Time Addicts (Monsterfest 2023) ★★½

AUSTRALIAN cinema does dumb criminals pretty well.

One of the best is the 2003 release Getting Square which features an hilarious turn from David Wenham.

Writer/director San Odlum’s Time Addicts doesn’t reach the same heights but is still fairly entertaining considering its low-budget aesthetic.

Denise and Johnny are friends who also happen to be drug addicts who owe money to their threatening neighbourhood dealer.

In order to pay off the debt they agree to break into a home and steal a bag from a man squatting there. They have no idea who he is or what the bag contains.

Part way through the crime the pair decide to partake of some product which has the bizarre impact of sending them back in time to 1995.

It’s a mish-mash of broad comedy and supernatural horror with a Back to the Future theme that doesn’t always hang together.

Some of the time you have absolutely no idea what’s going on but then a line like ‘You’re about as useful as a kindergarten in the Vatican’ gets a run and you’re back with it.

The cast have a lot of fun and I suspect Odlum may have a better film for us in the future.