# Great time travel movies - 10 years later **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 10, 2014, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774 "2014-04-10T02:46:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/41 "2014-04-11T02:39:53Z")
Time travel isn’t usually handled very well, especially the paradox aspects of it. If you’ll allow TV shows as well, here’s a list of interesting ones: 1.) _Demon with a Glass Hand_ Episode of the original **Outer Limits** TV show, written by Harlan Ellison. It’s my all-time favorite episode of a science fiction TV show. Robert Culp stars as Trent, a Time Traveler with missing memories who has been projected back to the present day. He has a computer in the form of one of his hands which tells him things, but is missing three memory modules (three fingers), which it needs to tell him everything. It turns out that he’s been sent because Earth in the future is being invaded by the alien Kyben, who discovered that humans have made the Earth uninhabitable for several centuries, and gone into hiding. The Hand is the only one who knows where they all are – or it would, if it had the other three fingers. The Kyben have them, and have pursued Trent into the past to find out. Wonderfully weird adventure with a solemn twist at the end. 2.) _Soldier_ – another Ellison **Outer Limits** script, based on his 1950s short story of the same name. Michael Ansara plays a soldier from the future, sent back by an accidental confluence of energies, to the present day. Some great ideas, filmed on a low budget. 3.) **The Terminator** – I was blown away by James Cameron’s solo directoral debut, which turned out to be not the shootfest I’d expected, but a well-plotted literate piece of genre-aware science fiction. Yes, he was influenced by Harlan Ellison’s two Outer Limits scripts, but it’s not a rip-off (and you could make a case for more direct lifting from Philip K. Dick’s “Second Variety”). It’s darkly comic, and does a lot on a low budget. 4.) **Terminator 2** – shows what you can do with a LOT more money. It dilutes the purity and impac t of the first Terminator movie, and gets more maudlin at the end, but it’s still a great flick. See the extended cut, if you can, with the cut “head operation” scene that actually adds something to the film. I didn’t care for any of the further, non-Cameron sequels. 4.) **Timescape** (AKA **Grand Tour: Disaster in Time** – interesting and not-well-known film based on Catherine L. Moore’s excellent story _Vintage Season_, but with a much happier ending. 5.) I agree that **Source Code** is an excellent film, but it’s a weird one to try to pigeonhole. It’s sortas kinda time travel, but plays fast and loose with time. 6.) The **Back to the Future** series – some very clever stuff in the films, and cute special effects work. 7.) **Sound of Thunder** – with some reservations. It’s not really great, and it does weird stuff with the Ray Bradbury novel it’s based on, but it’s a kinda fun film from Peter Hyams. One of these days I’d like to see someone film L. Sprague de Camp’s **A Gun for Dinosaur** , his answer to Bradbury’s story. Ones I didn’t like: **Primer The Time Machine** (any bersion. Nobody seems to get what Wells was really saying, or to put it on film) **12 Monkeys** (heresy, I know. I’m not really a big fan of **La Jetee** , either. **Donny Darko Milennium Time Bandits The Time Travelers** – 1960s time-travel flick with a cameo by Forrest J. Ackerman. But not particularly smart. **Beyond the Time Barrier** – low-budget 1960s flick about a pilot who flies faster than not merely the sound barrier, but the Time barrier, and ends up in a post-apocalyptic world. Pretty dumb. **The Man Who Never Was** – Outer Limits Episode starring Martian Landau, who comes back from the future to warn us about its awfulness. Disappointing. Most of the time-travel episodes of **The Twilight Zone** ---
**Author:** ![Accidental\_Martyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/42 "2014-04-11T04:13:07Z")
> [@KarlGauss](#): > > I’ve always been a sucker for [Peggy Sue Got Married](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091738/combined). I’m watching that right now. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Accidental\_Martyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/43 "2014-04-11T04:26:26Z")
_Army of Darkness_ > **[Army of Darkness (1992) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0106308/)** > > Army of Darkness: Directed by Sam Raimi. With Bruce Campbell, Embeth Davidtz, Marcus Gilbert, Ian Abercrombie. A sardonic hardware store clerk is accidentally transported to 1300 A.D., where he must retrieve the Necronomicon and battle an army of the... ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/44 "2014-04-11T04:40:03Z")
I can recommend _The Spirit In Which We Move_, coming to cinemas in 2017. ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/45 "2014-04-11T04:40:44Z")
> [@Cartoonacy](#): > > BTW, **Orr,G.** , can I find _La Jetée_ anywhere online? I haven’t seen that in over 35 years, and I’ve searched for it with no luck. Try Amazon: > **[Amazon.com: La Jetee / Sans Solei (The Criteiron Collection) \[Blu-ray\] : Étienne...](https://www.amazon.com/Jet%C3%A9e-Soleil-Criterion-Collection-Blu-ray/dp/B00687XNZS)** > > One of the most influential, radical science-fiction films ever made and a mind-bending free-form travelogue: La Jetee and Sans Soleil couldn’t seem more different—but they’re the twin pillars of an unparalleled and uncompromising career in cinema. A... Or as an Instant Video: > **[Watch La Jetee | Prime Video](https://www.amazon.com/Jetee-H%C3%A9l%C3%A8ne-Chatelain-Davos-Hanich/dp/B00E7ND9GI)** > > Chris Marker has been challenging moviegoers, philosophers, and himself for years with his complex queries about time, memory, and the rapid advancement of life on this planet. Marker's La Jetée is one of the most influential, radical science-fiction... ---
**Author:** ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/46 "2014-04-11T04:51:29Z")
Obscure 80s Kiwi flick [\*The Navigator \*](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Navigator:_A_Medieval_Odyssey) is weird, but cool: a group of 14th Century villagers escaping the Black Death accidentally tunnel to 20th century New Zealand. More allegory than science fiction, and a touch art-house, but some great performances and lovely visuals. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/47 "2014-04-11T09:06:13Z")
NERD POWERS ACTIVATE! [Returner.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0339579/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_13) Funny Games, 1997 original, [2002 hollywood](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808279/). [Superman 2](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081573/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1), Superman II the Richard Donner Cut. [Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0304141/) [Wikipedia’s list of science fiction time travel films](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_time_travel_science_fiction#Time_travel_in_science_fiction_films) [Wikipedia’s category: time travel films](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Time_travel_films). [/nerd powers] ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 9:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/48 "2014-04-11T09:29:45Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > Funny Games, 1997 original, [2002 hollywood](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808279/). I don’t remember any time travel in Funny Games. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/49 "2014-04-11T09:41:13Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > I don’t remember any time travel in Funny Games. The time travel is the only thing that makes it memorable. The part where the bad guy uses the remote control to rewind time. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/50 "2014-04-11T09:41:57Z")
I can’t believe no one has mentioned _Doctor Who_ (both film and TV series). Speaking of TV series, there’s _Goodnight Sweetheart_. And then there’s _Life on Mars_ and\* Ashes to Ashes\*. ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/51 "2014-04-11T10:00:47Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > The time travel is the only thing that makes it memorable. The part where the bad guy uses the remote control to rewind time. Ha! I do remember that. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/52 "2014-04-11T14:32:40Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > I can’t believe no one has mentioned _Doctor Who_ (both film and TV series). **Cartoonacy** did, in post #22, and I replied about it. Or maybe we traveled back and inserted those posts after you made yours. 😃 > [@Superhal](#): > > [Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0304141/) It _did_ use one of my favorite approaches–that you can change the past, but only to make things turn out exactly the way they already did. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/53 "2014-04-11T15:06:11Z")
[Happy Accidents](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0208196/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_39) [The Philadelphia Experiment](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087910/?ref_=fn_al_tt_3) [Star Trek: First Contact](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117731/?ref_=fn_al_tt_5) (I disagree with the previous poster who said it wasn’t good). [Time Cop](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0111438/) [Hot Tub Time Machine](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1231587/) ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/54 "2014-04-11T15:18:49Z")
> [@Balance](#): > > It _did_ use one of my favorite approaches–that you can change the past, but only to make things turn out exactly the way they already did. That takes all the fun out of time travel though. Why would you travel back in time to give yourself stock tips if you end up poor in the present anyway? The theory I hate the most is the Time Machine theory where something random will happen to force history to the same end result. That makes no sense at all and implies that time has consciousness and willfully makes changes to history. However, Adolf Hitler assassination attempts and Supercollider sabotage does argue that this theory is very likely to be true. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/55 "2014-04-11T15:44:23Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > That takes all the fun out of time travel though. Why would you travel back in time to give yourself stock tips if you end up poor in the present anyway? > > The theory I hate the most is the Time Machine theory where something random will happen to force history to the same end result. That makes no sense at all and implies that time has consciousness and willfully makes changes to history. However, Adolf Hitler assassination attempts and Supercollider sabotage does argue that this theory is very likely to be true. Those are two different things. The scenario I’m talking about is the one in which the timeline has already been altered in your favor–whether you’re aware of it or not–and when you go back in time, you find that you’re making the changes that produced that outcome. So, you would have received a mysterious set of stock market tips that made you wealthy, and only later learn that you sent them to yourself while time-traveling. You have no memory of a timeline in which you were poor. In _PoA_, Harry and Hermione were aware of some of the things that had worked out in their favor, but not all of them, and did not understand how the ones they knew came about. Yet, when they went back, their actions were responsible for the various favorable outcomes, as well as neutral things they observed, but lacked context for. The conservation-by-coincidence model doesn’t appeal to me, either. If the timeline is going to resist alteration, I prefer the model in the _BttF_ movies. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/56 "2014-04-11T15:51:40Z")
My favorite theory is the T2 theory where individual choice can change the future. However, I just realized that this creates a dilemma. If they succeeded in stopping Skynet, Kyle would not have come back in time in T1 to tell Sarah that the future needs changing. I also don’t like Butterfly Effect theory, where small changes in the past can make major changes to the present. ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/57 "2014-04-11T18:16:31Z")
[Frankenstein Unbound](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099612/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1). John Hurt time-travels back to the 19th century and meets the Shelleys and Frankenstein. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/58 "2014-04-11T18:42:58Z")
For entertainment, I just assume the [Many Worlds theory](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation) is true, regardless of my thoughts on the true nature of the universe. If I go back in time and kill my grandfather before he meets my grandmother, all that means is that _I’m on a different Earth_. I don’t recall Steven King’s **11/22/63** being mentioned, but that was a Universe where the law seemed to be to not mess with the big events. I found the ending to be rather disappointing as [spoiler]IMHO, King took the easy way out and left the protagonist with _no choice_ but to go back. By having “ripping sounds” and “scientists say it’s all going to end by 2080” and mystical earthquakes caused by George’s actions, King took out the element of choice on his protagonists part, which really really sucked because it could have ended so differently: How about George comes to in a future in which there was a worse reaction against the Civil Rights movement, to arrive in a Bircher America with concentration camps? Or no need to go that far, just say the Jim Crow laws never died and, in fact, expanded to the north and west. Or say LBJ is elected in 1968 and 1972, leading to a Reagan victory in 1976 and '80: How’s the Vietnam War lasting until the mid 80s sounding? An additional 1 million casualties, a militarism rampant in this country beyond WW1&2 levels, the Soviet Union and/or China keeping things together because of all the arms production, Communism remaining a going concern into the new millennium, etc. Regardless of the _plausible_ scenario, position it that Sadie is doing extremely well, far better than George could have hoped for. Make the choice difficult. Assist the civil rights movement, or JFK and Sadie? Ending Communism or Sadie? Something where the character has to actually weigh the moral balance of letting Kennedy die because the world was arguably better off with him dead. [/spoiler] If the universe being posited doesn’t match up with my assumptions/knowledge/beliefs/theories, I just keep it in mind that the story is still a valuable insight into how those other theories will possibly work out. (I wrote all the above and posted it, only to remember the thread was about movies. Sorry!) ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/59 "2014-04-11T18:58:24Z")
> [@Tangent](#): > > _Timecrimes_ - a Spanish thriller I second this one - it avoids getting all wrapped up in paradoxes and is fairly easy to follow (for a time travel movie), but still has a good payoff. ---
**Author:** ![Accidental\_Martyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774/60 "2014-04-11T19:27:26Z")
I just happened to come across this on TV last night: _Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann_ > **[Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann (1982) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086443/)** > > Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann: Directed by William Dear. With Fred Ward, Belinda Bauer, Peter Coyote, Richard Masur. A maverick motorbike racer wanders into a top-secret time-travel research test site which unintentionally teleports him to... > **[Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timerider:_The_Adventure_of_Lyle_Swann)** > > Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann is a 1982 science fiction Western film directed by William Dear and starring Fred Ward as Lyle Swann, a cross country dirt bike racer in the 1980s who is mistakenly sent back in time to 1877. The film was scored, produced and co-written (with director William Dear) by Michael Nesmith. > Lyle Swann is a well-known dirt bike motorcycle racer who is in the desert competing in the Baja 1000, a multiclass vehicle cross-country race. Swann has a reputation for b... Starring Fred Ward and written by Michael Nesmith of The Monkees. Super cheesy! 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-time-travel-movies-10-years-later/685774.md?page=4)