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The Movie:  While "Clockstoppers" won't win any awards, I'm surprised that it was essentially overlooked when released into theaters earlier this year. A fine, entertaining adventure for tweeners (kids who consider themselves too old for cartoons and are too young for older, PG-13/R-rated fare), the film has some instances of clever dialogue and impressive visual effects. "Clockstoppers" stars Jesse Bradford as Zak Gibbs, an intelligent teen who, in one of the funnier (and more realistic) moments in the film, finds out that, thanks to selling antiques on Ebay, he's made enough to put a down payment on the car he wanted. Although the car's the goal, all that Zak really wants is to hang out with his father, who's spending all his time talking to a former student named Dr. Earl Doppler (French Stewart), who's perfecting a watch that can speed up a person to the point where everyone else seems to be standing still. The only flaw: staying in hypertime speeds up the aging process. Zak manages to get a hold of the watch, impressing the foreign exchange student, Francesca (Paula Garces), who he has a crush on. Unfortunately, he also attracts the attention of Henry Gates (Michael Biehn), a government agent who wants to rule the world with the power of the watch and will do anything to get it. "Clockstoppers" is produced by Nickelodeon pictures and comes with a PG rating; the picture is essentially harmless kids fare that provides safe family viewing, but enough of an edge and energy that many kids will still find it involving. The hypertime effect is used several times throughout the picture and, quite honestly, I'd guess that a fair chunk of the budget went into this aspect. Several scenes where it's used, including one with a sink-spray, are frankly pretty amazing. Still, there were some areas where the picture was flawed. Although I admittedly wasn't too concerned, given the fact that this was a kids' FX adventure, there were certainly some holes in the plot, most of which the movie tries to speed past. The plot element of Zak attempting to spend more time with his father is brought up within the first part of the picture, then is essentially forgotten about afterwards, especially once the romantic angle with the Francesca character is thrown in. As for the romance, the two actually do have nice chemistry, but their relationship certainly isn't the main concern of the PG-rated film. As for the performances, Garces and Bradford are too old to be playing teenagers, but both seem to be having a fine time with their characters, although neither of which are terribly well-developed. Essentially wasted is French Stewart, the often-hilarious actor from "Third Rock from the Sun", who doesn't do as well here in a half-serious performance. Robin Thomas and Julia Sweeney also find themselves with minor roles as Zak's parents. "Clockstoppers" should be enjoyed most by its target audience. Personally, I liked the opening half better than the second half, which started to quickly turn into a series of fairly familiar action scenes. While experienced sci-fi director Jonathan Frakes ("Star Trek: First Contact" and some of the "Next Generation" series) has done a fine job, I sensed a better and more consistently inventive movie could have been made had Rob Hedden, J. David Stern and David N. Weiss been improved. The DVD  VIDEO: "Clockstoppers" is presented by Paramount in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen. Although there were a few minor faults with this transfer, I found very little to be concerned with overall. Sharpness and detail remained strong throughout; although the picture didn't seem to offer noteworthy depth to the image, fine detail was enjoyably presented. In terms of problems, there were a few small instances of edge enhancement, but they didn't cause any considerable distraction. The print used seemed very pleasantly crisp and clean, with no specks or marks seen. Pixelation was also absent from the proceedings. The film's vivid color palette was well-reproduced on this DVD edition, as they looked nicely saturated and bright, with no smearing. Black level looked solid, while flesh tones remained accurate.  SOUND: "Clockstoppers" is presented by Paramount in Dolby Digital 5.1. Most of the film is a fairly front-heavy audio production, aside from the wall-to-wall top-20 soundtrack and the occasional sound effects during the hypertime sequences. While surrounds weren't used that often, I did enjoy the few instances where they were put into more noticable use. Audio quality was quite good throughout, as the music remained crisp and punchy, while dialogue remained clear. MENUS: Basic, non-animated main & sub-menus. EXTRAS: A 10-minute "making of", music videos by Lil' J ("It's the Weekend") and Smashmouth ("Holiday in My Head"), four promotional spots and the theatrical trailer.  Final Thoughts: Plot holes and somewhat inconsistent quality aside, I liked the performances in "Clockstoppers" and thought much of it was fairly entertaining. Paramount's DVD edition provides very good audio/video quality, along with a couple of supplements. Fans of the film might want to consider a purchase of the DVD, while those who haven't seen it and are interested should certainly check it out as a rental. 
Film Grade The Film ** 1/2 DVD Grades Video 92/A Audio: 89/B+ Extras: 73/C Menus: 70/C- |