The film Premonition is a lackluster account of adult ennui, with a few cheap tricks thrown in for the benefit of a youth-centered marketing campaign.
In the middle of an ordinary afternoon, Sandra Bullock's Linda Hanson is told of the sudden death of her husband Jim. She picks up her daughters from school, calls her best friend, and lies on the couch to begin her grieving. The next morning, however, she wakes up to a shock: Jim is alive and asleep beside her. Linda soon realizes that she's living the days of an unusually jarring week out of order. Thus armed with a premonition of her husband's death, can Linda save him?
The real question is: does she want to?
Linda has a luscious home, charming kids, a gorgeous mate, and a fun best friend. She's even got four-wheel drive. But, apparently, Linda Hanson's life is empty. She feels more like a roommate than a wife, and when a priest asks her what she would fight for in this world, she can't answer.
So, how does her empty life get full again? The film doesn't really give us an answer.
It spouts mumbo-jumbo about the need for faith and hope, but in the end, Linda seems to be going through the motions just as much as ever before. The movie wants to give us thrills and ask big questions at the same time, and as a result it can't do either.
The suburban ennui that the film seeks to explore saps the action-movie thrills of any energy. Every few minutes, a note that seems to come from a keyboard set to "violin" swells louder and louder, until the shower curtain, etc., is pulled away to reveal ... yet another mundane vignette. Eventually, the soundtrack's swells lead to eye-rolls rather than pounding hearts.
It doesn't help that Linda's situation becomes less thrilling and intense as the movie progresses. Even at her most stressed, she can just call her girlfriend or mother to watch the kids, and take the time to relax with a glass of wine. She is told that no matter her husband's fate, she will be financially secure. And sure, with all this time-travel stuff she acts a little wacky, but with her social safety net and no job to lose, who really cares? She's never in real physical danger, and only once does she lose her cool.
Whose heart would pound for a heroine who calmly strides into a funeral parlor and arranges a funeral, or soothes her best friend by chalking up her husband's death to destiny? This is a somber adult melodrama sloppily edited into a so-called thriller.
Yet as thin as it is, the film manages to be a relatively fun watch. The casual clothes and human-scale house give a refreshing touch of naturalism, as do the vibrant presences Linda's daughters, played by Shyann McClure and Courtney Taylor Burness. Bridgette's little-girl bossy rebelliousness and Megan's funky kicking legs and general ebullience are a joy to watch. The solid casting and the clear, clean cinematography are this movie's strong suits.
Unfortunately, that competence can't make up for the thin characterizations, distracting plot holes, and the momentum's gradual slow-down. Linda's depression is fairly fleshed out, but she remains largely inscrutable and unrelatable. Nia Long brings charisma to her role as Linda's best friend Annie, but she is wasted as a background plot device and clichéd perky sidekick. Jim is a cipher throughout, although happily, Julian McMahon is at least a good bit of eye candy. The supporting adult characters don't have quirks, desires or fears separate from the events of Linda's week from hell. That makes any sub-plots thin at best.
Sadly, the main plot isn't complex or interesting enough to sustain the movie on its own. The worst possible outcome is Jim's death, but because his death is dealt with so early on it doesn't sustain much shock value. Who can really care about Jim, when we've already seen Linda and her daughters start (and finish) healing from the disaster?
Because Linda never experiments with trying to alter either the past or future, it becomes confusing how much she can -- or can't -- change any of her week's events.
The timeline's mechanics are contradictory at best. The plot begins on "Thursday," but the consequences from "Tuesday's" events aren't shown. Also, it's assumed that on "Thursday" Linda didn't know the events of "Tuesday" because she hadn't lived that day yet. But then why doesn't she feel like she's missed time on "Thursday" already? Inconsistencies lead to cheap surprises throughout, but those surprises seem to be at the expense of the attentive audience.
In the end, we are simply watching a bored housewife live through an especially traumatic week, albeit one she's living out of order. Too bad that housewife isn't especially easy to relate to, that her situation is not especially dire, and that the characters around her are not especially compelling.
