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The last time a dryly zany comedy from New Zealand involving fantastical shenanigans made me laugh this much, it was the original “What We Do in the Shadows.” Michael Duignan’s new film may not quite reach that level, but it is still very funny.
A former tennis pro who peaked at No. 347 in the world, Dutch (Benedict Wall) ends up with a limp after a hit and run. In his search for the Toyota Corolla that maimed him, he meets the mysterious Lyra (Florence Noble), who looks like she was kicked out of the Bene Gesserit from “Dune.” She informs Dutch of the existence of multiple dimensions (including “the avocado dimension”) and claims to have “psionic powers” that include telekinesis.
The real reason it works is because it has heart.
Setting a film in a desolate, empty world might have inspired some directors to go big with the vistas. Instead, Jeffrey St. Jules’s feature has a claustrophobically tight focus (though he does squeeze in good location shots of Newfoundland).
Theodore (Elias Koteas) has been on his own for a long time, sentenced to working alone on a planet-size penal colony. During the day he mines ore that’s then sent to Earth; at night he watches sitcoms in his small habitat.
And then one day another convict, Niyya (Briana Middleton), arrives — Theodore has taken out the monitor in his chest so he’s thought to be dead, or almost there. They engage in a tense cohabitation, which has the benefit of revealing to the viewers why they were exiled in the first place.
The phenomenon of powerful creatures defeated, or at least slowed down, by seemingly innocuous things — common bacteria in “The War of the Worlds,” water in “Signs” — is not new in science fiction. Will (Anthony Mackie) must leave his encampment and travel to a lower elevation to retrieve oxygen filters for his ailing young son.
Carlos (Michel Brown) and Elena (Sandra Echeverría) are on the brink of an acrimonious divorce when Cupid intervenes and sends them back to the 1990s, around the time of a fateful date at a Maná concert. The older couple goes to town trying to prevent its younger selves from falling for each other, thus sparing them future distress.
Is something worth pursuing if, before heartbreak sets in, it brings genuine happiness? “With You in the Future” has fun with some of the consequences the older couple’s actions set in motion, including the fact that changing the course of events leads to changing yourself. And do you really want to do that?
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