GENRE | Judy Greer Fires Into the Past – 'Aporia' x Fantasia 2023

"This machine is a gun that can fire a bullet into the past."

Fantasia International Film Festival

Indie filmmaker Jared Moshé writes and directs an emotional lo-fi sci-fi drama with an impressive reverence for its time-travel adjacent material. Aporia (definition: "an irresolvable contradiction or logical impasse") stars Judy Greer as Sophie, a widowed mother of a teenage daughter (Faithe Herman), still grieving from the devastating loss of her husband Mal (Edi Gathegi) after a drunk driver takes his life.

When Mal's best friend (a soulful Payman Maadi), a brilliant former physicist, tells her he's invented a machine that cannot travel back in time but is able to kill someone in the past, they decide to try it out, murder the driver responsible for Mal's death, and successfully bring him back into the present as if he was never gone. As you might guess, there are plenty of unintended consequences as the trio question the moral and ethical ramifications of their time-altering actions.

What follows is a thoughtful, dramatic rumination on the results of rewriting the past, not remembering the present, and the cost of saving one life at the expense of another. Greer, famously the best friend in countless studio romantic comedies, flexes her emotional range with a grounded, captivating performance that fleshes out the film's weighty narrative.

Moshé questions our collective wishes and regrets about the past through his characters' clear desires. Aporia takes a typical Twilight Zone-esque sci-fi premise and stretches it philosophically without making its ideas too complex on a limited indie film budget. It's also a fascinating take on extending theoretical ideas into our practical world through the process of chain reactions.

Aporia premiered at the 2023 Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal. It will be available through digital and video on demand starting August 11th.


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