Time-travel movies usually involve characters moving backwards or forwards in years so that they can experience a vastly different past or future to their own.
In 57 Seconds, Josh Hutcherson’s Franklin can travel, you guessed it, only 57 seconds into the past. But while you might think he’d be unable to create much chaos by repeating a minute, in a matter of weeks Franklin goes from being a lowly tech blogger to a rich insider at a pharmaceutical company.
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Franklin is able to travel back in time after he thwarts the assassination of visionary tech guru Anton Burrell (Morgan Freeman). Backstage after the incident, Franklin finds a mysterious ring on the floor. When he presses the diamond on the ring it transports him back 57 seconds.
At first, Franklin uses the ring to help him on his date with Jala (Lovie Simone), a girl he met while he was waiting to interview Burrell. After his car gets towed away, the desperately poor Franklin goes to a casino where he’s able to amass thousands of dollars in just a few hours by playing the previous roulette numbers.
But Franklin also has his eyes set firmly on revenge. The reason he was trying to interview Burrell was because he wanted his help in exposing Sig Thorensen (Greg Germann), the evil head of the pharmaceutical company responsible for his twin sister’s drug overdose and subsequent death.
After getting close to his nemesis, Franklin’s ability to predict every detail of the immediate future results in him being brought into Thorensen’s inner circle. Franklin sees this as an opportunity to get not just a minor victory over Thorensen, but to instead bring down his whole company. But the longer Franklin stays with the pharmaceutical executive, the closer he gets to him, and the more he uses the ring, Jala becomes concerned that he’s actually addicted to the power of time travel instead.
There are certainly moments where you can see why such a bevy of talented actors were attracted to 57 Seconds. Whenever Franklin is using the ring, there’s an excitement and intrigue about how he’s going to redo the minute. There’s a goofy cheekiness to Hutcherson that allows viewers to be impressed by the character’s rise, without ever getting annoyed by him, too. Plus the mere presence of Freeman is enough to make any cinephile smile – the veteran screen star could make reading the phone book sound profound.
The problem with 57 Seconds, though, is that it’s so poorly shot and thinly plotted that you’re always aware of just how sub-par the film is. It doesn’t even take 57 seconds to realise that the film does not have the budget, script, or direction from Rusty Cundieff to match its premise.
As 57 Seconds gets going, Hutcherson’s nearly intelligible narration provides pointless exposition in a ham-fisted fashion. It then sporadically returns throughout the story whenever it’s verging on getting too complicated. Meanwhile, the motivations for most of the characters are either non-existent or bizarre, there’s zero suspense at moments where it's required, while you can’t help but laugh at the ridiculous plot developments.
The script’s lack of quality is especially surprising considering that Cundieff co-wrote it with Macon Blair, whose previous films I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore and Hold the Dark gathered strong reviews. The writing is so bad that at times it has more in common with a soap opera than a sci-fi thriller starring two bona-fide Hollywood stars.
All of which builds to a pathetic final action sequence, which is then followed by a predicable and lacklustre plot twist and reveal that immediately renders any lingering goodwill for the film moot.
Thankfully, the film’s stellar cast, its entertaining premise, and its swift hour-and-a-half running time are enough to make sure that 57 Seconds isn’t a complete disaster. But you can’t help but wonder how good it might have been if it had a bigger budget, tighter script and better direction.
Top tips to avoid cyber fraud
Microsoft’s ‘hacker-in-chief’ David Weston, creator of the tech company’s Windows Red Team, advises simple steps to help people avoid falling victim to cyber fraud:
1. Always get the latest operating system on your smartphone or desktop, as it will have the latest innovations. An outdated OS can erode away all investments made in securing your device or system.
2. After installing the latest OS version, keep it patched; this means repairing system vulnerabilities which are discovered after the infrastructure components are released in the market. The vast majority of attacks are based on out of date components – there are missing patches.
3. Multi-factor authentication is required. Move away from passwords as fast as possible, particularly for anything financial. Cybercriminals are targeting money through compromising the users’ identity – his username and password. So, get on the next level of security using fingertips or facial recognition.
4. Move your personal as well as professional data to the cloud, which has advanced threat detection mechanisms and analytics to spot any attempt. Even if you are hit by some ransomware, the chances of restoring the stolen data are higher because everything is backed up.
5. Make the right hardware selection and always refresh it. We are in a time where a number of security improvement processes are reliant on new processors and chip sets that come with embedded security features. Buy a new personal computer with a trusted computing module that has fingerprint or biometric cameras as additional measures of protection.
Skoda Superb Specs
Engine: 2-litre TSI petrol
Power: 190hp
Torque: 320Nm
Price: From Dh147,000
Available: Now
Abandon
Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay
Translated by Arunava Sinha
Tilted Axis Press
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FIXTURES
Thu Mar 15 – West Indies v Afghanistan, UAE v Scotland
Fri Mar 16 – Ireland v Zimbabwe
Sun Mar 18 – Ireland v Scotland
Mon Mar 19 – West Indies v Zimbabwe
Tue Mar 20 – UAE v Afghanistan
Wed Mar 21 – West Indies v Scotland
Thu Mar 22 – UAE v Zimbabwe
Fri Mar 23 – Ireland v Afghanistan
The top two teams qualify for the World Cup
Classification matches
The top-placed side out of Papua New Guinea, Hong Kong or Nepal will be granted one-day international status. UAE and Scotland have already won ODI status, having qualified for the Super Six.
Thu Mar 15 – Netherlands v Hong Kong, PNG v Nepal
Sat Mar 17 – 7th-8th place playoff, 9th-10th place play-off
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
New UK refugee system
- A new “core protection” for refugees moving from permanent to a more basic, temporary protection
- Shortened leave to remain - refugees will receive 30 months instead of five years
- A longer path to settlement with no indefinite settled status until a refugee has spent 20 years in Britain
- To encourage refugees to integrate the government will encourage them to out of the core protection route wherever possible.
- Under core protection there will be no automatic right to family reunion
- Refugees will have a reduced right to public funds
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
The specs
Engine: 2.9-litre, V6 twin-turbo
Transmission: seven-speed PDK dual clutch automatic
Power: 375bhp
Torque: 520Nm
Price: Dh332,800
On sale: now
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
if you go
The flights Fly Dubai, Air Arabia, Emirates, Etihad, and Royal Jordanian all offer direct, three-and-a-half-hour flights from the UAE to the Jordanian capital Amman. Alternatively, from June Fly Dubai will offer a new direct service from Dubai to Aqaba in the south of the country. See the airlines’ respective sites for varying prices or search on reliable price-comparison site Skyscanner.
The trip
Jamie Lafferty was a guest of the Jordan Tourist Board. For more information on adventure tourism in Jordan see Visit Jordan. A number of new and established tour companies offer the chance to go caving, rock-climbing, canyoning, and mountaineering in Jordan. Prices vary depending on how many activities you want to do and how many days you plan to stay in the country. Among the leaders are Terhaal, who offer a two-day canyoning trip from Dh845 per person. If you really want to push your limits, contact the Stronger Team. For a more trek-focused trip, KE Adventure offers an eight-day trip from Dh5,300 per person.
The specs
Engine: 1.5-litre turbo
Power: 181hp
Torque: 230Nm
Transmission: 6-speed automatic
Starting price: Dh79,000
On sale: Now
Coming soon
Torno Subito by Massimo Bottura
When the W Dubai – The Palm hotel opens at the end of this year, one of the highlights will be Massimo Bottura’s new restaurant, Torno Subito, which promises “to take guests on a journey back to 1960s Italy”. It is the three Michelinstarred chef’s first venture in Dubai and should be every bit as ambitious as you would expect from the man whose restaurant in Italy, Osteria Francescana, was crowned number one in this year’s list of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants.
Akira Back Dubai
Another exciting opening at the W Dubai – The Palm hotel is South Korean chef Akira Back’s new restaurant, which will continue to showcase some of the finest Asian food in the world. Back, whose Seoul restaurant, Dosa, won a Michelin star last year, describes his menu as, “an innovative Japanese cuisine prepared with a Korean accent”.
Dinner by Heston Blumenthal
The highly experimental chef, whose dishes are as much about spectacle as taste, opens his first restaurant in Dubai next year. Housed at The Royal Atlantis Resort & Residences, Dinner by Heston Blumenthal will feature contemporary twists on recipes that date back to the 1300s, including goats’ milk cheesecake. Always remember with a Blumenthal dish: nothing is quite as it seems.
Tips for avoiding trouble online
- Do not post incorrect information and beware of fake news
- Do not publish or repost racist or hate speech, yours or anyone else’s
- Do not incite violence and be careful how to phrase what you want to say
- Do not defame anyone. Have a difference of opinion with someone? Don’t attack them on social media
- Do not forget your children and monitor their online activities
'Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower'
Michael Beckley, Cornell Press
Museum of the Future in numbers
- 78 metres is the height of the museum
- 30,000 square metres is its total area
- 17,000 square metres is the length of the stainless steel facade
- 14 kilometres is the length of LED lights used on the facade
- 1,024 individual pieces make up the exterior
- 7 floors in all, with one for administrative offices
- 2,400 diagonally intersecting steel members frame the torus shape
- 100 species of trees and plants dot the gardens
- Dh145 is the price of a ticket
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