in theatres (and chances are you did), the sci-fi thriller In Time, starring Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried, comes to Blu-Ray and DVD* today.

The first thing you might notice about In Time is how good-looking it is. Of course, being an Andrew Niccol (Gattaca, Lord of War) joint, the film is stylish and immaculate, but that’s not what I mean. I am referring to the film’s entire cast being comprised of gorgeous young actors. With the exception of two young children, every character in the film is 25 years old.

No matter how many years they have behind them, everyone from grandmothers to mob heavies are played by actors in their mid-twenties to early-thirties. Combine that with Hollywood’s natural trend towards beauty, and the effect creates what can only be described as a “model” future.

You see, in In Time‘s vision of the future, genetics have been altered to give everyone’s life a predetermined length. At 25 years old, bodies stop aging but start counting down. Everyone gets a year, but time can be earned, traded, gambled, or stolen. It is, in fact, the only currency humanity has left.

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The experts were wrong again. Last weekend’s huge success of Paramount’s Paranormal Activity 3 lead everyone to believe that the film would have continued success on the weekend leading up to Halloween. Turns out, kids who love Shrek and folks that love adorable, animated kittens proved them all wrong.

That’s right, Universal’s Shrek spinoff, Puss in Boots, managed to blow Paranormal’s creepy handicam shots out of the water this weekend with a decent $34 million in the domestic box office. Don’t worry, horror fans, Activity stil stayed relevant in 2nd place as it pulled in $18.5 million, bringing its total gross up to $81 million so far.

Also opening this weekend, Justin Timberlake’s foray into the world of sci-fi with In Time made a whisper in the box office, only making $12 million, while the faux continuation of Johnny Depp’s performance in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (The Rum Diary) underwhelmed audiences and only pulled in $5 million for the weekend.

Next weekend, it’s the tale of two crowd-pleasers, as the Ben Stiller/Eddie Murphy caper flick Tower Heist hits theaters alongside A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas, which both open up wide across the country. Are people already in the Christmas mindset or will Heist prove that the Ocean’s 11 formula works with lesser grade talent? We’ll find out in a week!

Craig Armstrong is one of those interesting composers that I have always really liked. He made a big splash in the late 90s with Romeo + Juliet, and has since been consistently solid in a long line of work. I have been longing for him to venture back into the action/suspense movie scoring business for a few years now. So it is with great excitement I get to review his latest release, the score for In Time.

Early in the process of composing this music Armstrong had conversations with the film’s director, Andrew Niccol, that gave direction to the music. They wanted to think of the kind of music people would be listening to in the “not to distant future”, deciding that there would be a fusion of types. This lead to the decision to merge classical, electronic and eastern influences together to give the film it’s sound.

It is very clear from the first track on where this music was inspired from, and I venture to guess that was exactly the point. The music doesn’t shy away from it’s parts, it is not trying to be subtle it is trying to be good, and for the most part I think it generally succeeds. Craig Armstrong’s style fits perfectly for a serious film score that fuses together different elements and makes something completely original from it.

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Like director Andrew Niccol’s previous film Gattaca, In Time is devoted more to its concept than showing car chases, fist-fights, shoot-outs, and your basic action staples. All those things are in the movie, but mostly they provide breaks from exploring the film’s dystopian world.

It’s a few hundred years in the future, and the worldwide currency is time. Human beings have been genetically altered to stop aging at 25, and from there, they get one year; if they don’t start working, or if they’re lucky enough to be born into a timely family, they’ll die once their clock winds down.

Everyone’s time is tracked by a digital counter in their arm, and they can exchange time by shaking arms or putting them in metal containers that store time. If you want to rob someone, it takes only a forceful arm-shake, and then plop they’re dead, and you have a few extra weeks, months, or years to live.

The wealthiest individuals can live forever, but the poor literally live day to day, and it’s nearly impossible to move up in society because the classes are physically confined to time zones. Travel between them is allowed but costly.

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I’ll admit a bit of a soft spot for writer/director Andrew Niccol. He manages to create pretty amazing worlds and tell stories with style. Plus, and this is a disclaimer, I had the pleasure to work with him a bit during the making of Gattica and enjyoed it very much, so I’m probably a bit biased.

It’s with much interest, then, that I watched the new trailer for his upcoming film In Time, which Fox and New Regency released over the weekend. It’s a futuristic science fiction thriller that takes place in a world where people who want to live past age 25 have to purchase more time.

Here’s the setup: “When Will Salas is falsely accused of murder, he must figure out a way to bring down a system where time is money – literally – enabling the wealthy to live forever while the poor, like Will, have to beg, borrow, and steal enough minutes to make it through another day.”

Check out the trailer after the break. In Time, which features Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, Olivia Wilde and Cillian Murphy, opens on October 28th.

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