“That’s a perfectly good trash can. Don’t be throwing students at it.”

Justin’s rating: Meeker is the new Weasel

Justin’s review: Time travel and time loop movies are a dime a dozen in Hollywood, but much rarer is the time freeze movie. The concept of characters that can stop time — or approximate it — is not seen that often despite the idea being pretty cool and novel. I might remind you of Quicksilver’s famous scenes in the later X-Men movies as proof.

Or we can jump back to 2002 where Nickelodeon and director Jonathan Frakes (Star Trek TNG) where Clockstoppers did the same thing. As an aside, how bizarre is it that early 2000s movies are now two decades old? It’d be like living in 1999 and watching movies from 1979. Doesn’t seem that long ago, but such is the relativity of time.

Zak (Jesse Bradford, Bring It On) is about to get a crash-course education in Einstein’s theory when he becomes the proud owner of a watch that can stop time. Well, it doesn’t do that so much as speed up the user to fast that he or she moves through a world that’s effectively standing still. The actual physics of this wouldn’t bear out this way, but let’s skim right over that to enjoy the general hijinks and corporate espionage.

Initially, Zak uses “hypertime” to impress his new school crush Francesca and mess with a few low-key bullies. But eventually he and his friends have to contend with an evil corporation — where mean Michael Biehn is forcing scientist French Stewart to develop the watch — and save Zak’s father from its clutches.

It’s not going to be that easy — the bad guys have watches too, plus liquid nitrogen guns that freeze any hypertime user. I guess it’s a way to have our teens be menaced without people shooting actual guns at them.

I’d forgotten that Nickelodeon teen movies around this time were pretty much gateway MTV vehicles, and as such, there’s a nonstop soundtrack of then-modern pop hits blasting in any quiet moment (see: Snow Day). It’s so obnoxious here that it threatens to steal attention away from the hypertime effects, which are kind of cool. Seeing water sprays frozen in mid-air or manipulating whole scenes is moderately amusing… for about five minutes.

The problem is that Clockstoppers has no bite to it. It’s going for easy, lazy crowd-pleasing beats without actually trying. This isn’t always the case in kids movies, I must state. Goonies had higher stakes and better characters, Heavyweights had undertones of dark comedy, and Diary of a Wimpy Kid had a much better finger on the pulse of childhood. Here is a flimsy superhero movie populated with stereotypes where there’s one power that’s used in mostly uncreative ways.

There is a vibe about this movie that’s not too hard to place. It wants to be The Matrix — or at least remind people of The Matrix, what with all the bullet time and industrial techno during the action sequences. If I recall correctly, this was kind of common around then, such as in Charlie’s Angels. The ’90s were dying pretty hard at this point.

What else is there to say? Not that much. I showed up for the scifi and was given whipped cream without the hot cocoa, a flaky crust without the filling, and French Stewart without the laughs.

Intermission!

• That’s the fakest of fake beards
• It’s not a 2002-era movie without a Blink 182 song cranked up! And an iMac! And teen girls on landlines!
• Einstein’s theory of highway safety
• That’s a really cool college classroom
• Cute South American girls are good for school attendance
• “I read Cosmo too.”
• Being stuck too long in hypertime can age you
• Raking leaves on a first date
• Girls love it when you bring a possum into their homes
• Breaking the fourth wall by looking at the camera: “This is weird.”
• “With such awesome power comes awesome responsibility!”
• The Star Trek reference
• Oh that frosted eye makeup
• “Sweet dreams Mr. Second Chance Man.”
• The watch is like a gremlin — don’t get it wet
• Hospitals don’t mind when teens mess around with the equipment
• This is the worst cover of “Time After Time” I’ve ever heard
• Defeated by a garbage truck
• Of course this is all going to end in a paintball war