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A Thousand Kisses Deep is a 2011 Time Travel thriller starring Jodie Whittaker, Dougray Scott and David Warner.

The film follows 32 year old Mia Selva who witnesses an old woman commit suicide, and investigating her apartment leads her to discover many of her personal items. With aid from kindly caretaker Max she finds herself being taken back across her life where she witnesses her distressing relationship with Ludwig Giroux, an abusive ex-lover, and discovers many secrets she was unaware of.


Tropes:

  • Abusive Parent: Doris is shown to have been a very negligent and emotionally abusive mother, which contributes to Mia’s issues in the present. Her first appearance, set when Mia was 18, heavily implies that she’s aware of this and deeply regrets it, in contrast to her later (but chronologically earlier) appearances where she’s more uncaring.
  • The Ageless: When travelling back to 1989, Max is recognised by Doug, Doris and 10 year old Mia, suggesting he looked exactly the same back then as he does in the present despite the gap of 22 years.
  • All There in the Manual: The behind the scenes feature of the DVD has Whittaker confirm that she’s playing the character of Mia at 32 in the present, 24 when Ludwig leaves her, 20 during her relationship with Ludwig, and 18 when her relationship begins. This establishes that Mia was born in, presumably, 1979.
  • Ambiguous Ending: Mia shoots Ludwig shortly after her birth in 1979, before going to Max and asking him about the old woman who committed suicide. He expresses no knowledge of her and Mia goes to visit her mother’s grave, determined to live her own life. It’s unclear however whether Mia actually killed Ludwig and changed her past, considering how previous attempts imply a Stable Time Loop is at play, or whether learning the truth about her past allowed her to fully move on, which changed her personal future.
  • Ambiguous Situation: How time travel works is never fully explained, resulting in the Ambiguous Ending.
  • Doctor Whomage: Max is a kindly grandfather figure who befriends a young woman and takes her time travelling through a box shaped time machine, and when meeting 10 year old Mia joking states that he’s Really 700 Years Old. Hilariously, David Warner did portray the Doctor years earlier in audio dramas.
  • Henpecked Husband: Doug, Mia’s father, turns out to be this when she encounters her parents in 1989 and discovers her mother having an affair with Ludwig. However it’s subverted to a degree in that while Doug appears to not divorce Doris, he does threaten to shoot Ludwig and does fire the gun.
  • Pet the Dog: When meeting him in 1989, Ludwig offers up his trumpet to some men he owes money to when one shows an interest in Mia. This suggests that at this point in time he was a far nicer man and she offers him money to leave for America. This is subverted however when he’s shown the next day with a new trumpet and has an affair with Doris at Mia’s birthday party, and he’s quickly shown to be a horrible man throughout his entire life.
  • Riddle for the Ages: Who is Max? How does his lift enable him to time travel? If the elderly woman was Mia, why did she commit suicide and how is Mia able to enter her room in 2042?
  • Stable Time Loop: This appears to be how time travel works in this film, though it’s implied that changing the timeline is possible. The film starts with the suicide of an elderly woman, heavily implied to be Mia in 2042, who causes Mia’s time travel journey. Her attempts to alter the past are often prevented and it’s implied that all Mia is doing is creating the events in the first place, or at least her presence results in an In Spite of a Nail outcome. However Max states that Mia removing the letter from the room affected time, and he at first tries to get her to put the letter back to correct the timeline, implying that future Mia’s suicide altered her past. The ending shows Mia shooting Ludwig and potentially killing him, with it being stated that Max has no knowledge of the elderly Mia, but earlier in the film it’s mentioned that Ludwig was once shot which would imply that Mia is in a time loop.
  • Surprise Incest: After time travelling to meet her parents in 1978, Mia discovers that Ludwig is her biological father, with Doris having had an affair with him for years. She's naturally horrified by the discovery.
  • Older Than They Look: In real life, there was a 17 year gap between Whittaker and Scott, the former being 29 and the latter 46 at the time of the film’s release. This film shows Ludwig looking relatively unchanged between 1979 and 2003, implying that he’s at least a few decades older than his actor. This also applies to Mia’s parents Doug and Doris and Ludwig’s wife Stella. The only one to age between the different eras is Buddy, but even then he doesn't look to be that old.
  • Weirdness Censor: When travelling back to the past, no one is able to recognise Mia even though she is played by the same actress as young as 18. It's possible that time travel makes others perceive her to have a different appearance, since when Mia met the elderly woman she was shown to have blonde hair and not resemble Mia that much.

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