Movie Movie Podcast

Today’s Fake Movie Friday comes along from the desire for hollywood to mine anything into profit no matter how ludicrous it sounds.  So why not take two moderately popular toy-lines from the early 90’s and spruce them up for a new generation of kids who knew jack shit about them, and make them so far from what they originally were that older people like me who remember it, think it’s an abortion.  READY. SET. GO!

Ok so Polly and Max stars AnnaSophia Robb as Polly Pocket and Alexander Ludwig as Mighty Max.  Since these toys never really crossed over, for film purposes Max and Polly are orphaned cousins who were taken in by their eccentric uncle Virgil played by Jim Broadbent.  It’s clear that he is some kind of scientist, but he’s wacky like Doc Brown.  Anyway as they both turn 18 on the same day, Virgil tells them that it’s time they knew the truth about their parents.  They come from a long line of Timekeepers.  Timekeepers are the balance of the world.  Anytime the catch wind that a bad guy is trying to go back in time or forward to change the course of history it was up to the Pocket family to stop them. Unfortunately 5 years ago (flashback sequence), an evil unlike anything they’ve ever seen named Erik Von SlechteMal, played by Jared Harris, defeated them.  He killed them by time jumping (which is ostensibly teleporting) them into a volcano.  Ever since then he’s been making slight changes to our timeline and gathering up an army to take over the world.  The feeling of deja vu you have is the slight changes he’s been making.  Now it is up to Polly and Max to learn how to be Timekeepers and put and end to SlechteMal before it’s too late.

Neither Polly or Max believe this, but they think it’s a cool story.  Anyway at school we see that Polly is an outsider in the way that Bella from Twilight is, and Max is this really popular jock.  They run in different circles at school.  One day after class lets out, Max is supposed to take Polly home, but he meets a really hot girl who asks him out.  He’s enamored with her immediately and before she leaves she asks Max to take her into the bleachers.  He does and soon as that happens, she transforms into a witch-like thing.  Max freaks out and runs away.  The witch chases him and right when she’s about to claw his face, Max timejumps to seconds before he meets the girl in a crowded hallway.  Instead of going with her, he decides not to instead taking Polly home.  He tries to explain to Polly what happened and brings up the Deja Vu.  She vaguely remembers being mad at him, but still doesn’t believe him.

When Polly gets home, this really cute guy calls her or whatever and asks if she can come over to help him study.  Polly has had a crush on him for months so she jumps at the chance.  When she gets to his house the same thing happens to her that happened to Max only this time before she almost gets killed she slows time.  She walks around the guy in a really cool effects shot and then runs home.  She explains that something happened to her to Max and they confront Virgil.  Virgil tells them that they both have different controls of time, but together they have everything they need to stop SlechteMal.  They ask if they can bring back their parents, but unfortunately that would be too convenient for story purposes, so once you die, you fall out of time controls.

In a training montage we see that Max can jump backwards or forward in time by about 24 hours to any location.  He could possibly do more, but that’s the extent of his abilities.  Polly can slow time down to almost frozen and speed time up by about 10 times.  SlechteMal can do  all of this and has trained his army to follow his time demands.  Max being the ever petulant jock says that it doesn’t matter what SlechteMal brings his way cause he’s all state in wrestling and football or some dumb shit.  Virgil has a time tracking device that picks up major time jumps and he figures out that SlechteMal is in SanFrancisco tomorrow, so Max, without Polly jumps to the next day to confront him.  SlechteMal has been expecting him and commands his army to attack.  Max dispatches of most of the army cause he’s now got kung fu skills, but he proves to be no match for SlechteMal.  He gets beaten within an inch of his life and right before the death blow, he time jumps home.  Polly sees how beaten he looks and freezes time around him, but speeds up Max’ time to heal him sooner.  From there they realize that their separate powers can prove to be an advantage over SlechteMal.

At this point SlechteMal has been sending his army back into the past to enslave San Francisco, and soon the world, and while this is happening we see that everything is changing around Polly, Max and Virgil and now SF is a prison-like city.  Virgil is captured by SlechteMal’s minions and tells Polly and Max that no matter what they have to work together to stop this.  They can do it.  Max tells Polly that fighting the army was no problem for him because he could always jump back a minute or two to regain energy and stamina, but SlechteMal is different.  He doesn’t get tired.  At that point Polly has an idea.  She says that once they jump back to SlechteMal they can combine their powers to keep Max rested and tire out SlechteMal.  Max says that’s all well and good, but according to Virgil’s time tracker, Slechte is jumping further ahead to times that Max can’t jump to.  Polly says she has an idea. Max begins concentrating really hard and at that time Polly focuses her powers on speeding him so that he can jump further.  It works, but Max’ energy is depleting and the army is about to attack Polly.  Polly normally averse to fighting slows time on the army by just enough time to make it a fair fight and she takes down the majority of the army in some cool sequences.  SlechteMal says that she is no match for him without her brother and at that moment Max is reenergized and reverses time back to when they first got to SlechteMal’s lair.  Polly at first is upset because it means she has to fight again, but Max explains that they have to work together cause it’s the only way. As the army attacks again, Polly speeds up her own time so that her attacks are stronger, and Max pushes her ahead or behind in time to keep her from getting killed.  While this is going on Max is fighting in Zack Snyder speed up and slow down fashion because Polly is controlling the speed to keep him from getting killed.  They see that with each of them helping the other, SlechteMal begins to get nervous and jumps along with them back to the moment when their parents were all killed.  By showing them that moment without them able to change it, he goes into a long monologue about how they will meet the same fate.  Polly is noticeably upset as is Max and they begin attack SlechteMal separately.  He makes short work of them both.  And right as he is about to kill Polly, Max remembers what Virgil said at some point (it was poignant, don’t worry about it), and he jumps them all back to SlechteMal’s lair.  He says that’s impossible, no one else can jump years at a time other than him, and Polly says that it isn’t. The power they use their powers together, the stronger they become.   In a really cool sequence Polly’s eyes go white and SlechteMal is completely frozen.  Max starts attacking him blow after blow, while moving him further and further back in time erasing all the damage that he’s done. Until they are at that fateful moment where SlechteMal killed their parents.  In this time, they unfreeze him and he pleads with them to stop.  That together they can all be gods, and Polly says “sorry, time’s up” and speeds up to punch him into the volcano.

Time has now been rewritten and Polly and Max’ parents still died, but SlechteMal died along with them.  Virgil tells them that is great as they did, there are always going to be people who come after them, who want them dead, who want to control time.  This is just the beginning.  Polly and Max, say bring it on.  Movie ends.

Credits roll and in a post credits sequence, we see that SlechteMal fell into the volcano, but he’s very weak and has been climbing up the inside of it.  A bunch of volcano backpackers go up to the volcano because they hear sounds, and see him.  They ask him if he’s ok, and he says “never better” and looks at the camera.

SEQUEL!