Tim Timmerman: Our Very Own Ferris Bueller

If Ferris Bueller was set in Utah in the 90s…you’d get something like this.

I had been seeing some ads for the upcoming Tim Timmerman movie and had been curious about it. One reason for that has been that it was a production of Vid Angel studios, whose legal battles to defend movie content streaming have been making recent headlines. I had heard that they are also going into the business of creating quality family entertainment, especially if streaming doesn’t work out. The movie is pretty family friendly with only a few moments that push it to a PG-13 rating, like a couple of teens making out in a car and some depiction of drug use. Utah grade profanity like “fetch” is used liberally throughout.

The director graciously allowed me a special advanced copy of the movie for review.

One of the things that I enjoyed about the movie was that I could tell it was “Made in Utah”, with some familiar faces and locations. Monica Moore Smith and Casey Elliot are two local faces I was happy to see on my screen. On a personal note, much of it was filmed in the first high school I ever taught at, our own Mountain View High School in Orem. They cleverly renamed the high school “Mount Vista” so they could still use all of the places that said “MV” on them.

Another strong point about the movie was its casting. Eddie Perrino plays the titular Tim Timmerman (too many Ts?) carried his role as the quirky leading quite nicely. Another standout was Chelsea Maidhof the other student body president in the movie, who is deaf. Though the actress is not deaf in real life, it was really cool to see them incorporate a person with a disability into the script and portray her in such an empowering, positive light. In many ways, she is everything that the protagonist pretends to be at the beginning of the movie.

The supporting cast is quirky and varied, painting a nostalgic and zany picture of time’s past. It’s weird that the 90s now feels like “the good old days”, but that’s just how it goes.

I love how the movie shows people’s capacity to change and improve themselves.

There was also some great humorous moments in the movie. There’s a great running gag about a game called “assassins” where the main character is running away from a person who supposed to tag him with a pellet gun. Apparently it’s a real thing. The recurring dream sequences with former president Bill Clinton…well, I’ll let you judge that for yourselves.

If there was something I wanted more of, it was to see more of Tim’s family. He alluded to how he had pressure to succeed because he was a “Timmerman”, but you don’t really see much of that portrayed on screen. I wanted his family to be exerting actually pressure on him, but they are almost entirely absent.

Tim Timmerman, Hope of America is out in many Utah theaters this weekend and I encourage you to go out and see it. Not only was it an entertaining ride with a good message, but it’s also awesome to support local talent! I would like to see more projects like this in the future.

Come watch the trailer and find tickets at http://timtimmermanmovie.com/.