Time certainly isn’t on the side of the gung-ho hero in Duncan Jones’s fast-paced action thriller. He has just eight minutes to avert disaster and unmask a bomber, who has planted a device on a speeding commuter train bound for Chicago. But there’s a mind-boggling twist: if the hero fails and the bomb detonates, killing everyone on board, the hero can travel back in time to relive the same eight minutes, gathering more evidence to solve the case.

Groundhog Day shakes hands with The Matrix in Jones’s eagerly awaited follow-up to the critically adored Moon. While this new film lacks some of the low-budget ingenuity of the director’s debut, Source Code is nevertheless an adrenaline-pumping thrill ride that plays fast and loose with our notions of space and time.

On reflection, there are aspects of the high-concept plot that do not make sense and some of the digital effects aren’t as slick and polished as you would expect.

But Jones and editor Paul Hirsch don’t pause for breath, maintaining a brisk tempo as the clock ticks down towards doomsday.

Helicopter pilot Captain Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) wakes on a train, sitting opposite Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan). Confusingly, she calls him Sean and it turns out that he is trapped inside the body of a teacher called Sean Fentress.

“Everything’s going to be okay,” says Christina — as the train explodes. Colter wakes almost instantly in a top secret facility under the control of Dr Rutledge (Jeffrey Wright), who needs Colter to identify the bomber.

“I don’t know who bombed the train!” rages Colter.

“Then go back and find out,” sternly replies Rutledge, ordering uniformed officer Colleen Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) to send the pilot back into the ‘source code’, culled from the real Sean Fentress’s memory.

Each time Colter is transported back into the parallel reality, he gathers intelligence about his fellow passengers including businessmen Max Denoff (Russell Peters) and student Derek Frost (Michael Arden), Source Code doesn’t become too bogged down in the science behind the slam bang thrills, and while Colter is destined to repeat the same journey down the line, the iterations are sufficiently different to hold our attention.

Gyllenhaal brings vulnerability to his role, including a heartbreaking scene when he breaks protocol to make an important telephone call. Farmiga is equally impressive.

The romance with Monaghan is a sweet diversion, providing the impetus for a final journey inside the source code.

EB (voiced by Russell Brand) lives on Easter Island with his father (Hugh Laurie) in Hop. The young rabbit is destined to ascend the throne as master of all that is sugary and ovoid but EB harbours dreams of becoming a drummer in a rock band. So he runs away from the warren and heads for Hollywood, where he finds an unexpected ally in eternal loser Fred O’Hare (James Marsden), who glimpsed the Easter Bunny delivering baskets when he was a boy.

Having revealed his true identity to Fred, EB auditions for Hoff Knows Talent in front of judge David Hasselhoff. Meanwhile, Fred struggles to win the approval of his parents (Gary Cole, Elizabeth Perkins), who dote on his goody-two-shoes, adopted sister (Tiffany Espensen). Older sister Sam (Kaley Cuoco) helps Fred achieve his potential.

Hop is a sugar-coated treat for audiences of all ages about the pressures of living up to your parents’ expectations. Brand brings laconic charm to his floppy-eared hero, while Marsden bounds around the screen.