Halfway through the Butterfly Effect, a startling thought occurred to me. Is it possible that Aston Kutcher can actually act? I mean we know he can act like a doofus. That 70's Show, Dude, Where's My Car? and Punk'd prove that in spades. We know he can pull hot older women. Weekly tabloid reports of his relationship with Demi Moore prove that. But the question remains, can he actually act?

Kutcher gives a surprisingly good performance in The Butterfly Effect. Too bad it isn't a better movie. Here's the premise. A boy, Evan, inherits his institutionalized father's rare memory loss disease. He suffers from blackouts as a boy and is encouraged to keep journals. Over the course of his childhood and adolescences Evan records some pretty harrowing events in his journal. As a college psych major, he is researching the concept of memory when he realizes that by reading his journals he can go back in time and change the course of events and the lives of his friends (William Lee Scott and Elden Henson) and his childhood sweetheart, Kayleigh (Amy Smart).

 Of course, every time he changes something it creates unexpected and negative consequences in the alternate universe he's created. There are enough holes in the plot to fill several golf courses and it gets a little tedious to have to retread over his childhood traumas again and again.

The ending ends up a little too neatly. I know audiences love a happy ending and the movie gives it to them. But, to me, there is a point about 10 minutes or so before the end, where I think the movie should have ended. It would have been a little more bittersweet, and to me anyway, more fitting.

I came away impressed with Kutcher (who also executive produced the movie) but not with the film itself. If I could go back in time, I'd have left the house 10 minutes earlier and seen Monster instead.