Movie Review - 'Chaos Theory'

Chaos Theory

Starring Ryan Reynolds, Emily Mortimer, and Stuart Townsend
Directed by Marcos Siega
Rated PG-13

Ryan Reynolds is at the top of his game in Chaos Theory, a circling-the-drain comedy about a man who is so organized that one little variation on his routine alters everything in his life. What’s most impressive about Reynolds here is the realization that the top of his game is a lot higher than we thought.Frank Allen (Reynolds) is an efficiency expert who has spent an inefficient amount of time during his life writing choices and goals on index cards. The cards have led him here, to that fateful morning. On that fateful morning, Frank’s wife (Emily Mortimer) has moved the clocks ten minutes back. She meant to move them forward, to prove to Frank that he’s a slave of whatever the watch hands read.

Of course, he really becomes a slave when it dawns on him that his wife has now made him ten minutes late for the most important speaking engagement of his professional life.

And it’s all downhill from there. Frank blows the speech, is propositioned by a woman in the hotel bar, is stuck driving a pregnant woman he doesn’t know to the hospital as she’s going into labor, and becomes a victim of an extreme case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, precisely what he’s spent the previous 30-odd years trying to avoid.

As a result, Frank becomes “free” in his own mind. He still writes down every possible choice on an individual index card and picks his next course of action, but now instead of prudent choices, Frank opens himself up to anything in the universe, which leads to him, somewhat regrettably, streaking on the ice at a hockey game.

Reynolds has come an exceedingly long way from his smirking performance as a young Chevy Chase in Van Wilder. There are some hilarious scenes for him in Chaos Theory, but then, in line with the desperation of the character, Reynolds portrays a combination of frustration, confusion and desperation immediately and convincingly.