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Repeaters is a movie that may not bear repeat viewing, but it’s worth at least one


139
139 points

I’ve been on the road for a while so haven’t been around to do much blogging, but I was on a cross-Canada flight recently and had the good fortune to see a Canadian movie that could easily be labelled as science fiction. The movie is Repeaters.

The best one-line elevator description I read was “Groundhog Day meets Trainspotting.” It gets compared to Groundhog Day because the characters keep repeating the same day and Trainspotting because they are all drug addicts in rehab.

So why do I label this as science fiction? What else could a story about people stuck in a time loop be called? Although the “science” explaining the

phenomenon is weak, something about a lightning storm, the setup is clearly lifted straight from the sci-fi playbook.

What makes this story interesting is how the trio of main characters react when it discovers what is happening. What emerges is their dark sides when they realize that no matter what evil they do, the next day they will wake up and it’s as if it never happened.

In short order, they perform all sorts of dark and dasterdly deeds, but as the days repeat, the thrill fades, for two of them at least, but the third descends deeper and deeper into darkness.

The story is great and draws you right in, wondering what the heck is going on and how will it, or will it, ever end.

The acting is believable as are the characters, although I quibble at the supposed ages of the three which I believe is meant to be in the mid to late teens although they each seem in their early 20s.

I’m always glad to watch a Canadian movie, something that is rare for Canadians, but I applaud Air Canada, the airline on which I was flying when I saw this movie, for giving passengers the option of watching films from this country. There are some great movies coming out of Canada, but they don’t get much in the way of theatrical release because they can rarely compete commercially against the Hollywood juggernaut.