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''Primer'' is a 2004 independent film, written and directed by Shane Carruth. It was made on [[NoBudget a minuscule budget]]: $7,000, most of which went towards buying film stock. The film is a character-driven drama about two engineers who unexpectedly create a TimeMachine, and an examination of how TimeTravel (and the power it confers) affects them and their friendship.
to:
''Primer'' is a 2004 independent film, written and directed by Shane Carruth. ([[UpToEleven Also produced by Shane Carruth, starring Shane Carruth, edited by Shane Carruth, Shane Carruth as director of photography and with a soundtrack composed by Shane Carruth.]]) It was made on [[NoBudget a minuscule budget]]: $7,000, most of which went towards buying film stock. The film is a character-driven drama about two engineers who unexpectedly create a TimeMachine, and an examination of how TimeTravel (and the power it confers) affects them and their friendship.
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* CastTheExpert: Keith the clean room guy at University of Texas at Dallas is played by... Keith Bradshaw, the clean room guy at UTD.
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* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
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Quite possibly the single {{geek}}iest film ever made, and one that brings TechnoBabble to a new art form, it is also one of the most believable via its starkly straightforward presentation.
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Quite possibly the single {{geek}}iest film ever made, and one that brings TechnoBabble [[TechnoBabble technical jargon]] to a new art form, it is also one of the most believable via its starkly straightforward presentation.
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It is also quite possibly the single {{geek}}iest film ever made; one that brings TechnoBabble to a new art form.
to:
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* HourglassPlot: Aaron starts off as a family man and rather risk-averse (note the scenes where he worries about needing eye protection and warns his wife against using the first batch of ice from the new fridge). Abe starts off unmarried and rather more devil-may-care. Over the course of the film, access to a TimeTravel-powered ResetButton makes Aaron become more aggressive and willing to take risks, and he eventually leaves his family. Abe, on the other hand, becomes increasingly worried about the side-effects of time travel and oddly protective of Aaron's family.
to:
* HourglassPlot: Aaron starts off as a family man and rather risk-averse (note the scenes where he worries about needing eye protection and warns his wife against using the first batch of ice from the new fridge). Abe starts off unmarried and rather more devil-may-care. Over the course of the film, access to a TimeTravel-powered ResetButton makes Aaron become more aggressive and willing to take risks, and he eventually leaves his family. Abe, on the other hand, becomes increasingly worried about the side-effects of time travel and oddly protective of Aaron's family. family.
* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
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* HourglassPlot: Aaron starts off as a family man and rather risk-averse (note the scenes where he worries about needing eye protection and warns his wife against using the first batch of ice from the new fridge). Abe starts off unmarried and rather more devil-may-care. Over the course of the film, access to a TimeTravel-powered ResetButton makes Aaron become more aggressive and willing to take risks, and he eventually leaves his family. Abe, on the other hand, becomes increasingly worried about the side-effects of time travel and oddly protective of Aaron's family.
* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
to:
* HourglassPlot: Aaron starts off as a family man and rather risk-averse (note the scenes where he worries about needing eye protection and warns his wife against using the first batch of ice from the new fridge). Abe starts off unmarried and rather more devil-may-care. Over the course of the film, access to a TimeTravel-powered ResetButton makes Aaron become more aggressive and willing to take risks, and he eventually leaves his family. Abe, on the other hand, becomes increasingly worried about the side-effects of time travel and oddly protective of Aaron's family.
* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.family.
* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
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* As it does not laterally bypass temporal mechanics, but rather alters their progression, they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours, one has to remain in the box for the same duration.
* As it alters temporal mechanics only within its own dimensions and during operation, and offers only one 'exit node' back into standard temporal progression, they can only travel back to the time that it was turned on, not before or after.
* As it alters temporal mechanics only within its own dimensions and during operation, and offers only one 'exit node' back into standard temporal progression, they can only travel back to the time that it was turned on, not before or after.
to:
* As it does not laterally bypass temporal mechanics, but rather alters their inverts its progression, they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours, one has to remain in the box for the same duration.
* As it alterstemporal mechanics time only within its own dimensions and during operation, and offers only one 'exit node' back into standard temporal progression, they can only travel back to the time that it was turned on, not before or after.
* As it alters
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By scaling up the Box, they're able to use it as a means to travel into the past. It has its limitations: They can only travel back to the time the Box was turned on, no sooner or later; and they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours, they have to sit in the box for two hours. Even so, they figure out how to use time travel to make a nice profit off the stock market.
to:
By scaling up the Box, they're able to use it as a means to travel into the past. It The device has its limitations: They can only travel back to the time the Box was turned on, no sooner or later; and limitations:
* As it does not laterally bypass temporal mechanics, but rather alters their progression, they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours,they have one has to sit remain in the box for two hours. the same duration.
* As it alters temporal mechanics only within its own dimensions and during operation, and offers only one 'exit node' back into standard temporal progression, they can only travel back to the time that it was turned on, not before or after.
Evenso, with the limitations, however, they figure out how to use time travel to make a nice profit off profit, through effectively living through the same period a second time with foreknowledge of the stock market.
market.
* As it does not laterally bypass temporal mechanics, but rather alters their progression, they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours,
* As it alters temporal mechanics only within its own dimensions and during operation, and offers only one 'exit node' back into standard temporal progression, they can only travel back to the time that it was turned on, not before or after.
Even
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Then something goes wrong. And that's when things get [[TheEndingChangesEverything really confusing]]. The ''plot itself'' is non-linear. Several crucial events are neither shown nor described, just ''{{implied}}''. Another challenge to following events is the frequent use of dense TechnoBabble.
to:
Then something goes wrong. And that's when things get [[TheEndingChangesEverything really confusing]]. The ''plot itself'' is non-linear. Several Most of the plot -- including several crucial events are -- is neither shown nor described, just ''{{implied}}''. Another challenge to following events is And on top of that, the frequent use of characters communicate almost exclusively in dense TechnoBabble.
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* ReedRichardsIsUseless: They invent a workable TIME MACHINE and the best use they can think of is to make money in the stock market?
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moved Putney Swope Panic to YMMV
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* PutneySwopePanic: Not uncommon for its labyrinthine story and, as mentioned below, HardCore TechnoBabble to cause many a layman to fall victim to this state.
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** Which on the other hand lends another layer of how incredibly stereotypically accurate the characters are to start-up company engineers in Dallas in the late 90s/early 2000s.
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* ResetButton: Various characters have back up boxes going from the beginning of the story in case something goes wrong. Then they start folding up more boxes and bringing them back in the fail-safe one.
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* ResetButton: Various characters have back up back-up boxes going from the beginning of the story in case something goes wrong. Then they start folding up more boxes and bringing them back in the fail-safe one.
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* ShownTheirWork: Anyone without significant knowledge of university-level physics won't be able to understand a single line of dialogue for at least the first ten minutes of the film.
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* ShownTheirWork: Anyone without significant knowledge of university-level physics won't be able to understand a single line of dialogue for at least the first ten minutes of the film.
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: Some viewers find the film hard to follow.
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: Some viewers find the The film hard leaves the viewer to follow.figure a lot of the very complex plot out on their own.
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* WrongGenreSavvy: Abe comes up with a very thorough plan to avoid causing {{Temporal Paradox}}en, which turns out to be completely unnecessary [[spoiler:(or not, depending on your interpretation of Granger's fate; the idea that he is suffering from temporal paradox -- that the consequence of paradox is that the universe destroys you, rather than vice versa -- was put forth by Carruth himself, [[DeathOfTheAuthor whatever his opinion's worth]])]]. Still, points for trying.
to:
* WrongGenreSavvy: Abe comes up with a very thorough plan to avoid causing {{Temporal Paradox}}en, Paradox}}es, which turns out to be completely unnecessary [[spoiler:(or not, depending on your interpretation of Granger's fate; the idea that he is suffering from temporal paradox -- that the consequence of paradox is that the universe destroys you, rather than vice versa -- was put forth by Carruth himself, [[DeathOfTheAuthor whatever his opinion's worth]])]]. Still, points for trying.
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* MistakenForGay: The pair speculates that this is bound to happen, what with the extended time they spend by themselves in a hotel room waiting to come out.
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* PutneySwopePanic: Not uncommon for it to cause many a layman to fall victim to this state.
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* PutneySwopePanic: Not uncommon for it its labyrinthine story and, as mentioned below, HardCore TechnoBabble to cause many a layman to fall victim to this state.
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* PutneySwopePanic: Not uncommon for this to cause many a layman to fall into this state.
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* PutneySwopePanic: Not uncommon for this it to cause many a layman to fall into victim to this state.
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* PutneySwopePanic: Not uncommon for this to cause many a layman to fall into this state.
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* ClockDiscrepancy: Abe suspects that the Box is a time machine, and he confirms this by placing a digital watch inside it for a minute. Upon removing the watch, it's about 21 hours fast.
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* IncestuousCasting: As per the commentary, Aaron (Shane Carruth)'s wife is played by Shane Carruth's sister.
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I\'d hazard that it\'s both.
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* IronicEcho: ''They/he took from his/their surroundings what was needed, and made of it something more.'' Overlaps with MeaningfulEcho.
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* MeaningfulEcho: ''They/he took from his/their surroundings what was needed, and made of it something more.'' Overlaps with IronicEcho.
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In Soviet Russia Trope Mocks You was renamed to Russian Reversal. Misuse and bad examples are being deleted.
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* WrongGenreSavvy: Abe comes up with a very thorough plan to avoid causing {{Temporal Paradox}}en, which turns out to be completely unnecessary [[spoiler:(or not, depending on your interpretation of Granger's fate; the idea that he is suffering from temporal paradox -- that the consequence of paradox is that the [[InSovietRussiaTropeMocksYou universe destroys you]], rather than vice versa -- was put forth by Carruth himself, [[DeathOfTheAuthor whatever his opinion's worth]])]]. Still, points for trying.
to:
* WrongGenreSavvy: Abe comes up with a very thorough plan to avoid causing {{Temporal Paradox}}en, which turns out to be completely unnecessary [[spoiler:(or not, depending on your interpretation of Granger's fate; the idea that he is suffering from temporal paradox -- that the consequence of paradox is that the [[InSovietRussiaTropeMocksYou universe destroys you]], you, rather than vice versa -- was put forth by Carruth himself, [[DeathOfTheAuthor whatever his opinion's worth]])]]. Still, points for trying.
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** Research into the physics of time has suggested that if a time machine was built, it would have at least one similar restriction as in the movie: it would only allow you to travel back to the point at which it was turned on.
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* TheSlowPath: To go back two hours, you have to sit in the box for two hours.
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* TheSlowPath: In ''both'' directions. To go back two hours, you have to sit in the box for two hours.
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* TimeMachine: Closest it comes is to a {{Terminator}}-type, but it's really in a category all its own.
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* TimeMachine: Closest it comes is to a {{Terminator}}-type, ''{{Franchise/Terminator}}''-type, but it's really in a category all its own.
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No it doesn\'t
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* TimeTravelTenseTrouble: Provides the top quote for the page.
** Also: "Man, are you hungry? I haven't eaten since later this afternoon." (Aaron)
** Also: "Man, are you hungry? I haven't eaten since later this afternoon." (Aaron)
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* TimeTravelTenseTrouble: Provides the top quote for the page.
** Also:"Man, are you hungry? I haven't eaten since later this afternoon." (Aaron)"
** Also:
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I can find no reference to this anywhere else on the internet, if someone wants to put it back in they be more specific on who they\'re talking about.
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* IncestuousCasting: The married couples are played by brother and sister.
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* CastTheExpert: Keith the clean room guy at University of Texas at Dallas is played by... Keith Bradshaw, the clean room guy at UTD.
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** Which on the other hand lends another layer of how incredibly stereotypically accurate the characters are to start-up company engineers in Dallas in the late 90s/early 2000s.
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: Some viewers find the film hard to follow, mostly because of the complexities of time travel.
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: Some viewers find the film hard to follow, mostly because of the complexities of time travel.follow.
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* GambitRoulette: When you've already seen events play out, you can make plans work that involve [[JustifiedTrope things that would normally be completely unpredictable]], but sometimes even having seen it happen once [[ForWantOfANail doesn't mean it will happen the same way again]].
* GambitPileup: Two {{Chessmaster}}s, a TimeMachine, and no need to worry about causing a TemporalParadox. Things get complicated.
* GambitPileup: Two {{Chessmaster}}s, a TimeMachine, and no need to worry about causing a TemporalParadox. Things get complicated.
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* NightmareFuel: The neurological effects of time travel.
--> Abe: ''Why can't we write like normal people?!''
--> Aaron: ''I don't know. I can see the letters - I know what they should look like, I just can't get my hand to make them easily.''
--> Abe: ''Why can't we write like normal people?!''
--> Aaron: ''I don't know. I can see the letters - I know what they should look like, I just can't get my hand to make them easily.''
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* ResetButton: Various characters have back up boxes going from the beginning of the story in case something goes wrong, when they start folding up more boxes and bringing them back in the fail safe one, that when things get ''more'' confusing.
to:
* ResetButton: Various characters have back up boxes going from the beginning of the story in case something goes wrong, when wrong. Then they start folding up more boxes and bringing them back in the fail safe one, that when things get ''more'' confusing.fail-safe one.
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* XanatosRoulette: Apparently, time travel is a Chessmaster's best friend.
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%% New image selected per Image Pickin' thread: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1317449977000617700
%% Please do not change or remove without starting a new thread.
[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/primer_film_3810.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:What if it actually works?]]
->''"Look, everything we're putting into that box becomes ungrounded, and I don't mean grounded like to the earth, I mean, not tethered. I mean, we're blocking whatever keeps it moving forward, and so they flip-flop."''
-->--'''Abe'''
''Primer'' is a 2004 independent film, written and directed by Shane Carruth. It was made on [[NoBudget a minuscule budget]]: $7,000, most of which went towards buying film stock. The film is a character-driven drama about two engineers who unexpectedly create a TimeMachine, and an examination of how TimeTravel (and the power it confers) affects them and their friendship.
It is also quite possibly the single {{geek}}iest film ever made; one that brings TechnoBabble to a new art form.
The film opens with two engineers and entrepreneurs, Abe and Aaron, building electronics in Aaron's garage. After achieving some success with their latest project -- a room temperature superconductor -- they discover it has an unexpected side-effect: creating time loops. Everything they place inside the Box runs back and forth through time for roughly 1300 iterations.
By scaling up the Box, they're able to use it as a means to travel into the past. It has its limitations: They can only travel back to the time the Box was turned on, no sooner or later; and they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours, they have to sit in the box for two hours. Even so, they figure out how to use time travel to make a nice profit off the stock market.
Then something goes wrong. And that's when things get [[TheEndingChangesEverything really confusing]]. The ''plot itself'' is non-linear. Several crucial events are neither shown nor described, just ''{{implied}}''. Another challenge to following events is the frequent use of dense TechnoBabble.
!!! Some helpful, spoilerific, graphs:
* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Time_Travel_Method-2.svg A graphical representation of how time travel in the Box works.]]
* [[http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/PrimerTimeline.gif Abe and Aaron's paths through time.]]
* [[http://unrealitymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/primer-chart.jpg The timeline(s) of the entire film.]]
Yes, this is a movie that requires graphs to get a handle on.
%% General explanations of the subtle intricacies of time travel don't belong on this page.
%% Things which directly appear in the movie itself go here.
----
!!This film provides examples of:
* AnachronicOrder: Maybe! It's difficult to tell when a linear plot would be going back and forth in time as well.
* ChekhovsGun: [[spoiler: Aaron's headphones.]];[[spoiler: Rats in the attic.]]
* CloneDegeneration: WordOfGod for states that [[spoiler:doubles created via TimeTravel are imperfect copies. This is the reason for Aaron and Abe's earbleeds and the degradation of their handwriting when they begin altering their past.]]
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Platz is hinted to be one. At first, it seems like he's just your typical BadBoss but a bit of dialog earlier in the movie refers to an event that happened "last year" and one of the characters saying he knew someone with a legal background that knew about "cases like ours." Suggesting Platz took an intellectual property invented by the company (probably claiming that it was developed on company time with company resources, which is often covered in employment contracts.)
* DeadlyNosebleed: A symptom of improperly performed time travel. He leaped out of the box late (early from his perspective.)
* HeterosexualLifePartners: Abe and Aaron.
* HomemadeInventions: The time machine.
* HourglassPlot: Aaron starts off as a family man and rather risk-averse (note the scenes where he worries about needing eye protection and warns his wife against using the first batch of ice from the new fridge). Abe starts off unmarried and rather more devil-may-care. Over the course of the film, access to a TimeTravel-powered ResetButton makes Aaron become more aggressive and willing to take risks, and he eventually leaves his family. Abe, on the other hand, becomes increasingly worried about the side-effects of time travel and oddly protective of Aaron's family.
* IncestuousCasting: The married couples are played by brother and sister.
* LimitedWardrobe: Abe and Aaron's work clothes might as well be uniforms. At one point, Abe is shown sleeping in them.
* MisappliedPhlebotinum: Abe and Aaron could have made money in a number of ways more efficiently than playing the stock market, though the movie shows that they go about it this way because they're trying to be as careful as possible about the impact they have on causality, as they don't know which rules apply to their type of time travel, and they're trying to hide their invention's existence until they fully understand it.
* NarratorAllAlong: [[spoiler:Hooded Aaron's]] phone message.
* NightmareFuel: The neurological effects of time travel.
--> Abe: ''Why can't we write like normal people?!''
--> Aaron: ''I don't know. I can see the letters - I know what they should look like, I just can't get my hand to make them easily.''
* NoEnding: We don't know whether Abe's plan succeeds, what Hooded Aaron is doing, or what Aaron Three is doing.
* {{Prelap}}: An ice machine is triggered on a refrigerator, but the sound is a piece of construction equipment from the next shot.
* ResetButton: Various characters have back up boxes going from the beginning of the story in case something goes wrong, when they start folding up more boxes and bringing them back in the fail safe one, that when things get ''more'' confusing.
* SdrawkcabName: Abe Terger comes to regret his work at Emiba which leads to a ''mise en abyme.''
* SecondHandStorytelling: Half the reason the film is so {{mind screw}}y is because several key events are described rather than shown -- and the characters doing the describing would rather be laconic than descriptive.
* SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong: The plot involves [[spoiler: Aaron going back in time twice to save Abe's girlfriend, Rachel, from her psychotic ex-boyfriend. Thomas Granger, Rachel's father, is believed to have come back for similar reasons, but we never find out exactly what his motives were.]]
* ShownTheirWork: Anyone without significant knowledge of university-level physics won't be able to understand a single line of dialogue for at least the first ten minutes of the film.
** They researched what would happen if you had [[spoiler:two copies of the same cellphone. Turns out, some networks just look for the first one, and others ring both.]]
* SpannerInTheWorks: [[spoiler:Granger's surprise time trip (given the place and time he shows up, he's probably there to prevent a disaster resulting from the punch-Platts experiment). Abe tries to fix the Granger problem two different ways, once with one of the Thursday 5:00pm boxes (we see him running to get into place behind the house before the other Abe leaves the car), and then with his fail-safe box. The former trip left him with a quantum entanglement with Granger, since he had a 50/50 chance of using the same box Granger did -- thus Granger lost consciousness whenever he got too close to Abe).]]
* TheSlowPath: To go back two hours, you have to sit in the box for two hours.
* TechnoBabble: In the absence of any solid RealLife physics supporting time travel, their hypothesizing about the technicalities can't be anything else. However, the language of mathematics and engineering has been leveraged to maximize plausibility. Within the framework of the film a lot of work has been done to keep things consistent.
* TimeIsDangerous: Excessive time travel causes strange physical problems in the protagonists: mysterious bleeding from their ears and deterioration of their handwriting. WordOfGod is that this is also a case of CloneDegeneration.
* TimeMachine: Closest it comes is to a {{Terminator}}-type, but it's really in a category all its own.
* TimeTravel: The central premise.
* TimeTravelForFunAndProfit: Abe and Aaron never got around to publicizing their time machine, because [[spoiler:they were too busy using hourly time travel to make money day-trading stocks.]]
* TimeTravelTenseTrouble: Provides the top quote for the page.
** Also: "Man, are you hungry? I haven't eaten since later this afternoon." (Aaron)
* TheEndingChangesEverything: The second act of the film involves the use of very limited Time Travel. However, [[spoiler:in the third act Abe learns that his friend Aaron has already used the time machine to change the past. So during the entire aforementioned second act, Aaron had actually been Aaron-from-a-week-in-the-future, manipulating current events for his own ends.]]
* ViewersAreGeniuses: Some viewers find the film hard to follow, mostly because of the complexities of time travel.
* WhamLine: [[spoiler:"I hope you're not implying that any day is unimportant at Cortex Semi." A WhamLine not for the words itself, but for the fact that Aaron says it even though Abe had failed to remember the line that prompted it, revealing that he was reciting the conversation from memory, too.]]. The lines before that also count, such as the fact that [[spoiler: Abe has a secret backup time machine which has been running for most of the movie.]]
* WrongGenreSavvy: Abe comes up with a very thorough plan to avoid causing {{Temporal Paradox}}en, which turns out to be completely unnecessary [[spoiler:(or not, depending on your interpretation of Granger's fate; the idea that he is suffering from temporal paradox -- that the consequence of paradox is that the [[InSovietRussiaTropeMocksYou universe destroys you]], rather than vice versa -- was put forth by Carruth himself, [[DeathOfTheAuthor whatever his opinion's worth]])]]. Still, points for trying.
* XanatosRoulette: Apparently, time travel is a Chessmaster's best friend.
----
%% Please do not change or remove without starting a new thread.
[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/primer_film_3810.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:What if it actually works?]]
->''"Look, everything we're putting into that box becomes ungrounded, and I don't mean grounded like to the earth, I mean, not tethered. I mean, we're blocking whatever keeps it moving forward, and so they flip-flop."''
-->--'''Abe'''
''Primer'' is a 2004 independent film, written and directed by Shane Carruth. It was made on [[NoBudget a minuscule budget]]: $7,000, most of which went towards buying film stock. The film is a character-driven drama about two engineers who unexpectedly create a TimeMachine, and an examination of how TimeTravel (and the power it confers) affects them and their friendship.
It is also quite possibly the single {{geek}}iest film ever made; one that brings TechnoBabble to a new art form.
The film opens with two engineers and entrepreneurs, Abe and Aaron, building electronics in Aaron's garage. After achieving some success with their latest project -- a room temperature superconductor -- they discover it has an unexpected side-effect: creating time loops. Everything they place inside the Box runs back and forth through time for roughly 1300 iterations.
By scaling up the Box, they're able to use it as a means to travel into the past. It has its limitations: They can only travel back to the time the Box was turned on, no sooner or later; and they have to take TheSlowPath: to go back in time two hours, they have to sit in the box for two hours. Even so, they figure out how to use time travel to make a nice profit off the stock market.
Then something goes wrong. And that's when things get [[TheEndingChangesEverything really confusing]]. The ''plot itself'' is non-linear. Several crucial events are neither shown nor described, just ''{{implied}}''. Another challenge to following events is the frequent use of dense TechnoBabble.
!!! Some helpful, spoilerific, graphs:
* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Time_Travel_Method-2.svg A graphical representation of how time travel in the Box works.]]
* [[http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/PrimerTimeline.gif Abe and Aaron's paths through time.]]
* [[http://unrealitymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/primer-chart.jpg The timeline(s) of the entire film.]]
Yes, this is a movie that requires graphs to get a handle on.
%% General explanations of the subtle intricacies of time travel don't belong on this page.
%% Things which directly appear in the movie itself go here.
----
!!This film provides examples of:
* AnachronicOrder: Maybe! It's difficult to tell when a linear plot would be going back and forth in time as well.
* ChekhovsGun: [[spoiler: Aaron's headphones.]];[[spoiler: Rats in the attic.]]
* CloneDegeneration: WordOfGod for states that [[spoiler:doubles created via TimeTravel are imperfect copies. This is the reason for Aaron and Abe's earbleeds and the degradation of their handwriting when they begin altering their past.]]
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Platz is hinted to be one. At first, it seems like he's just your typical BadBoss but a bit of dialog earlier in the movie refers to an event that happened "last year" and one of the characters saying he knew someone with a legal background that knew about "cases like ours." Suggesting Platz took an intellectual property invented by the company (probably claiming that it was developed on company time with company resources, which is often covered in employment contracts.)
* DeadlyNosebleed: A symptom of improperly performed time travel. He leaped out of the box late (early from his perspective.)
* HeterosexualLifePartners: Abe and Aaron.
* HomemadeInventions: The time machine.
* HourglassPlot: Aaron starts off as a family man and rather risk-averse (note the scenes where he worries about needing eye protection and warns his wife against using the first batch of ice from the new fridge). Abe starts off unmarried and rather more devil-may-care. Over the course of the film, access to a TimeTravel-powered ResetButton makes Aaron become more aggressive and willing to take risks, and he eventually leaves his family. Abe, on the other hand, becomes increasingly worried about the side-effects of time travel and oddly protective of Aaron's family.
* IncestuousCasting: The married couples are played by brother and sister.
* LimitedWardrobe: Abe and Aaron's work clothes might as well be uniforms. At one point, Abe is shown sleeping in them.
* MisappliedPhlebotinum: Abe and Aaron could have made money in a number of ways more efficiently than playing the stock market, though the movie shows that they go about it this way because they're trying to be as careful as possible about the impact they have on causality, as they don't know which rules apply to their type of time travel, and they're trying to hide their invention's existence until they fully understand it.
* NarratorAllAlong: [[spoiler:Hooded Aaron's]] phone message.
* NightmareFuel: The neurological effects of time travel.
--> Abe: ''Why can't we write like normal people?!''
--> Aaron: ''I don't know. I can see the letters - I know what they should look like, I just can't get my hand to make them easily.''
* NoEnding: We don't know whether Abe's plan succeeds, what Hooded Aaron is doing, or what Aaron Three is doing.
* {{Prelap}}: An ice machine is triggered on a refrigerator, but the sound is a piece of construction equipment from the next shot.
* ResetButton: Various characters have back up boxes going from the beginning of the story in case something goes wrong, when they start folding up more boxes and bringing them back in the fail safe one, that when things get ''more'' confusing.
* SdrawkcabName: Abe Terger comes to regret his work at Emiba which leads to a ''mise en abyme.''
* SecondHandStorytelling: Half the reason the film is so {{mind screw}}y is because several key events are described rather than shown -- and the characters doing the describing would rather be laconic than descriptive.
* SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong: The plot involves [[spoiler: Aaron going back in time twice to save Abe's girlfriend, Rachel, from her psychotic ex-boyfriend. Thomas Granger, Rachel's father, is believed to have come back for similar reasons, but we never find out exactly what his motives were.]]
* ShownTheirWork: Anyone without significant knowledge of university-level physics won't be able to understand a single line of dialogue for at least the first ten minutes of the film.
** They researched what would happen if you had [[spoiler:two copies of the same cellphone. Turns out, some networks just look for the first one, and others ring both.]]
* SpannerInTheWorks: [[spoiler:Granger's surprise time trip (given the place and time he shows up, he's probably there to prevent a disaster resulting from the punch-Platts experiment). Abe tries to fix the Granger problem two different ways, once with one of the Thursday 5:00pm boxes (we see him running to get into place behind the house before the other Abe leaves the car), and then with his fail-safe box. The former trip left him with a quantum entanglement with Granger, since he had a 50/50 chance of using the same box Granger did -- thus Granger lost consciousness whenever he got too close to Abe).]]
* TheSlowPath: To go back two hours, you have to sit in the box for two hours.
* TechnoBabble: In the absence of any solid RealLife physics supporting time travel, their hypothesizing about the technicalities can't be anything else. However, the language of mathematics and engineering has been leveraged to maximize plausibility. Within the framework of the film a lot of work has been done to keep things consistent.
* TimeIsDangerous: Excessive time travel causes strange physical problems in the protagonists: mysterious bleeding from their ears and deterioration of their handwriting. WordOfGod is that this is also a case of CloneDegeneration.
* TimeMachine: Closest it comes is to a {{Terminator}}-type, but it's really in a category all its own.
* TimeTravel: The central premise.
* TimeTravelForFunAndProfit: Abe and Aaron never got around to publicizing their time machine, because [[spoiler:they were too busy using hourly time travel to make money day-trading stocks.]]
* TimeTravelTenseTrouble: Provides the top quote for the page.
** Also: "Man, are you hungry? I haven't eaten since later this afternoon." (Aaron)
* TheEndingChangesEverything: The second act of the film involves the use of very limited Time Travel. However, [[spoiler:in the third act Abe learns that his friend Aaron has already used the time machine to change the past. So during the entire aforementioned second act, Aaron had actually been Aaron-from-a-week-in-the-future, manipulating current events for his own ends.]]
* ViewersAreGeniuses: Some viewers find the film hard to follow, mostly because of the complexities of time travel.
* WhamLine: [[spoiler:"I hope you're not implying that any day is unimportant at Cortex Semi." A WhamLine not for the words itself, but for the fact that Aaron says it even though Abe had failed to remember the line that prompted it, revealing that he was reciting the conversation from memory, too.]]. The lines before that also count, such as the fact that [[spoiler: Abe has a secret backup time machine which has been running for most of the movie.]]
* WrongGenreSavvy: Abe comes up with a very thorough plan to avoid causing {{Temporal Paradox}}en, which turns out to be completely unnecessary [[spoiler:(or not, depending on your interpretation of Granger's fate; the idea that he is suffering from temporal paradox -- that the consequence of paradox is that the [[InSovietRussiaTropeMocksYou universe destroys you]], rather than vice versa -- was put forth by Carruth himself, [[DeathOfTheAuthor whatever his opinion's worth]])]]. Still, points for trying.
* XanatosRoulette: Apparently, time travel is a Chessmaster's best friend.
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