Science Fiction

Drama

Aporia

Armian Pictures

Soapbox Films

BondIt Media Capital

United States of America

English

Judy Greer

Edi Gathegi

Payman Maadi

Faithe Herman

Whitney Morgan Cox

Rachel Paulson

Lisa Linke

Adam O'Byrne

Dionne Audain

Veda Cienfuegos

Mann Alfonso

Grace Hinson

Jeffrey Sun

Elohim Nycalove

Coel Mahal

Cassie Lavo

Cortni Wimberley

Shelly Wen

Jenna Tresidder

Jared O'Brien

Dennis Walker

H. Scott Salinas

Bryan Kopp

Jared Moshé

Christopher Alender

Neda Armian

Tyler Gould

Matthew Helderman

David Lawson Jr.

Elizabeth Mihelich

Doris Pfardrescher

T. Justin Ross

David A. Smith

Luke Taylor

Peter Van Steemburg

Marshall Granger

Sunday Boling

Meg Morman

Kati Simon

Ariel Vida

Nicholas Bupp

Brent Marchant

For those unfamiliar with the term “aporia,” it refers to a state of puzzlement or bewilderment, especially in philosophical and ethical discourse. And, in the case of this latest effort from writer-director Jared Moshé, it’s equally applicable to the essence of this film’s existence. This romantic sci-fi saga of a nurse, Sophie (Judy Greer), who loses her engineer/physicist husband, Mal (Edi Gathegi), to a drunk driver follows the efforts to bring him back to life with the assistance of her late spouse’s best friend, Jabir (Payman Maadi), a fellow scientist with whom he was working on a time machine. Unfortunately, the device doesn’t function as intended, but it is nevertheless capable of sending a deadly subatomic particle through time whose impact is capable of killing someone – in this case, the proposed target being the motorist who killed Mal. The prospect poses a daunting ethical dilemma, but Sophie agrees to it, and she soon finds herself back in the company of her husband. But changing the past carries consequences, many of them unforeseen and difficult to deal with. The film presents an intriguing premise, to be sure, but one not unlike what was previously examined in “The Butterfly Effect” (2004). What’s more, this offering is plagued by a number of issues, such as needlessly slow pacing, insightful but overlong ethical debates and a stunningly unsophisticated temporal device that looks like one of Rube Goldberg’s comical contraptions. The biggest problem by far, though, is one of narrative credibility – not from a scientific standpoint but from a moral one: It’s hard to believe that these three supposedly intelligent individuals can be so casual and cavalier when it comes to their ethics and morals. I find it unfathomable how a supposedly compassionate caregiver like a nurse could so willingly go along with a harebrained plan to willfully kill someone for self-serving purposes; it’s a hallow, contrived and patently unbelievable story arc. And, when efforts to make up for this transgression surface, the plot truly starts to go off the rails. Indeed, the logic behind this tale truly needs to be rethought and reworked, because, as it stands now, it genuinely leaves philosophically minded viewers in a deep state of aporia, especially when it comes to figuring out why they bought a ticket to watch it in the first place.

Jared Moshe Q&A | Director's Night | Aporia (2023)

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Aporia

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Cast

Judy Greer

Edi Gathegi

Payman Maadi

Faithe Herman

Whitney Morgan Cox

Rachel Paulson

Lisa Linke

Adam O'Byrne

Dionne Audain

Veda Cienfuegos

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