25 Cult Movies You Must See Before You Die
1. Primer
Shane Carruth is an genius. A former engineer who just up and quit one day to become a filmmaker, the one-man crew wrote, directed, starred in, produced, scored and probably did the catering for Primer which, if you've already heard of it, will almost certainly have been described as “the realistic time travel movie.”
“Realistic” obviously comes with a healthy pinch of salt when talking about time travel, but Carruth's quantum mechanic-riffing approach certainly scans. If you know what anybody's talking about, anyway, which you might not. Primer is a film that demands repeat viewings, both because it's brilliant, and also because it takes that many watches to understand.
Carruth and his IT buddies work on an invention in his garage, which soon becomes a way to travel back in time a day to manipulate the stock market and get rich. Then they start manipulating each other, sending back doubles to confuse the timeline, and everybody's head starts to hurt. In a good way! In the best way, in fact.
Endlessly inventive, well acted, with an ambient score and an oppressive, dazed atmosphere, Primer is one of the smartest, best-made sci-fi films of all time. And yet, barely anybody has seen it. Sort it out.