Stars: Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, Cillian Murphy, Vincent Kartheiser, Alex Pettyfer, Olivia Wilde
Running time: 109 mins
Rating: ***

NEW Zealand-born screenwriter and director Andrew Niccol has consistently conjured dark clouds with his dystopian visions of life in the 21st Century and beyond.

Think Gattaca and The Truman Show.

For his latest film, he imagines an emotionally- starved globe in which money has become obsolete and the currency is time.

People are engineered to age until they reach 25 years old, then a timer, embedded in their arm, begins to tick down second by second to their demise. You can earn, steal or inherit more time to extend your life expectancy, leading to a vast divide between the haves and have-nots.

The wealthy are essentially immortal: forever 25 years old in physical appearance, with centuries on their body clocks to squander at leisure. Meanwhile, the poor literally live from one day to the next, unsure if they will be able to claw back enough minutes to see another sunrise.

Justin Timberlake’s Will learns the truth about how the powerful manipulate the populace for their own gain and vows to bring down the corrupt system with the aid of rebellious Amanda Seyfried. At the same time, he’s being hunted down by a time thief (Alex Pettyfer) and timekeeper (Cillian Murphy) who want to recover time given away to Will by a friend.

In Time is a neat concept, stylishly executed, with some well-orchestrated action sequences to paper over a few cracks in Niccol’s logic.

Review: Damon Smith