2) Safety Not Guaranteed
Safety Not Guaranteed was one of the surprise hits of last year, garnering indy circuit awards and being quite well received in the on-demand market lately. It also landed Colin Trevorrow enough credibility to land some big gigs. The movie itself is knowingly odd, taking a somewhat straightforward premise and stretching it to its extremes, yet never losing a certain optimism and humor so as to keep us enjoying ourselves as much as it keeps us on our toes. A tremendously underrated performance by Mark Duplass bears a lot of responsibility for how well his character turned out, and the story really seems to hinge on his believability, and receives an additional boost from his enormous likeability.
But can you imagine reading about it before seeing it? I was fortunate enough to know basically nothing going into it, but had I known anything that was about to come I might have opted for something else instead. It has to do with a magazine intern following a bizarre wanted ad in a local newspaper in hopes that it turns into a story; the ad in question describes a search for a partner to travel in time with. And when the intern investigates, she develops a weird relationship with the guy and maybe believes in his theories about time travel.
Probably the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. But it works so beautifully that you don’t even seem to realize how bad it’s going to sound when you describe it to people afterwards.
