Past Tense - Pocket Full Of Important Doodads Part II


I should, the movie did bomb after all.

The film centers on technology developer Michael Jennings (Ben Affleck). He gets the hard jobs; reverse-engineer competitor devices for companies to sell that tech without breaking copyright laws. He excels at his career choice. Part of the trade is corporate secrets, stay - a secret.

This takes place in the near future where technology exist that can erase memories. The perfect solution to keep these quasi-illegal endeavors under wraps.

Memory of what he had pieced together and built is axed, just a fat paycheck remains. Money he uses to play and live large, the playboy lifestyle, not shy about it in the least.



Jennings is approached by billionaire James Rethrick (Aaron Eckhart), an old friend who offers him an eight figure check in exchange for three years of this life working on a covert personal project. Just on the edge of memory erasure.

So much money he could retire. Michael agrees.

Three years later...

No memory, just the knowledge of a ton of money coming to him. Then he is horrified to discover just before the mind wipe he had waived his check. Zero. Squat. Three years for nothing. This is something he would never do. He loves money. What happened to him - why did he turn it down???



Jennings starts to backtrack his moves - which is his skill; clues leads him to the research facility Allcom where he meets Dr. Rachel Porter (Uma Thurman), a bio-scientist at the firm... his girlfriend when he worked at the company. Soon his world comes crashing down.

Michael is frame for something he has zero knowledge of - treason and the murder of physicist William Dekker (Serge Houde). His pursuer are times two; the FBI wants him as does Rethrick who fears Jennings will reverse-engineer his memories.

The only clues Michael has are various random objects that were given back to him once the task was completed

What was so terrible that he built/figured it out for Mr. Rethrick?

He uncovered the future.

Michael Jennings built an optical time machine based on the futures of the person operating the machine; those things that will be seen.

The person who controls that device will control the world; know the stock market in advance, political conflicts, world affairs and global weather. Think CoronaVirus; you knew about it months ahead and took steps to be there when it happen to profit from it. Having a surplus of specialty mask and gloves - going for the highest bidder and knowing how much to have, not getting sold out.



Jennings' only help is Porter who is now also a target. The solution is in those objects. What makes them so special to be singled out?

This is at its heart, a detective movie with a sci-fi spin - outthink the future. Because at a later date, Rethrick will cause a nuclear war because of political discord he brought about. All because of that visionary contraption.

It's a solid flick, entertaining. Too bad it failed to find its audience. And sadly had gotten lost among the home video potpourri. Each week getting a bit more buried under newer titles. Do check it out.

The movie reminds me of a so-called real temporal device. Yes.

An alleged gadget that could view into the past - just like watching a television broadcast. Huh? Yup, this is a rabbit hole.

The "ChronoVisor" was a quantum access machine. Physicist, Father Pellegrino Ernetti from the Vatican created visual time machine in the 1960s. Claimed he could tune in past events. Like how telescopes work. The night sky you're seeing is not real time.

You have a distant star, that you're looking at. That star is some 500 light-years away. What you're seeing - with your telescope is how that star looked five hundred years ago. NOT the current moment. You are viewing the past. That makes telescopes, visual time machines, but you have zero control over what moment you're viewing.

Father Ernetti took that concept into overdrive with his machine. He claimed he and his team saw the crucifixion of Christ, even took a snap of the event. The betrayal of Judas. Saw Napoleon. Witnessed a speech by Roman philosopher Cicero. And watched Roman poet Quintus Ennius' play, "Thyestes" as it happened.

It was purported that rocket scientist Wernher von Braun was part of the team. The story goes that the Vatican pulled the plug and had Ernetti recant his claim since they feared the tech would be abused.

Was it BS? Father Pellegrino Ernetti was a published author and an intellectual. Why would he lie about something so bizarre?

There have been efforts to uncover that device - if it existed at all.

The principle was based on electromagnetic radiance. All things radiate, broadcast as it were. This mechanism could focus on that radiance and transfer that data into moving pictures with audio.

Deeper into that rabbit hole you get conspiracy - that the Vatican didn't end it, but rather subcontracted the tech to the CIA in the '60s. The machine could see the future too. Some thinking that "Project Looking Glass" is related to the contraption; another rabbit hole that invoves recovered alien tech mixed in. Gets really bizarre the more you look into it.

- - -



This something I'm still fuzzy on.

Is Uma Thurman attractive?

There are times when I would say, she's hot. But a lot of the time - she's... a plain jane. I know I'm not the only one thinking this. Her appeal is very much a roller coaster. Hot then not.

And there you go folks. Come back here on June 4th, 2020 for another brand new entry! You get a killer of serial killers. Did I spill the beans?



Yup, director John Woo isn't into the exchange. We've all been there. So many Thanksgivings, so many. See you then.