Time Cut-- My take on the movie with spoilers!

 

Plot: Lucy accidentally travels to the year 2003 when her sister Summer was murdered by a serial killer.

Quick Movie Review

Remember the movie Totally Killer that came out on Amazon Prime in 2023? Yes, Time Cut on Netflix is pretty much like that minus the comedy bits.

Time Cut focuses more on family drama, suppressed aspirations, and liberties with the time travel concept.

Plot holes are easily covered up by a dialogue that states that no, that's not how time travel works. How convenient.

Time Cut is like any teen drama where a teenager experiences an existential crisis, feels like her parents don't want her, and is forced to give up on her dreams. But the acting is decent, so there is that, at least.

The movie misses the opportunity to show off a bygone era and make it work in the story's favour. There is only one song that keeps playing on the loop: What's Luv by Fat Joe and Ashanti.

One of the characters wears a Baby G watch, owns a vintage Apple iMac, and the other teens own iPods.

iPhones were yet to hit the market, and so when a character from the future brings along her latest iPhone, everyone is amazed by the gadget.

But that's where the differences end. Time Cut doesn't explore the 2003 era and purposely misses the opportunity to make it a fun outing.  Which makes the poster completely misleading. The poster for the movie is all colours, rhinestones, and heart glasses.

The movie is actually quite dull.

TIME CUT Movie Plot

The movie begins on April 18th, 2003. Summer Field lives in Sweetly, Minnesota. She is attending the Spring Fling reluctantly. As she is about to enter, a boy called Quinn stops her and comforts her about her murdered best friends Emmy, Brian, and Val. Afterwards, he tries to give her a red envelope, but before Summer considers taking what is obviously a love letter, her ex-boyfriend Ethan comes over to be obnoxious. Summer ignores him and goes inside.

Inside, she meets her friends and wonders how everyone can behave normally when she feels heartbroken. Ethan gets up on stage and asks everyone to hold up their cups in tribute to the students who got murdered.

Summer and Ethan get into a thing, and she walks away to the bathroom. The police come in and make some comments about the students asking for it, considering there have been murders taking place. They shut down the party but just before Summer can find out what is happening, she is chased by a man in a mask who is obviously a lot taller than who the killer is later revealed to be.

After a lot of hiding and running about, Summer is killed by a serial killer who is wielding a scythe.

The movie then jumps to 2024. We meet Lucy Field, who is a total nerd. She has just been accepted for an internship at Nasa and tells the news to Mr Fleming, her science teacher who is ecstatic. He asks her if she told the news to her parents, but she tells him that her parents don't even let her go outside after dark and won't be too happy about her news. She looks at the pet tortoise, Mr Pickles, who is still stuck in a glass box for twenty years. She makes some weird comment about people being stuck in boxes in this town.

Her parents, Gil and Kendra, take her out for dinner. Lucy passes the downtown part of Sweetly, where everything has been closed for years. Apparently, the town did not heal from the killing spree in 2003. They go to a restaurant where even the waitress remarks how much Lucy looks like Summer.

Lucy feels like she's living in the shadow of a sister she never met.

Earlier, she had ventured into her sister's room that had been kept intact, complete with CD players and iMac computers. She had found a letter written to Summer that was signed with the letter E. She thinks it may be a threatening letter and so hides it from her family.

As their dinners arrive, Lucy tells them about her internship, and they are not pleased. Gil offers to get her an apprenticeship at the place where he works, SONR. Lucy doesn't look enthusiastic.

The family then visits the shrine in the place where Summer was killed. Her parents leave a memento and ask Lucy what she brought. Lucy didn't get anything because she was starting to dislike the sister she had never met who was responsible for her parents being overprotective of her.

She makes an excuse about leaving it in the car and heads back. When she can't find anything worthwhile, she considers leaving her chain but then sees a flash of light nearby. Instead of informing her parents, she decides to investigate on her own. She finds a weird device with the date, 2003. She changed the date to two days before her sister was killed.

Lucy is instantly transported back and falls on the ground. She is surprised to see her surroundings in better shape. She ventures out to call her parents, but they are gone. She begins to run on the road and sees that the town doesn't seem in that bad shape anymore. In fact, the restaurants she thought were closed are open. Soon enough, she found a banner with the year for 2003. Lucy is stunned to see that year and wonders if she has time travelled to a different period.

She goes to her high school and sees students who are wearing 2003 attire and have rhinestones on every gadget. She then sees Summer and is stunned.

She goes to meet Mr Fleming, who is 20 years younger. She asks him about time travel, and he believes it may be possible. Quinn enters and drops something that catches her attention. He is stunned that someone is speaking about time travel.

Lucy doesn't pay him any attention because his photo wasn't put up on the wall of the students who were murdered.

Later, seniors create a ruckus and pick up Quinn to dunk him in the nearby river. Lucy finds it weird that the students are indulging in such dumb rituals. She is also shocked to see Emmy alive.

Right before Ethan is about to dunk Quinn in, Lucy comes over to stop him. She even pushes Ethan down to make a point about bullying. Their moods ruined, they returned to their class while Quinn remarks that he didn't need a girl to fight for him.

Lucy tells him that she needs his help, considering he is a science nerd. She tells him that she is from the future and shows her his phone, which he is completely amazed by. Summer walks in after being ignored by Emmy,  asking for her Chem homework. Lucy finds it odd that Quinn isn't seeing that he is clearly being used by Summer for her homework. He promises to help her and deliver the homework to his house.

Lucy then shows Quinn the barn where she found the time machine, which enabled her to enter 2003. They bring it back to Quinn's shed. He prefers spending time here than at his own home. We never get to see his parents or anyone else's. It's not important to learn anyone else's backstories.

When they open it, Lucy learns that she needs to replace a gadget that will take her back home. She decides to get it from SONR, the place where her father works.

Quinn takes her to her home and is shocked to learn that she is Summer's sister. Summer thinks Quinn has brought her chem homework, but he has only got the calculus one. Summer pouts, and Lucy offers her help.

Lucy meets her parents, who look chilled out. They invite Lucy to stay, and she accepts. She eats the food and notices how much her parents used to adore Summer and how shattered they were when she died.

Summer takes her to her room, and Lucy asks her hypothetically if she could stop something bad from happening, would she do it. Summer says obviously. Lucy knows that if Summer survives, her parents would not have had her. So she asked Summer if she tried to do one good thing that ended up ruining another thing, and she would still try to do the right thing. Summer insists she would do the right thing no matter what.

This gives Lucy the encouragement to go to the mall to save Brian and Val.

There, she meets Mr Fleming and barely passes a word with him. He's just there so he could be suspected of being the killer. This is also when we probably see him last.

Ethan flips Lucy the bird. Lucy goes to Quinn, and he tells her where she can find Val and Brian.

They are at a store, trying out new dresses with the killer lingering behind, behaving like a mannequin.

Eventually, he gets tired of listening to them being annoying, and when Val is in the changing room, he stabs Brian with his American Psycho DVD.

Val comes out to scream and run about. The scene is kind of like the one in Fear Street.

Anyway, Lucy comes to help and calls the security guard who barely makes it in time.

The killer has got Val and kills her at the bottom of the escalator. The security guard approaches him to be stabbed as well.

Lucy is shocked because the security guard had not reportedly died previously.

The police sirens ring out before the killer can go after Lucy.

Quinn explains about paradoxes and stuff while Lucy is distressed. She asks Summer's parents why they didn't have another child. They reply that Summer is a handful and they are happy with one. Lucy leaves teary-eyed, knowing that her parents would not have gone to great lengths and done IVF to have her if Summer was still alive. They even gave her Summer's middle name!

Summer wants to know how Lucy happened to be there when Brian and Val were killed. Lucy decides to tell her that she is from the future and her sister. Summer doesn't believe her, and Lucy shows her the letter she had found under her floorboards. Summer hasn't received it yet.

She asks about the Sweetly Slasher, and Lucy tells her that Emmy is next. While she is grappling with this revelation, Quinn and Lucy head out to the Maritime Museum to save Emmy. Summer, who finally receives the letter in her locker, realizes Lucy is telling the truth and goes to help them.

They save Emmy's life by distracting the killer. As they drop Emmy home, Lucy gets an inkling that there is more to Summer and Emmy's friendship than meets the eye. Quinn asks her if there are any more victims. She tells him about summer. He wants to go away with her as far as possible from this town. Lucy reminds him about paradoxes and whatnot and that if Summer exists, then she will not.

Later, Summer asks Lucy all about her future. Lucy lies about Summer being successful and married to a nice man. Summer looks troubled at that.

It is only later that Lucy confronts Summer about her relationship with Emmy and that the E was not Ethan but Emmy.

Summer tells her about her apprehensions regarding coming out, but Lucy assures her that the future is more tolerable. She still doesn't tell Summer about her being the next victim.

Lucy manages to steal Gil's ID card so that she can break into the facility to steal the gadget that can make the time machine work again. Quinn decided to help her even though he and Lucy got into an argument earlier about him being in love with Summer, and Lucy being selfish enough not to want to save her sister.

At the facility, they find murdered guards. Apparently, the killer has been here.

At the Spring Fling, Summer confesses her love to Emmy, who then kisses. Ethan gives a toast only for Brian and Val since Emmy is alive.

The killer shows up and chases Summer, but Lucy and Quinn come to save the day.

TIME CUT Ending Explained

The trio is in a car and planning to run over the killer when he gets up. He is much shorter now, and his mask is broken.

He is none other than...Quinn.

Future Quinn, apparently. He manages to give his speech about how he was bullied throughout high school, and then Summer made it worse by rejecting his love. So, he had travelled back in time to exact revenge on all of them. Except Ethan, who was the biggest bully of all.

Anyway, the trio gets inside the shed and tries to ward off his attacks. Lucy charges up the Time machine and asks Quinn to take Summer away.

She then grabs future Quinn and takes him with her back to 2024.

Once there, they find themselves in a parking lot. Lucy finds a charger for electric cars and hits Quinn with it before using it to stun him. He gets knocked out, and she steals a gadget he had in his pocket that will help her time travel anywhere she wants.

Quinn and Summer are talking about how much they miss Lucy when she pops up. She tells them she has decided to stay.

Yay! Since Summer never died, her parents didn't make another kid, so Lucy...exists...because...? But then as future Quinn had stated, that's not how time travel works and you know nothing.

Summer and Emmy go out on dates and stuff. Lucy cannot stay with her parents because they don't know she's their daughter. Lucy hangs around with Quinn all the time.

In the last scene, Summer and Lucy try to be cute by fighting over who is actually the oldest.

The movie ends on a confusing note.

My Take On The Movie

Time Cut may have been written earlier than Totally Killer and while that movie wasn't perfect either, it was a tad more entertaining than this one.

Watch Totally Killer instead.

Scare Scale: 2.5/5