New to Netflix from today (and arriving just in time for Halloween) is the horror movie, Time Cut. Directed and co-written by Hannah Macpherson and starring Madison Bailey, Antonia Gentry, and Michael Shanks, the film is a time-travelling slasher about a girl who jumps back in time to catch a killer.
In the movie, it is April 18th 2003 and a serial killer is on the loose in the town of Sweetly, Minnesota. To protect the citizens, the police have initiated a night-time curfew, but the local teens are ignoring police instructions to attend a party.
One of the attendees is high school student, Summer Field. Unfortunately, Summer is in the wrong place at the wrong time and she is murdered by the killer.
Twenty-one years later, on the anniversary of Summer’s death, her sister, Lucy is unexpectedly transported back to 2003. Arriving on April 16th, two days before Summer’s death, Lucy is given the unique opportunity to save her sister.
OK, so let’s get this out of the way now: Time travel slasher movies are not new. In the past few years we’ve had the Groundhog Day-inspired horror, Happy Death Day (2017), as well as its sequel, Happy Death Day 2U (2019), and last year we had the ‘80s-set Totally Killer (2023), as well as the reality bending It’s A Wonderful Knife (2023).
Of all these movies, Happy Death Day is the most successful when it comes to time-meddling horror. And I’m sorry to say, it remains the most successful because this latest offering, Time Cut doesn’t even come close.
In fact, Time Cut is a huge misfire. The premise is stale, the script is lacklustre, and there is no energy, excitement, or even horror in this horror movie.
The opening prologue, which sets up Summer’s death is dreadful. Not only does it fail to deliver any thrills and kills, it doesn’t offer up enough of a hook to continue with the rest of the film.
However, those who do continue will find things simply don’t improve. The movie trundles along, becoming tedious and tiresome as the run-time ticks along, with little sign of any improvement.
Outside of Summer’s death, no other ‘kills’ take place until 40 minutes into the film, and even when they do happen it is a bloodless affair. This is essentially sanitised horror, and really boring sanitised horror at that.
The concept of jumping back 21 years to the ‘00s seems odd, considering the ages of Summer and Lucy, and it all seems kind of pointless too. Other than to poke fun at 2003, or to throw a bit of nostalgia into the mix, via a Buffy poster or a Wheatus song, this jaunt back through time is half-cooked.
But then, this whole film is half-cooked. It’s cheap, disposable tosh, which does nothing to entertain and will simply be added to the never-ending pile of cheap disposable tosh filling up Netflix.
I can only imagine that its release date (just one day before Halloween), is to take advantage of the fact some streamers will known nothing about Time Cut and will watch it on the big day. Had this film dropped weeks ago, word would circulate that it’s a dud and I doubt anyone would be watching this picture on October 31st.
And I don’t suggest you watch it either. Go and watch a classic horror movie instead, or seek out some of the better horrors from 2024 such as Immaculate, Abigail, Speak No Evil, or Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.
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