I had a great time watching “In Time”, a sci fi movie about a world that uses time as currency. The movie’s release is full of controversy, as famed science fiction writer Harlan Ellison tried to stop the film’s release citing similarities to his short story “Repent, Harlequin!” Said The Ticktockman. Having now seen the movie and read the short story I don’t feel the similarities were extensive, but more on that later.

The premise as seen in the trailer is pretty straightforward, and what an interesting premise this is. The movie replaces money with seconds, minutes, hours even months and years of people’s lives as people trade off time on their life line for goods and services, working themselves to the bone to be able to make it another day. Extremely topical amongst these times of economic strife and worldwide protests, the movie vilifies the “rich” immortals while making us feel the plight of the working class. All this social commentary is wrapped in this interesting sci fi concept which makes for interesting scenes and concepts, like the idea that poor people from the ghetto are always in a rush, while the rich take their time in everything, because what is there to hurry about if you know you’ll probably live another century or two?