IF I could travel back to a point in my own lifetime and change something, it would be just before I was going to watch Dude, Where's My Car? and I would have changed the channel.

Luckily for us, Ashton Kutcher, who was also in the aforementioned "comedy", has decided to play it straight and take on his first serious role, courtesy of The Butterfly Effect.

Charting his life from childhood to the present, Evan (Kutcher) finds that he is prone to black-outs during significant events in his early life.

As he grows up with his friends, including girlfriend Kayleigh (Amy Smart), he learns that he has inherited a condition from his father that gives him the power to travel back to his childhood, fill in the black-outs, and change the past.

It's a bit like an episode of Quantum Leap as Evan travels back to "put right what once went wrong". However, he finds that, when he changes things in his past, it has dramatic consequences on events when he grows up.

Needless to say, he must work out what this gift is and make sure that he changes things to make all his friends happy in the present.

The film moves along fairly fluidly, providing shocks and jumps for the audience by the bucketload. It is a thriller in every sense of the word, made even more remarkable by the fact that Kutcher can carry a lead role without a comedic element. His performance is surprisingly impressive, and the on-screen chemistry between him and Smart is always believable.

This is all assisted by competent supporting actors, including the often under-estimated Eric Stoltz, and getting sucked into the story is less of an effort than you might think.

I thought that taking the step up from comedies such as Just Married to more serious roles would be too much for young Kutcher, but I was proved wrong.

This is probably a film best rented, but it's still a treat. Just sit back, enjoy, and feel the time fly by.