A Sound of Thunder (film)

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A Sound of Thunder
A Sound of Thunder poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Peter Hyams
Produced by <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Screenplay by Thomas Dean Donnelly
Joshua Oppenheimer
Gregory Poirier
Based on A Sound of Thunder
by Ray Bradbury
Starring <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Music by Nick Glennie-Smith
Cinematography Peter Hyams
Edited by Sylvie Landra
Production
company
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Distributed by <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Release dates
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  • 15 May 2005 (2005-05-15) (Cannes)
  • 2 September 2005 (2005-09-02) (United States)
  • 24 November 2005 (2005-11-24) (Czech Republic)
Running time
 103 minutes
Country United Kingdom
United States
Germany
Czech Republic
Language English
Mandarin
Budget $80 million[1]
Box office $11,665,465[1]

A Sound of Thunder is a 2005 science fiction thriller film directed by Peter Hyams, and starring Edward Burns, Catherine McCormack and Ben Kingsley. An international co-production between the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany and the Czech Republic.

The film is based on the short story of the same name by Ray Bradbury. It is about "time tourists" who accidentally interfere too much with the past, completely altering the present.

Plot

In 2055 Chicago, the Time Safari company offers the ability for people to hunt dinosaurs in the past via time travel technology. Because of the dangers of interferring with the time line, the company's activities are vocally attacked by Sonia Rand, the developer of the time machine software TAMI, who feels scorned for not receiving credit and fears they may alter the past through their activities.

A trip with clients Eckels and Middleton goes afoul when Ryer's gun fails to go off. The dinosaur rushes the group, scattering the clients. Ryer kills the dinosaur, regroups the clients and returns to 2055, unaware that Middleton had stepped on a butterfly. The next day, they hear reports of global increases in temperature and humidity, and Ryer observes a sudden increase in plant life. On their next trip, they find that the Allosaurus is already dead when they arrive and the volcano erupting much sooner. They quickly return and report the changes, and the government shuts down Time Safari to investigate. Ryer learns from Rand they are being struck by "time waves" that cause drastic alterations to the city as they pass due to something that happened on a previous expedition. Ryer and Rand narrowly escape a building after a time wave causes the appearance of thousands of beetles and a tree bursting through its structure. Rand warns that more time waves can be expected.

They return to Time Safari to try to fix what has gone wrong along with the government. They are struck by another time wave that leaves the city without power and now covered by dense vegetation. Evaluating the machine's logs, they find that the Eckels/Middleton expedition had come back a few grams heavier, and that the bio-filter was turned off. They recognize that they can use the time machine to go back to intercept their past selves so to prevent whatever happened, but will only have a few seconds to act, and so must work to figure out who they need to stop. The Time Safari finds their equipment and gear free of anything, so Ryer and Rand leads a group through the city - now filled with evolved and deadly Baboonlizards and other new hazards that kill some of their party members - to find Eckels and Middleton. Eckels is safe but asserts he remained on the path, while Middeleton, poisoned by the new wildlife, takes his life before they can stop him. However, they are able to find a dead butterfly on the sole of the suit he used for the safari. The party make it back to Time Safari after more time waves hit, now finding the time machine partially underwater and unusable. Rand obtains the hard drive containing the TAMI software with plans to use it with the nearby university's particle accelerator as a substitute time machine.

Ryer and Rand are the only two survivors once they finally make it to the university, Rand noting that the appearance of simian-like Babboonlizards from the latest time wave means the next one will wipe away humanity. Rand prepares the accelerator and stays behind while Ryer goes through the time portal, just as the last time wave hits turning Rand into a catfish-like creature. Ryer catches up to the previous expedition, tells Jenny the bio-filter is off at the same time asking her to give his earlier self a recording of the events he has witnessed. The expedition returns without incident to the future they had left. Ryer shares the footage with Rand.

Cast

Production

The film, announced in 2001, was originally going to be directed by Renny Harlin, star Pierce Brosnan in the main role,[2] and be shot in Montreal.[3] However, Harlin was fired over a disagreement with Ray Bradbury. Brosnan left the project as well and was replaced by Edward Burns.[4]

After Franchise Pictures went bankrupt during post-production, the remaining backers provided only $30 million to work with,[5] out of the $80 million originally allocated.

Video games

A video game based on the film was released for the Game Boy Advance. It also had been considerably delayed, and ended up coming out slightly before the film, in March 2005.[6] It was an overhead shooter with some driving stages, and included support for co-op and deathmatch multiplayer via link cable.

A third-person action-adventure shooter based on The Thing engine was being developed by Computer Artworks for BAM! Entertainment for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox, but ended up being cancelled. Its plot differed from that of the film: the changes in the course of evolution were not an accident, but acts of terrorism caused by a Luddite cult. The "present" time was also changed to 2038. The game was to have nine missions taking place in both the past and present. Real-life bands would have been hired to provide the music.[6]

Reception

As of November, 2015, the film has a 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 96 reviews.[7] The film scored an average rating of 2.8 out of 10.[8] Common complaints against the film included its poor special effects, uninvolved performances, scientific errors and Ben Kingsley's hair.[9][10][11]

The Boston Globe stated "The combination of awful special effects and mediocre acting created this catastrophe." and included the film in its list of "Box Office Bombs".[12] Roger Ebert stated that while he "cannot endorse it, [he] can appreciate it" as a film that is bad because it "want[s] so much to be terrific that [it] explode[s] under the strain."[13]

Due to negative reviews and lack of promotion, the production grossed only $1,900,451 in the United States and $9,765,014 elsewhere for a worldwide total of $11,665,465.[1]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 A Sound of Thunder at Box Office Mojo Retrieved 2013-02-02.
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ A Sound of Thunder (2005) - Trivia - IMDb
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ A Sound of Thunder at Rotten Tomatoes Retrieved 2013-02-02.
  9. ↑ A Sound of Thunder – Movie – Review – The New York Times
  10. ↑ A Sound of Thunder Movie Review, DVD Release – Filmcritic.com
  11. ↑ MovieJuice: A Sound of Thunder
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links


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