As a teenager, David Rice (Hayden Christensen) lives with his father, William Rice. David’s mother, played by Diane Lane, left when he was five years old, unexplained. One day David discovers that he has an enormous power, the ability to teleport anywhere in the world. David discovers this one day after school when he falls through the ice on the river, and suddenly finds himself in the library, soaked. After several more experiences like this, David finally realizes what’s happening to him, and decides to leave his dysfunctional home.

There are some limitations to his power; he must see the place that he is going to teleport to. After leaving, he goes to New York City and robs a bank. This becomes his way to get money as he grows up. Eventually, he settles down in an apartment in New York where he sleeps and keeps his hoard of money from different countries. However, he spends little time there because he spends his time travelling the world for his pleasure. Everything seems to be going well for David until one day a man, Roland Cox (played by Samuel L. Jackson), shows up in his apartment, threatening him. With the help of a fellow jumper, David learns that the man is the head Paladin. A Paladin is someone that hunts ‘Jumpers’, they are very religious and believe that only God should have the power to be everywhere at one time. The plot then falls into a cat-and-mouse game in which David and his friend must outsmart the Paladins.

The development of the movie began in November 2005 when New Regency Productions hired director Doug Liman to adapt the science fiction novel, of the same name, by Steven Gould, into a film. Screenwriter Jim Uhls was also included in helping to adapt this idea for the screen. Main photography was scheduled to take place in Tokyo, Rome, Toronto, and New York City. To be able to film in the Rome Film Colosseum is a very rare opportunity, but director Liman made a very big negotiation to film there for three days. Christensen was not originally written for the role, but he got a big break when two weeks before the shooting started, the crew decided to give him the lead role because they were concerned with their immediate actor not fitting in with the young cast.

Rachel Bilson co-stars with Christensen, bringing romance to the film. Filming started in September, and though most of the movie is set in foreign countries, all ‘in building’ scenes were filmed in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. It took a long time to complete the filming of the movie because of the different locations.

The movie received generally negative reviews from critics (public and experts), at accusation of being a cliché super-hero movie. The website RottenTomatoes.com has given this film a disappointing 16%. Rotten Tomatoes is a website that gathers all the reviews is can find on a movie, and on the basis of 100, gives it s percent review.