TIME TRAVELLER is an unusual time travel type movie starring Josh Hartnett, ill at ease in a role which requires him to put on a British accent. The bizarre thing about this is that the present day story is merely a framing device that feels like it gets in the way of the main tale, a typical historical romance set in 18th century India. I think a straight-up historical story would have worked a lot better. As usual, the film suffers from heavy-handed scripting, presenting stereotypical British soldiers plundering their way through the Indian subcontinent and asking us to believe in a fierce warrior-woman who's more than a match for her male counterparts (yeah, right). The director isn't too bad but the story never goes very far, making this a slight effort.

It was in the pre-production for over a decade, before reshuffle and recasting happened with the existing one. It was supposed to be an Indo-Aussie joint production, but later the Belgium production company joined the project. After the several hurdles it managed to get completed. It was an Anglo-Indian historical romance-drama, during the British raj in India about betrayal, coup, revenge and a journey movie. Also simultaneously set in the modern world focusing an archaeological couple who discovers a lost ancient Indian jewel in a shipwreck. From there the story gets a perfect beginning, later moves back to India.

I don't understand what's with the Chinese music where the actual story take place in the 18th century India. It was so good and blends well, but that does define India or Indian culture while narrating its story. If you are not familiar with both Chinese and Indian musics, then it's not an issue at all. But that does not it, the names are Hindu and Indian soldiers with the Persian costumes, swords and other gadgets.

How the name 'Dragon's Throat' came to Indian geographical area and surname for the Indian characters in a wrong princely state. Like that, many stuffs make no sense, especially if you are from that part of the Earth. I think the research was very poor for making this movie. They should have hired an Indian musician and costume designer with an historian.

"Love has many faces, and one of them is jealousy."

The quality was top notch, the cast and their performances were excellent. But I could not stand for Bipasha Basu's facial expressions. She was always been in a sad face look, so depressing. That is the way her character was developed, so nothing wrong in her display. It was her international debut flick as well, and the launch was so disappointing. Because the story was very weak, maybe very silly. I have never seen the narration set in the ancient India other than in the Indian films. Quite amazing locations, and convinced with the visuals that how the 1700s' subcontinent would have looked like.

The major problem with this flick is that people can't get ending. How the time barrier was broken to pass through another timeline was never explained. The Hindu priest/saint/sadhu who blabbers about the space and time was a ridiculous than intellectual briefing. So this film owes lots of explanation to the viewers than entertaining them. I want to favour it, but I also want to be honest. The film was not like I was hoping for, very excited for the merge of historical subject with sci-fi, but did not stand tall. Thankfully, either it was not a bad movie of the year, I've seen even worse that I felt not to review. I won't recommend it, but there's a slim chance that you might like it, so choose it carefully.

5/10

When I saw the cover and description on Netflix I thought this was a movie about a man who travels through time and is kind of two timing by having a lady in each time he travels between.

A little bit into the movie, after the main character ended up in a coma I realized he wasn't traveling in time but may have been dreaming the past (uncertain, the connection between the two times is never fully established). Is it a past life? The rings are supposed to reunite lovers but don't quite seem to live up to the challenge.

Most of the movie is immersed in the past time line, and though there is a lot of cutting back and forth near the end of the film, the future hardly gets any screen time and the only connections between the past and the present are the ring(s) and the main character (or his soul? assuming he doesn't just magically look just like the other guy). I kept watching it waiting for the connection to click and it just doesn't get there.

A lot of people commented in their reviews about not finding out who D.E. was, but I figured it was pretty obvious that it was Dolly Egerton (and her shiny metal purse),but there is no explanation as to how she ended up with the ring(s) (and it looks like she never made it to America). I finished the film kind of wondering what happened at the end. Did the ring magically restore the past version of his soul or pull him back to himself or what? How did Tulaja get it there? Why didn't it reunite her with him? It seems like he didn't need to be in the past for it to work or for Tulaja to be there. The movie was interesting, but the end was all jumbled up an nonsensical.

Also I was a little disappointed in Tulaja's warrior skills. She started off the movie strong, but then she got drugged. And she spends a lot of time away from her queen while traveling. And she was ambushed in the swamp and screams and flees and gets stabbed. And they tossed her stuff while she was escaping and she didn't notice. And they stole her ring while she was sleeping. And she didn't catch them in time. She went from prancing down the face of a building and trying to fight with an arrow in her shoulder to crashing into a bush during her stealthy sneak attack (assuming stealth must have been the reason she ditched the horse and followed them on foot). She seemed much more capable at the beginning.