Project Depressing: Fetching Cody

It is not so much bad as it is mind-numbingly-depressing.  Today's film is Fetching Cody, a film given to me by Bob due to its similarity to the Butterfly Effect series (which I have covered completely).  The similarities are hard to miss, but don't tell that to the Writer/Director.  While glancing at the Forums on IMDB for the film, I found a Topic mentioning that.  Who sends a comment refuting it?  Why it is the Writer/Director, who apparently checks the Boards for his film.  To be fair, he only made one, so I guess it is easy!  To note, he has Written many films, but only Directed one.  I'll get into what he's written in the wrap-up.  As you probably guessed, the film is about Time-Travel.  In this case, our hero goes back in time to try and save his girlfriend after she goes into a drug-related coma.  He has pretty much set her up for this, so it only seems fair!  It is also worth noting that the Star here is Jay Baruchel, who has an Animated film coming out this Friday.  This...this is not the primer for How to Train Your Dragon 2 (The Quickening)!  This time-travel tale is both low-budget and quirky, so the device is an arm chair.  Since this film is all about flashbacks, it is only fitting that we have someone from Highlander.  The man- Jim Byrnes.  Can a loser, a bum and their time-traveling chair save one girl?  Well, the odds are slim.  To find out more, read on...

Cody and Jay (not his character name) are in love.  They are also...not working and living in the slums of Toronto.  Well, one of out of three ain't bad.

Unfortunately, Cody collapses one night and goes into a coma.  It is all due to taking some hard drugs for a long period of time.  Drugs she got from...yeah, our hero.

His seemingly-crazy friend (who is never shown walking) is not alot of help, but does give him a place to stay one night.

As it turns out, a chair he picked out of the garbage is a time-machine.  They don't say how it works, so don't ask me.

It apparently works on voice commands and...I don't pretend to know or care how.  It could just as easily be a Genie's Lamp or a magic ring, really.  Rules and consistency- you have no place here.

So here's the hook/problem here: our lead is kind of an idiot.  It is supposed to be funny, I guess, but it mostly comes off as him just being, well, an idiot.

For example, he tries to salvage the moment when 13 year-old Cody first 'became a woman.'  As such, he takes some Tampons and just shows up at her Private Girls' School in the middle of Gym.  You. are. a. moron.

He later learns that her brother committed suicide, which messed her up.  He tries a few times to stop him, which fails.  It is presented in a way that is supposed to be funny in some sort of dark way, I guess.

Oh and put one more point on the idiot board for showing up at a later attempt with the guy's blood still on your shirt!

Oh and causality be damned as he meets a young Cody to save her from some boy 'pawing at her' as a little girl.  Creepy adult- much safer!

Will Jay succeed?  Can Cody be saved and everything live happily ever after?  Look at this guy below and ask me that question again.

He does save her, but he does so by stopping them from meeting.  This makes him forget that they met (somehow), but allows Jim the Watcher to still remember her (somehow).  The End.

I need to go watch some cute animals to balance this out.  I will say this: the movie is not as randomly-dark and bleak as The Butterfly Effect.  Sorry, Writer/Director, but I'm making the comparison again.  The trade-off is that we get a bunch of scenes of Jay acting like an idiot in the biggest way.  Showing up as a Fireman (well, the jacket, at least) to hand Tampons to a 13 year-old girl- dumb.  Stalking the family's Christmas party to see how to break her up with her earlier boyfriend- creepy.  Not realising that your constant interference is helping cause the problem- really dumb.  I realize that he's not supposed to be a smart character, but there are logical hurdles here that he should have been able to step over.  I have other issues with how the rules (or lack thereof) work.  He doesn't remember calling 9-11 for her at first, since he did it on a later trip.  Of course, HE did it earlier with the time-machine, so why does he not remember his own actions.  In the Ending, he forgets everything about Cody when he stops them from meeting...but he was the one who time-traveled and changed that.  Can you think of any time-travel film where the guy forgets his own actions, while a random guy that didn't go with him doesn't?  It is clearly just there to set up the 'maybe they will meet up again' ending, but makes no sense.  Unless Jim Byrnes is playing God/Devil, I have no clue why he remembers anything.  It is not the worst time-travel film I've seen, but I'd recommend stuff like Time Crimes over this.  Oh and as for what the Writer/Director has written since this film, well it is stuff like this...

Next up, I cover the last film of a world-famous Director.  The legend tells the tale of kidnappers, a fake psychic and the Coach from Not Another Teen Movie.  Stay tuned...