A Sound of Thunder (2005)

A Sound of Thunder: Directed by Peter Hyams. With Armin Rohde, Heike Makatsch, Jemima Rooper, David Oyelowo. A single mistake in the past, by a time travel company in the future, has devastating and unforeseen consequences.

“I have lived in the Los Angeles area for about a year now. When I can, I enjoy seeing free screenings of movies. As I understand it, these test screenings are done by marketing-research companies at the behest of the movie studios. You watch a movie for free and then you fill out a form explaining what you liked and didnu0026#39;t like about the movie. The company then selects a smaller group of viewers for a Q u0026amp; A focus group.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eSo I saw a free screening of A SOUND OF THUNDER about six months ago. We were told that the special effects were just u0026quot;mock-upsu0026quot; and therefore to not judge those effects too harshly. And we were promised that for the actual release the special effects would look spectacular.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI just watched A SOUND OF THUNDER on its opening Friday and the special effects were EXACTLY the same. They used the mock-ups, the u0026quot;pretend special effects,u0026quot; for the release.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eWhich leaves me to believe that the test screenings got such bad feedback that the studio decided to cut its losses. They didnu0026#39;t advertise this film very much and they didnu0026#39;t spend any REAL money on the special effects.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eOne thing they may have changed was some of the editing. The pace felt a little better than the original free screening. I mean the movie has a lot of problems but it seemed like some small things were cut or at least cut differently.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIu0026#39;m hoping that the DVD will have a commentary track so we can hear the behind-the-scenes story of what really happened. But I doubt the studio will put any bells and whistles on the DVD release.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI agree with everyone else. This is a bad movie (with the exception of Ben Kingsleyu0026#39;s interesting character work). But it was made worse by the studiou0026#39;s lack of commitment and backing.”