Movie Review: 'Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes' is So Much Fun

Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes is one of the most fun movies I have seen recently. This delightfully oddball science fiction comedy from Japan has a brilliantly odd premise, lovable characters and a wildly inventive spirit that permeates each of its delightfully short 70 minute runtime. Directed by Junta Yamaguchi, who also acted as his own cinematographer and editor, Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes isn’t merely entertaining, it’s a marvel of film technique, especially in the incredible editing.

Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes stars Kazunari Tosa as Kato, the owner of a small cafe in Japan. One night after closing, Kato returns to his apartment, upstairs from the café, and has a bizarre encounter. While searching for a lost guitar pick, Kato gets a message from himself from two minutes in the future. He explains to himself how to find the pick and then tells himself to run down to the café so that he can send this same message to himself two minutes later. Kato listens to himself and a loop begins where everything Kato does repeats two minutes later.

Each loop leads to the next and changes with the arrival of one of Kato’s many friends including his café worker, Aya (Riko Fujitani), his best friend Komiya (Gota Ishida), and two more friends that Komiya invites into the loop, Ozawa (Yoshifumi Sakai) and Tanabe (Masahi Suwa). It is Ozawa who theorizes that if they take Kato’s computer from his apartment and put it in front of the monitor in the café that they can create infinite loops that will allow them to see further than 2 minutes into the future.

I am truly not doing justice to how entertaining these repeated loops are. This cast is having an absolute ball coming up with little bits to do in each loop and how they might benefit from seeing 6 or 8 minutes into the future. Even more exciting is watching to see how director Junta Yamaguchi is keeping all of this craziness straight. It’s fair to say that Yamaguchi is playing fast and loose with this premise but it is nevertheless entertaining watching it all come together. Are there cheats? Perhaps, but I was so delighted that I really didn’t care if EVERY aspect met the strict rules that the movie set for itself.

Not only is editing an exciting high wire act of continuity, the cinematography is equally impressive. The film has the feel of a movie captured one single take with the handheld camera constantly on the move with the characters. The constantly moving camerawork adds wonderfully to the zany energy of Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes. There are really only two locations in the movie, the Café and Kato’s apartment and yet the story never feels confined, it feels nearly as infinite as the time loop between Kato’s computer and the monitor in the café.

The theoretical constructs built into Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes are so much fun. I could not fully keep up with how they came up with the idea to create the time loop and the science behind any of this but the lively energy of the movie and the excitement of the cast was more than enough to keep engaged in trying to understand and keep up with the loopy constructs at play in the story. A movie with this much goodwill can bend the rules a little and still work and I have nothing but goodwill for Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes.

Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes is wildly fun. The characters are a delight, the premise is clever, and the filmmaking techniques on display are extraordinary. That Junta Yamaguchi pulled this off on a skinny budget while acting as his own cinematographer and editor makes me appreciate the movie even more. Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes is available now for streaming rental everywhere and I urge everyone to see it.