Okay, I saw a sneak preview of this last night, and IT IS BAD. It reminded me of a made for TV movie. The CGI sucked, and there was very little background music, so I thought maybe they weren't quite done. Then my friend informed me it comes out tomorrow. I'm not surprised I've never seen a trailer other than the one I downloaded. Look for this to be at the theaters for about a week.

I too am intrigued by the premise. I've seen both trailers and am willing to give it a try. I enjoyed "The Core" so, this is right up my alley!

i been waiting too, the premise is cool and the trailer was nice, but i dont know not a good sign being delayed so long

I saw this and the Core, and I would rather watch this movie 10 times than to see the Core once more.

This film is very flawed, but for some strange reason I didn't hate it. I'm not sure why, because the people I was with didn't exactly love it. Honestly, it's not a good film, but I didn't leave with a negative feeling towards the movie. I kinda enjoyed the nonsensical plot, and I enjoyed the 'end of the world' setting that was going on.

The plot really just uses whatever is convenient for it. It makes no sense that I saw this at a November 2004 test screening, so I have no idea how it has changed since then. At least then they had an excuse for incomplete special effects. Sounds like they just never finished them at all.

AICN has two reviews up which pretty much trash the movie: http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=21145

I've said it before and I'll say it again...Peter Hyams movies aren't masterpieces, but hell if I don't like them. The Relic is nothing but an Alien retread, but I love the hell out of it.

Its getting my 8 bucks this weekend.

Haha, I saw it.

Definetely this year's Gigli.

"What's that?"
"An allosaurus blood molecule strand."
"Oh. Cool."

Check out the standing at rottentomatoes -- 4%!!! For context, "Gigli" got 7%, Uwe Boll's "House of the Dead" 6%, and "Battlefield Earth" 4%. I love reading all the horrid quotes on rottentomatoes -- it almost makes me want to see this. Note I said almost. My favorites: "Burns is the kind of actor you hire when a piece of wood is unavailable" and "Our advice: wait until its on the Sci-Fi Channel. Then watch something else".

CNN has an awesome review:

'Sound of Thunder,' smell of garbage

I've said it before and I'll say it again... Peter Hyams is a no talented hack who needs to stay out of Hollywood.

I disagree on Peter Hyams - I really like several of his movies. Outland, 2010 (which, unfortunately, has dated badly due to the demise of the Soviet Union), Timecop, The Relic, End of Days, The Presidio, Sudden Death, Stay Tuned....OK - Stay Tuned wasn't all that good, but it was still very entertaining anyway!

I am very disappointed, though, to read all of the negative comments about A Sound Of Thunder - it's a great concept and has good source material. If they really have screwed it up then that's just pathetic. I hope it's not as bad as some people are making it out to be.

I'll spoiler-tag this one for those who don't know:

Funny how I never saw one piece of marketing on this movie....I guess I now understand why because of everyone's reviews here...Thanks guys! You've saved me a matinee and now a rental...LOL

Paid full price for this one. It was seriously on the level of a Sci-Fi Channel Original movie. The story had premise, the execution was horrible. There was one scene where characters were walking in an obviously CGI environment to the point it looked like they were walking in place. Bad movie.

Damn, I had some high hopes for this one, but it sounds pretty bad.

But thankfully it already had a great interpretation. Does anyone remember that NPR series in the 80's called Bradbury Thirteen, which were half-hour radio plays of 13 of his stories? A Sounds of Thunder was in there, and it was awesome.

I am really starting to get pissed at Peter Hyams... Studios give him lots of resources, that he then always pisses away on awful/mediocre movies. The only flick of his I really dig is Stay Tuned and that's for Ritter... the other one is The Relic...but even that is just an acceptable flick that doesn't hold a candle to it's source material (seriously, the book could make one of the best thrillers of all time...but they dropped the ball).

I love the premise of SOT, and the cast was decent, but the execution was terrible (not to mention the FX that would have even been cringe inducing on Buffy or Angel, let alone on the big screen). I just think this guy keeps getting the greenlight from studios because he is competent enough to FINISH making the movie...don't they realize that just because he can complete a task, doesn't mean the thing he's delivered is any good? As a filmmaker myself who is trying to raise some cash to make a sweet movie, flicks like this just make me really sad... definitely not worth seeing at the theatre, and I'd be hard pressed to recommend watching it on TV....

MATT

"A Sound of Thunder" =


SOME VERY SLIGHT SPOILERS AHEAD.

Man did they screw the pooch on this one. About 45 minutes in I was getting that, "Let's get to the end already!" feeling and that's not good at all. I mean the sfx SUUUUCCKKKEEED!!! It sucked to the point of distraction. The street scenes with actors and cars going by COMPLETELY took me out of the film because they were horribly done. The action scenes looked like a million other action scenes in a million other movies and you could pretty much tell what was going to happen before it happened.

Some of the worst parts for me:

1. The Story and the way it ended
2. The sfx
3. The Time Travel aspect of the movie seemed really dummied down. I've seen movies that handle the different problems that can occur when you mess with time and they handled various paradox problems much better.

4. The Characters were boring lame ass cookie cutter characters:

The Handsome Hero/Rebel Scientist who has disdain for his boss.
The Brilliant Female Scientist who's work was perverted by Corporate Greed.
The Greedy Corporate Guy willing to endanger lives for a buck.
The Girl who's under the protection of the Hero due to some promise made to her dead parent.
All the rest sucked too much to mention.

Anyway, I hate that I didn't enjoy this film. I was actually going to see Transporter 2 but a last second change of mind sent me into this flick. I really wanted to like it but it was just impossible to do. Save your money folks.

On an up note, using my MOVIE WATHER card on this film earned me a FREE PASS plus Popcorn and Soda on my next visit so it wasn't a total loss.

Yeesh, A Sound of Thunder seems like perfect material for the guys at MST3000 to make fun of...

I tried very hard to watch this disc with an open mind. I liked the idea of adapting a classic Ray Bradbury short story of 1952 that had already been adapted in a 1954 issue of EC Comics "Weird Science-Fantasy" magazine. I can't say I like what they've done with it though. The premise of Bradbury's cautionary fable on capitalistic irresponsibility, come to think of it - using a time machine to allow sleazy millionaires to shoot at dinosaurs in the distant past - could only have been possible under the macho, greasy, ecologically-insensitive, politically-incorrect, paranoid, brutish, gung-ho, unidimensional and violent world of McCarthyite America, unless you admit that George W. Bush has lived on to be president until the year 2055, when this story is set. Ray Bradbury's story wasn't so much about the past or the future as it was about 1952 America.


(Al Williamson, 1954: Despite EC Comics' reputation for violence, in this first comic-book adaptation,

(Even though this is an incredibly lame 1977 rip-off, with no time machine and no mention of Ray Bradbury's story, the IMDb still lists A Sound of Thunder as a remake of this dud.)

(Richard Corben, 1980's)

("Ray Bradbury Theater", TV, Episode 24, aired 11 August 1989, http://home.wlv.ac.uk/~in5379/rbt/24...nd_thunder.htm )

(The Simpsons' "Time and Punishment" episode in which Ned Flanders becomes a fascist dictator after Homer fools around with time travel, in "Treehouse of Horror V", aired October 30, 1994)

(the film, 2005)

And time waves don't work... If you change something in the past, the present you return to is already changed, assuming you can return to the present. Why? Because, by definition, time has had all the time in the world to go on as usual and evolve along its merry way. So, in theory, you wouldn't even encounter the city, the boss or the lab you left behind before your trip - if you had goofed in a major way - and that would be the end of the story. In Bradbury's original scenario, only the rules of English spelling had been dumbed-down on the explorers' return and a different, more war-like, right-wing president had been elected (which makes you wonder who might conceivably have stepped on what monumental insect back in the Cretaceous period to explain the last two U.S. presidential elections). The democratic election of a fascist dictator was considered disaster enough in those simpler times...

This story, as well as the memorable spoof of it on one of "The Simpsons" better Halloween specials showed more common sense, all in all, than this film does. But if you accept those two goofy premises, you can have a few minutes of goofy fun also accepting that gorillas have somehow mated with reptiles since the last time you left the office to go hunting in the past.

I sort of liked the primitive aspect of the CGI, which allows us to appreciate really fine work, by way of comparison. I thought the characters' motivation was always trite but crystal-clear, as opposed to, say, a recent hit like King Kong where none of the characters' actions make much sense - except the gorilla's and except as an elaboration on the original 1933 film. I really liked Edward Burns as the even-tempered studmuffin for all seasons in relation with Catherine McCormack's terminal case of PMS. I also liked every second of Ben Kingsley's time on screen as oily manipulator Hatton.

What I didn't like was I also had serious problems with the facial features of Jemima Rooper as the brattish assistant. I mean, aren't there physical or legal limits to the amount of collagen human lips can withstand without doing permanent damage to the jaw? I also didn't care for the choppy editing style which cuts away from CGI scenes in order to save money but also from essential plot-establishing scenes - like a character talking - for no reason at all, all in the middle of a rather slow-moving sequence. And I didn't like the military jungle drums music which makes James Horner sound like Jules Massenet.

But, other than that, it was a fine piece of entertainment.

By the way, here's a new link to the original Bradbury story online - the other one in this thread doesn't seem to work anymore : http://www.is.wayne.edu/mnissani/WWI/thunder.htm .

Let's see...Thunderbirds, Bloodrayne, Sound of Thunder...no that's not thunder, it's the sound of Ben Kingsley trying to flush his career down the toilet.

A Sound of Thunder may not be a great film but it is definitely worth seeing for Ben Kingsley's performance, which is note-perfect all the way.

I disagree. There's nothing for him to do. He doesn't do any amazing acting. He does the required job, and collects a paycheck.

I'm sorry but the corn that surrounds him in this turd is just to much to risk in terms of the time spent watchig this mess.

Watched this last night and it's not that lame. It has it's problems though. Seems that WB didn't have the confidence in the project to greenlight the $$$ necessary to do it proper and those involved made do with what they had. The participation of at least one marketable name(Kingsley) may have been a requirement by WB for a go and his fee was probably the biggest chunk of the budget. Not all the effects were bad. Some, the allosaurus, underwater snake and prehistoric world were bad, while the baboons, giant bats and plants were ok. The sets(time travel complex, subway car) were ok, although some of the city scenes were way to CGI. The poor CGI(in spots, not throughout) not withstanding, I thought the movie was par with recent sci-fi like Deep Blue Sea, Timeline and Paycheck.
There are the standard time travel inconsistencies in the story which most time travel stories have.

I rented due to the trailer which made the movie look decent. Terrible movie the visuals were awful. The cars looked awful. Seemed like there were only 3 different cars in the future they designs were awful too. the looked like garbage trucks. the only good part was the part when they were getting ready to time travel with the guy who was nervous.