Movie Review - The Adam Project

Director: Shawn Levy
Genre: Science Fiction/ Action/ Adventure
Runtime: 106 minutes
Year: 2022
Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Mark Ruffalo, Jennifer Garner, Zoe Saldana, Catherine Keener, Walter Scobell

I WATCHED THIS MOVIE FOR MY 2022 MOVIE CHALLENGE

WEEK 12: A NETFLIX-ORIGINAL MOVIE

Description: After accidentally crash-landing in 2022, time-traveling fighter pilot Adam Reed (Ryan Reynolds) teams up with his 12-year-old self (Walter Scobell) for a mission to save the future.

Review: Anyone who goes to see a movie starring Ryan Reynolds knows what to expect: sarcasm, self-conscious commentary, and many jokes. Whether you like Reynolds or not, you have to admit: his talent for verbally annoying others is undeniable. In the infectious Netflix time-travel film “The Adam Project”, he finally gets a big mouth back. From his 12-year-old self.
The films opens in 2050. Fighter pilot Adam Reed has just stolen a jet and is skimming through space, with an angry pursuer in his wake. Reed is injured, but manages to narrowly escape by flying into a wormhole, which lands him in the year 2022. There he sees how his life as an adolescent once was: playing video games, taking beatings in the schoolyard and making irritating jokes to annoy his grieving mother. 
The conversations he has with himself are deliciously caustic. “How did you get so smart?” asks Adam at one point to his younger self, wo which the latter responds with: How did you get so stupid?” It’s not often we see an exasperated Ryan Reynolds twist himself into so many turns to win an argument with another on the basis of wit. It lends the film a surprising amount of sass.
The dialogue-rich “The Adam Project” is also self-aware enough to poke fun at its own internal logic; time travel causes plot holes one way or another. The longer you dwell on it, the more inconsistencies you will find. The open naming of such pitfalls is a smart move, because it takes the wind out of the sails of even the most skeptical viewers.
Sometimes it gets a bit much, all that bickering. The holy adage ‘show don’t tell’ would have deserved more compliance in that sense. On the other hand, the dynamic between Ryan Reynolds and the talented young Walter Scobell is actually much too funny not to maximize. Besides, you get your share of action in the end, albeit in modest doses.
Fortunately, those action scenes are very smoothly, skillfully and flashily portrayed by Shawn Levy, the director with whom Reynolds previously made the entertaining “Free Guy”. Adam and Adam are on the run from a bunch of futuristic soldiers, let by a villain with rather predictable motives: power and money. And the way the created a younger version of Catherine Keener’s characters is really bad.
The latter is a major weakness in a film that really isn’t so much about action or messing with timeless as it is about dealing with personal trauma. In the final phase, Ryan Reynolds is allowed to squeeze out a few tears and the scope of his performance turns out to be broader than expected. Behind that big mouth, there is of course a lot more hidden. No matter, sometimes it pays to be a nerd.

Rating: 3,5/ 5