In Time 2011

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Writer-director Niccol manages to cover the same ground as the most recent "Spy Kids" movie without tumbling into silliness. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Somewhere Marx quips that capital is immortal even if its possessors are not; this movie's imaginative leap is to conflate the two and build a world where even death, the great leveler in human affairs, can be bought off. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: It's a great idea that Niccol can't translate into a great movie. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: If you can get past the plot holes and the copious time puns, In Time is actually rather brisk, enjoyable entertainment. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: It's an intriguing concept, rather than a compelling story. Before the movie's over, its time is up. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: Not for one moment does Niccol compromise this serious sci-fi world, and yet he hits all the marks for crowd-pleasing mass entertainment: "In Time" never stops moving. Read more

Kathleen Murphy, MSN Movies: Oddly, Niccol doesn't seem to have a clue how to mine dread and anxiety out of that greenly flickering readout of a human lifespan. Read more

Manohla Dargis, New York Times: The tick tick tock of the mortal clock gives the science-fiction thriller "In Time" its slick, sweet premise. Read more

Keith Uhlich, Time Out: 'Ticktock on the clock, but the party don't stop.' So sang that great philosopher of our times Ke$ha, whose words are surely gospel to the ruling classes of Andrew Niccol's innocuous dystopian thriller. Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: Andrew Niccol's "In Time" looks great, sounds stilted and plays like a clever videogame with too many rules. Read more

Scott Bowles, USA Today: Despite a terrific concept that could make for an Inception for 2011, we get Logan's Run meets Robin Hood. And not the good parts. Read more

Tasha Robinson, AV Club: A chilly, stiff movie where clever ideas are delivered as self-righteous sermons. Read more

Kerry Lengel, Arizona Republic: Timberlake, who had a scene-stealing turn as Napster mogul Sean Parker in "The Social Network," is a snooze in this role, not quite as wooden as Keanu Reeves but hardly making a case for himself as an actor. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Andrew Niccol wrote and directed this pitifully titled movie, and one hurdle he fails to clear involves the frustration of watching so many shots of rapidly elapsing days and hours. Read more

Andrea Gronvall, Chicago Reader: Clever and unsettling. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: Frustratingly, Niccol's technique isn't up to his premise. The movie offers roughly 60 minutes of story complication stretched out to 109. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: The film is beautifully shot in chilly blues and grays by cinematographer Roger Deakins, and Los Angeles locales are well chosen for futuristic effect. Most of the time, however, I found myself glancing at the clock on my own wrist. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Is it worth your time? Only if you have time to kill. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Timberlake and Seyfried's relationship is way too thin to make us believe in them as a powerful outlaw couple, and the plot, once you get past the premise, is basically all cliches. Read more

Laremy Legel, Film.com: Nothing more than a clumsily executed preach-a-thon. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter: Unfortunately, as the film moves along, its brisk pace notwithstanding, too many issues come to weigh against it. As cleverly conceived as it is, the time-for-money substitution leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Read more

Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times: If only the ticking clock were more tightly wound; if only more time were used to develop the romance and relationships; if only dying didn't seem so easy. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: The story is derivative, but the details are ingenious. Read more

David Thomson, The New Republic: In Time is so crammed with provocative ideas it begins to feel over-crowded. Read more

Bruce Diones, New Yorker: Niccol's zippy direction, joined to a sleek, rich production design, keeps the movie spinning like a shiny toy. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: A both flawed and fascinating movie, give it this, at the very least: Even at its most far-fetched or thinly plotted, you never feel that "In Time" is wasting a second of yours. Read more

Jeannette Catsoulis, NPR: Niccol, whose excellent 1997 film Gattaca revealed a similar obsession with human genetics, is an above-average filmmaker who may simply lack the daredevil recklessness a project like this requires. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: Sadly, for 99% of its running time, this muddled sci-fi drama is filled with enough overplotting, bad acting and riddle-speak dialogue to stop a clock. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: A dystopian allegory with much on its mind and all of it wrong. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Philip K. Dick for knuckleheads. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: It's a little like Michael Bay's The Island in the way the narrative fails to live up to the promise of its back story. Read more

Richard Roeper, Richard Roeper.com: In Time is filled with sly references and obvious puns, as well as sometimes heavy-handed parallels to class warfare. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: The premise is damnably intriguing. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Pretty cast. Potent premise. Piss-poor execution. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: A movie so consistently flat-footed, with pauses between lines of dialogue so vast, that you begin to wonder if the whole thing might be a psychological experiment of some kind. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Ace cinematographer Roger Deakins makes it all look exciting, but the rob-and-run action sequences are subpar. Read more

Kevin C. Johnson, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Niccol's movie demands a lot of explanation - too much. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: Happily, there are some laughs en route. More happily yet, a few of them are even intentional. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: For all the film's political chutzpah and savvy filtering of contemporary issues through sci-fi allegory, In Time is a pretty dopey movie. Read more

Tom Huddleston, Time Out: Niccol's major problem is timing: action sequences and dialogue scenes lie flat on the screen, while his tendency to play around with pacing means that any tension quickly dissipates. Life's too short. Read more

Linda Barnard, Toronto Star: The concept of the movie dovetails nicely with society's never-ending obsession with youth and our pursuit of ways to find more hours in the day, but somebody forgot to stop at the plot store on the way to the studio. Read more

Peter Debruge, Variety: The premise is rich enough to engage, making it easy to forgive Niccol's indulgences. Read more

Melissa Anderson, Village Voice: In Time owes as much to The Marx-Engels Reader as Bonnie and Clyde. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: All in all, "In Time" is not just stylish but surprisingly substantial. Read more