NOTE: This is a RETRO MOVIE REVIEW, originally written and posted on my former blog in 2013, and now re-posted with some slight revisions and added images because I haven't been able to complete anything new this month.
THE TIME TRAVELERS - American International Pictures, 1964, color, 82 min. Directed by Ib Melchior. Screenplay by Ib Melchior & David L. Hewitt. Cinematography by Vilmos Zsigmond. Music by Richard LaSalle. Visual Effects by David L. Hewitt.
CAST:
Merry Anders as Lab Assistant Carol White
Steve Franken as Electrician Danny McKee
Philip Carey as Dr. Steve Connors
Preston Foster as Dr. Erik von Steiner
John Hoyt as Dr. Varno
Joan Woodbury as Dr. Gadra
Dennis Patrick as Councilman Willard
Delores Wells as Reena
Peter Strudwick as The Human-Hybrid-Mutant
Gloria Leslie as a Councilwoman
Mollie Glessing as an Android
Margaret Seldeen as Miss Hollister
Forry Ackerman as a Technician
The Los Angeles Lakers as The Mutants
I'VE WAITED a heckuva long time for this 1964 film to be released on DVD, and thanks to the good folks at Shout Factory that day is finally here. Yay!
Conceived by writer/filmmaker Ib Melchior as a kind of updated version of The Time Machine by H. G. Wells, The Time Travelers is now part of a shared platter with three other Silver Age "B" movies: The Man From Planet X (1951), Beyond the Time Barrier (1960), and The Angry Red Planet (1959). Amazon is selling this DVD product (seen below) under the title MOVIES 4 YOU-SCI-FI CLASSICS for as little as $5, plus shipping.
The Time Travelers (hereafter referred to as TTT), is an absolutely ridiculous but portentous movie that has been a favorite of mine since I first saw it at a Drive-in theater as a kid. The only way to fully explain why I like TTT so much is to reveal some of its many imaginative elements--there's just no other way around it (WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD). The story by itself is probably insufficient as convincing material, although by my low sci-fi standards it's an entertaining one: In 1964, scientists inadvertently create a time portal and then foolishly pass thorough it to become permanently trapped 107 years in the future, in the year 2071. The Earth at that time has become a bombed-out, devastated planet, saturated with radiation and overrun by barbarous, hostile mutants.
While the circumstances of just how our scientists become marooned in the future are laughable, I'd like to point out that in the early stages of their "mishap" laboratory technician Carol White (Merry Anders), and electrician Danny McKee (Steve Franken of "Bewitched" television fame), demonstrate some real hutzpah in the face of pressing danger; White grabs a fire extinguisher and wields it like a weapon against the aforementioned mutants. Alternately, McKee keeps his mutant pursuers at bay by ably throwing rocks at them. That's right--rocks! You certainly don't see that in movies very often.
These actions were surprisingly smart and joyful to watch, especially when just prior to this we were witnessing both characters and their scientist associates, Dr. Erik von Steiner (Preston Foster) and Steve Connors (Philip Carey), commit actual follies--in particular Danny McKee, the root cause of their dire predicament.
Holy McKee! They really are stranded now!
To find out what happens next you will have to watch the movie,
but the course of action our apparently doomed scientists do decide upon
is not all that surprising when you consider what got them stuck in the
future in the first place. I mean, there is a limit on just how clever
this film is. What I can reveal without ruining too much of the fun is
that which helps enliven this slightly grim but always silly pulp-fest
to its near classic sci-fi status.
Consider these components:
• A Time-Portal shaped like a bigscreen TV monitor (already shown above of course, which has since been replicated many times in movies and television).
• Belted Jumpsuits (that look like an adult version of a onesie).
• A Matter-Transfer Chamber.
• Androids.
• An Android Assembly Plant.
• Rock Cutting Lasers.
• A Cosmic Camera.
• Hydroponic Gardens (which produce rapid growth flowers and fruits from seeds in mere seconds).
Pretty impressive, eh?
There is also a marvelous Spa Treatment Room (seen below), where we are get to feast our eyes on some gorgeous women in pure relaxation mode, plus our star, the beautiful Merry
Anders, ray-bathing in the nude. And yes, Anders does put the "beaut" in beautiful, in addition to having the skills to make her character's
female persona refreshingly mature for the time, which was fifteen
years ahead of Sigourney Weaver's prime interpretation of Ripley in Alien.
And lest I forget, there's an amazing psychedelic Music-Machine (seen below) that puts folks in the proper mood for, well, having sex. Ha! According to sweet, sexy Reena (also seen below), it's activated with a mere wave of the hand over the keys, and was developed to help bolster their society's dwindling male population. Ha again!
But that's not all...
There's also a goofy time paradox at the story's
climax, which while completely ridiculous and excruciating to watch, must
be seen to be believed.
All of these fantastic concoctions and
even ones that haven't been mentioned help make The Time Travelers one of the most
inventive, and, dare I say it--important science fiction films of the 1960's.
It's a TRUE BLAST from the SCIENCE FICTION PAST!
TTT's director of photography was Vilmos Zsigmond (1930-). He shot
most of the film's outdoor scenes at the lava beds of Pisgah Crater near
Barstow, California. Some key moments were also filmed on the USC campus
at both Mudd Hall and at the Doheny Library.
Although this was only Zgismond's fourth effort as an actual DP (he would later win a BAFTA Award for shooting The Deer Hunter, an Emmy for the miniseries Stalin, and an Oscar for Close Encounters of the Third Kind),
his camera work proved solid enough, in fact, there's only one jittery
scene in the entire film, an extended POV moment in a chase sequence
that should have been excised. Of course, Zsigmond should not be blamed
for the movie's irksome, speeded-up climax. That ludicrousity was
probably all Melchior's idea. Nevertheless, this film is undoubtedly the
better of Melchior's two directorial efforts, the other being The Angry Red Planet, a cult film in its own right, which has been generously included on this DVD release.
A true renaissance man, Danish born and educated Ib Jorgen Melchior
(1917-2015, seen above in the company of his beloved wife Cleo) was a writer of both
novels and non-fiction books, many of them based on his experiences as a
decorated soldier in World War II, as well as numerous movie scripts,
teleplays and stageplays (he was awarded the Hamlet Award for best playwriting by the Shakespeare Society of America). He was also a fine illustrator, as
demonstrated by his concept sketches for TTT, seen just below. In 1976,
the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films presented
Melchior with a Golden Scroll Award of Merit for Outstanding
Achievement. It was well deserved in my opinion.
Producer Irwin Allen was so impressed with Melchior's accomplishments that he based his 1966 television series The Time Tunnel
in part on ideas lifted from TTT. He also cannibalized one of
Melchior's best scripts, turning it into the hit 1960's TV series Lost in Space.
Sadly though, Melchior was never compensated for any of Allen's
glomming, or for the shaming of his Dr. Smith character by actor
Jonathan Harris until more than thirty years later when Lost in Space
was remade into a 1998 feature film by Prelude Pictures. Melchior was
then hired to be a consultant on the film, ultimately earning a big
paycheck, but also ultimately getting denied his contractually promised
two percent of the producer's gross receipts.
SHOUT FACTORY'S September, 2013, *DVD release of The Time Travelers
is certainly a must have item for science fiction fans, if for archival
reasons alone (now I can throw out my old VHS tape. Yay!).
Unfortunately, the only extra features provided are a meager Stills
Gallery. However, there is a bonus in the film itself, when Spaceman magazine editor and sci-fi superfan Forry Ackerman makes a brief cameo as a technician, uttering the absolutely forgettable line, "Don't worry. I'm keeping our spacemen happy. Getting things squared away." The joke is a self-referential sight gag; his character is working on a device that turns a circular frame into a square frame. But we do get a fairly good transfer for TTT, with adequate
color, sound, and even clarity. When you consider how this fifty-four
year old film has been crammed onto a single disc with three other
seventy-plus minute films that's pretty good--although to be honest the
other transfers don't fare so well--so buyer beware!
[*Note: As of 2016 and 2021, TTT has been released in both a standalone DVD and a Blu-ray]
HERE are some additional screen shots from TTT:
TAGLINES:
• Step through "The Time Portal" beyond the crack in Space and Time where the fantastic world of the Future will freeze your blood with its weird horrors!
• Step Through The "Time Portal"... and you are in the Future before it happens!
• See: the humanoid robots perpetual slaves to their maker's whim!
• See: the invasion of the Diviants... Mindless Mutants of horror! (and yes, that's how it was spelled on the half-sheet poster--*see further below)
• See: women use the Love Machine to allay the male shortage!
QUOTES:
Reena: "Don't you like me?"
Danny: "Of course I like you. You're a beautiful girl."
Reena: "Oh, that! Beauty is only skin deep."
Danny: "Well, it's deep enough. What do you want--a lovely liver?"
[Reena, finishing her shift, hands Danny a tray of finished android eyes to put away]
Danny: "Holy McKee, and I thought I was giving her the eye!"
TRIVIA (courtesy of IMDB):
• The mutants were played by members of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team.
• TTT was made with two different endings, one happy, one sad. The happy ending version was used for the riffing comedy show, MST3K The Return.
• Delores Wells, credited as Reena, and the film's brief love interest for character Danny McKee, was a Playboy Playmate in the June, 1960 issue of Playboy.
• The theme uses the same four distinguishable notes from The Twilight Zone theme.
• The nude sunbathing scene was added to demonstrate the more liberal sexual mores of "The Future." Director Ib Melchior insisted the actresses actually be nude during filming though nothing would be shown on screen. Delores Wells, who had been a Playboy Playmate, had no issue with it but some of the others did, but they were talked into it anyway.
• Gene Roddenberry saw this film while in the process of writing the pilot script for Star Trek (1966-69). When pitching the idea to Desilu studios, who were concerned by the costs, he took them to see this film to show what could be done on a limited budget. They then ended up hiring some of the production personnel who had worked on this film to design and build the sets and costumes for the TV show. They also hired actor John Hoyt (Varno in this film) when casting for the pilot show Star Trek: The Cage (1964).
The Space-Ark is "one of cinema's last V-2 inspired tail-sitting rocketships. This now-dated ethos would be replaced by the more functional spacecraft seen in the contemporaneous Robinson Crusoe on Mars [Ib Melchior co-wrote the screenplay] and four years later in Stanley Kubrick's classic 2001: A Space Odyssey."
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--- Dr. Varno.
[© May, 2023, Jeffersen]
