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The Butterfly Effect

Posted: Jan 29th 2004, 1:29 am
by miss_squish
this movie rocks. Ashton Kutcher takes a leap into drama and blew me away!!!
it is sooo chilling and makes you question situations in life.
i give it 2 big thumbs up.
i highly recommend it to all you MSCL fans :-P

Posted: Jan 30th 2004, 9:25 pm
by lance
Cool,

Thanks for the review. I will have to check it out.

-LanceMan

Posted: Jun 6th 2004, 5:49 am
by foolishoptimist
I just caught this movie at the astor theatre(they play movies that have finished there theatrical run), I really loved it. It has to be one of the best movies i've seen this year.

The concept behind it(you don't even get the full thing from the trailer btw), is just legendary.

Posted: Aug 12th 2004, 10:57 am
by fnordboy
Ok, I finally saw this on DVD last night. :shock: I don't know how anyone could actually like this film. I really wanted to like it too. It was just...bad. I watched both endings, the theatrical release one and the director's cut one. And...wow...if you haven't seen the director's cut one you have not seen the stupidest ending in hollywood history.

Ashton Kutcher was actually semi decent in this movie. Every now and then there would be moments where it would look like he was about to slip into his "Punk'd"-like character, but he kept himself in check. In reality though the part was nothing special I think anyone could have done it.

Concept wise it has some decent ideas, but I think the execution was bad. The writing was pretty damn weak too IMO. There were scenes where there was no logical way that one of the characters could jump to the conclusions they did just by what was happening around them.

Posted: Aug 12th 2004, 9:33 pm
by Megs
What happened in the director's cut ending?

Posted: Aug 12th 2004, 10:27 pm
by fnordboy
Megs wrote:What happened in the director's cut ending?
[spoiler]instead of "jumping back to the party where he meets kayleigh (or however they spelt her name) he jumps back to his mothers womb and strangles himself with the umbilical cord. :lol: LAME! There was this side story where he goes to a psychic with his mother after the scene where they are having dinner out talking about his father and if he had remembered any of his blacked out times. The psychic tells him he has no life line and should never have been born, he is soulless. The mother gets freaked out and explains that she had to miscarriages before she had him. Guess 2 other kids killed themselves the same way before Ashton :roll: [/spoiler]

Posted: Aug 14th 2004, 11:25 am
by Megs
fnordboy wrote:
Megs wrote:What happened in the director's cut ending?
[spoiler]instead of "jumping back to the party where he meets kayleigh (or however they spelt her name) he jumps back to his mothers womb and strangles himself with the umbilical cord. :lol: LAME! There was this side story where he goes to a psychic with his mother after the scene where they are having dinner out talking about his father and if he had remembered any of his blacked out times. The psychic tells him he has no life line and should never have been born, he is soulless. The mother gets freaked out and explains that she had to miscarriages before she had him. Guess 2 other kids killed themselves the same way before Ashton :roll: [/spoiler]
Oh, wow. I guess when we rented the DVD we watched the director's cut. I had no idea that wasn't the original ending. No wonder people were looking at me funny when I talked about the ending! My sister's fiance was all, "I don't remember THAT happening when I saw it." hahahaha

Crap. Now we have to re-rent it. :x

Posted: Aug 14th 2004, 11:30 am
by Megs
I will also say that the director's cut ending really disturbed me. More:

[spoiler]The shot of that baby strangling himself just did me in. I cried for a good 15 minutes afterwards. My husband was looking at me like this: :shock: I guess I was overly emotional about babies, especially since we have been trying for so long to have one with no luck.

I will say, I did kind of like the fact that he figured out he was never to be born (b/c he didn't have a soul), and that by him living, he was destroying the lives of those who loved him. So he went back and ensured that he wasn't born, and then it showed how good the lives of his mother, girl, and friends turned out for the better. I thought that part was interesting. I want to re-watch it with the original theatrical release, and see how much it changes how I felt about this movie. [/spoiler]

Posted: Aug 15th 2004, 12:34 am
by Jody Barsch*
Yeah, I guess I never saw the original ending either. I'm curious about what it was, but not so curious as to rent it again. [spoiler]I didn't really take the endig so much as him realizing that he couldn't live without a soul, but just that he relized that whatever he did to try to fix things he just made things worse - concluding fianlly that it would be better if he wasn't born. I really liked the idea that there had been two babies before him, who had gone through the same thing, all living several lives before deciding that they should not live for the sakes of those they loved. I agree that many things were illogical, but overall I had fun watching it, and enjoyed it for what it was. I'm still a little confused by that note he writed that we see at the start and finish of the film.[/spoiler]

Posted: Aug 29th 2004, 10:47 pm
by Angela_Catalano
I really enjoyed this movie. Ashton Kutcher is Great!

I saw it at the theater originally. When I got in on DvD i didnt even realize that there was that different ending and other parts, so I watched it and it became like a whole different movie to me. Either way I Loved it.

Posted: Aug 29th 2004, 11:25 pm
by TomSpeed
I was also disturbed by the Director's Cut ending.

[spoiler]Sometimes, when I've been really depressed, I've wished that I had never been born. Ashton's character actually takes steps to make that happen. It was freaky for me seeing a thought that I, and others, have had enacted. Of course, It's a Wonderful Life has the same theme, but the execution of it was much different.[/spoiler]

I'll watch the theatrical version too the next time I see it.

Posted: Aug 29th 2004, 11:35 pm
by Angela_Catalano
As much as I do really like this movie, I dont like the director's cut as much. I Have a bit of a death problem, and that ending bother's me a bit.

Posted: Aug 30th 2004, 12:04 am
by Jody Barsch*
So, what was the original ending? The director's cut ending was kind of what made the film for me.

PS: what the HECK was going on with my spelling and grammar above?? "writed"?! :oops:

Posted: Aug 30th 2004, 11:41 am
by emmie
this is what happened in the original:

[spoiler]all of the scenes talking about the miscarriages were taken out. when he is in the doctor's office, the home movie he is watching is a birthday party when he's like 5 or something. he goes back to that and is mean to Kayleigh so that her and her brother pick to live with their mother. then years later, everyone is happy. the last scene is Kutcher and Kayleigh passing each other on a sidewalk in NYC. they make eye contact and then look at each other in a funny, do I know you?, kind of way.[/spoiler]

it's a much happier and simpler ending.

Posted: Aug 30th 2004, 1:18 pm
by TomSpeed
emmie wrote:this is what happened in the original:

[spoiler]all of the scenes talking about the miscarriages were taken out. when he is in the doctor's office, the home movie he is watching is a birthday party when he's like 5 or something. he goes back to that and is mean to Kayleigh so that her and her brother pick to live with their mother. then years later, everyone is happy. the last scene is Kutcher and Kayleigh passing each other on a sidewalk in NYC. they make eye contact and then look at each other in a funny, do I know you?, kind of way.[/spoiler]

it's a much happier and simpler ending.
HMMM...The original ending doesn't seem to have the same punch. I can see why filmmakers opted for the tamer ending for theaters.