Tiempo muerto (Dead Time), the Argentine-Colombian co-production written and directed by Víctor Postiglione, tells the story of Franco (Guillermo Pfening), a man in his thirties who is shattered into pieces when his loving wife, Julia (María Nela Sinisterra), dies in a car accident. The idea of not seeing her again is too overwhelming and so he feels his life has no meaning anymore. Desperate, he is drawn into the power of an urban legend which says that a strange man has the power to make you travel back in time so that you get to have one last moment with your loved one. Such phenomenon is called tiempo muerto (dead time).
Sooner than later, Franco meets the mysterious man in question and embarks himself into this time warp experience. Before doing so, he is told not to try to modify the past at any cost. But how is he supposed to accept that when he realizes he can bring her back from the dead?
While not original, the overall premise of Tiempo muerto could be good enough to deliver a merely average feature. Thing is that considering you’ve seen this kind of stuff before, then its execution is what really matters — as is the case with all films who rely strictly on a safe formula. Within the conventions, a sense of suspense and a minimum degree of unpredictability are mandatory. And characters that can be described with more than two or three words are also a must; or at least performances that can turn sketched figures into something more gripping. Remember this is also meant to be a drama. Too bad you won’t find much of any of these things in Postiglione’s film.
Consider there’s not much here other than the twists and turns of the plot itself and if too early in the film you can already guess all that there’s yet to come, then boredom is bound to take over. And suspense doesn’t mean to resort to intendedly tense incidental music in an obvious and repetitive manner. A dose of fair surprises is also necessary, which you don’t have here. So in the end what you watch is too much dead time even if things do happen. Call it a paradox of time travelling...
Technical credits are fine, mostly the cinematography — both in terms of composition and lighting. Aesthetically speaking, the visuals for the past aren’t exactly alluring, but they are not a mess either. Even with these achievements, Tiempo muerto falls below average for this subgenre.
production notes
Tiempo muerto (Argentina / Colombia 2016) Written and directed by Víctor Postiglione. With Guillermo Pfening, María Nela Sinisterra, Luis Luque, María Eugenia Arboleda, Claudio Cataño, Consuelo Luzardo. Produced by Mauricio Brunetti, Nastassja Bischitz, Deisy Marroquin. Running time: 102 minutes.
