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5.6/10
1.6K
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Scott McKenzie, a history professor, becomes involved with two time travelers from the year 2586 after making a discovery in an old photograph from 1886.Scott McKenzie, a history professor, becomes involved with two time travelers from the year 2586 after making a discovery in an old photograph from 1886.Scott McKenzie, a history professor, becomes involved with two time travelers from the year 2586 after making a discovery in an old photograph from 1886.
Begonya Plaza
- Carla
- (as Begona Plaza)
Featured reviews
Time travelling with a gun slinging Klaus Kinski and western memorabilia nut William Devane? I won't have it any other way. "Timestalkers" is a playfully modest little made-for-TV production that's full of warmth and covers an interestingly ambitious concept.
The story follows Professor Scott McKenzie (William Devane), an old western memorabilia collector discovers in a photograph from 1866 a 20th century .357 Magnum revolver in the hands of a cowboy (Klaus Kinski). Scott soon starts questioning the possibility of time-travel and writes a paper on it. Then strangely a lady appears who claims that she believes him and he soon discovers that she's a time-traveller too. She wants him help her find out why this time-traveller has gone back to the old-west and eventually stop him from changing the face of history.
Early on the plot moves back and forth between the past and present. Some of the items that Devane's character looks at or purchases at an auction have a history that involves the magnum-toting gunman. Some foreseeable plot-holes creep in, but it's inventively told and works well with its collective gimmicks. The chintzy special effects create some charm, and so does the cheesy igniting sparks cutaways. The uncanny music is whimsically scored. There's a nice sense of humour in the script. Devane gives a winning performance and Kinski's glazed turn offers that venomously cold tinge. Lauren Hutton is fetchingly palatable. John Ratzenburger and Forest Tucker pop in with fun support parts. It looks cheap, but it's actually better than its limitations allow it to be. A smart, enjoyably harmless sci-fi yarn.
The story follows Professor Scott McKenzie (William Devane), an old western memorabilia collector discovers in a photograph from 1866 a 20th century .357 Magnum revolver in the hands of a cowboy (Klaus Kinski). Scott soon starts questioning the possibility of time-travel and writes a paper on it. Then strangely a lady appears who claims that she believes him and he soon discovers that she's a time-traveller too. She wants him help her find out why this time-traveller has gone back to the old-west and eventually stop him from changing the face of history.
Early on the plot moves back and forth between the past and present. Some of the items that Devane's character looks at or purchases at an auction have a history that involves the magnum-toting gunman. Some foreseeable plot-holes creep in, but it's inventively told and works well with its collective gimmicks. The chintzy special effects create some charm, and so does the cheesy igniting sparks cutaways. The uncanny music is whimsically scored. There's a nice sense of humour in the script. Devane gives a winning performance and Kinski's glazed turn offers that venomously cold tinge. Lauren Hutton is fetchingly palatable. John Ratzenburger and Forest Tucker pop in with fun support parts. It looks cheap, but it's actually better than its limitations allow it to be. A smart, enjoyably harmless sci-fi yarn.
I watched this for the first time last week on TV. Really a well done film with a real twist to the plot. Good action and interesting build up to the finale. I found it very entertaining... which is what I like in a film.
I watch westerns on a weekly basis, and one day i was browsing through the internet looking at Sci-Fi westerns when i saw Timestalkers. I did some research to find that it is a rare film. Afterwords i bought it on VHS off eBay. When i watched this film i found it had a good storyline. William Devane plays to role of a man with an obsession for the old west. He finds and old photo from a trunk bought at auction, in the photo he sees a man holding a man holding a 1980 magnum. He encounters a lady from the future and they travel back to the old west. William Devane plays a great role in the film,and it is very well shot. This film is a rarity in the Sci-Fi western section, apart from Back To The Future 3 i have only seen this film as being great.It is worth watching alone or with the family, it will leave a fond memory to last forever burning in our hearts.
There's few time travel pictures that I don't pick apart with fourth dimensional reasoning and this is one of them. There's a very wonderful scene as the time traveling bad guy wants into an Army base, so he travels back to before it was built, crosses where the perimeter fence will be and then returns to the present on the other side of the fence ! William Devane does a great job as the writer who writes the book that causes time travel to be invented. When he discovers an old tin-type with a man holding a very modern-day gun, he steps into an adventure with Lauren Hutton that leads him into fulfilling his greatest wish to be a gunfighter. John Ratzenburger forgets Cliff on "Cheers" to play a very likeable Army Colonel and Forrest Tucker appears too in his very last movie role as an Old West Collector (Shades of "F-Troop," perhaps). This wonderful movie is great for the whole family as Hutton repays Devane's kindness with an act that probably eliminates the entire movie from even occurring.You have to see it to know what I mean.
The fast moving and clever time travel plot is greatly enhanced by the presence of the duster clad Klaus Kinski. He has a lot of screen time, along with a fine performance by William Devane. After his wife and boy are killed in a car wreck, Devane purchases an old western trunk, which contains the intriguing 1886 photograph, that sets the story in motion. A chase ensues across 100 years to reverse history, and the tale never falters. One memorable scene involves Kinski entering a fence protected compound. The film holds interest throughout, and the ending is very satisfying. I bought "Timestalkers" because I am a big fan of both Klaus Kinski and William Devane. I was not disappointed. - MERK
Did you know
- TriviaScott McKenzie's sports car is a 1986 Panther Kallista.
- GoofsWhen looking up the song about the Star Handled Stranger, Dr McKenzie and his colleague comment that not many people could read back in those days (the late 19th century). In fact, literacy rates for white Americans were very high in the mid and late 19th century. At the time of the Civil War, somewhere around 90% of white men could read and write. Literacy rates on the frontier a generation later would have likely been somewhat lower but literacy for whites would have been the rule, not the exception.
- ConnectionsEdited into Your Afternoon Movie: Time Stalker (2023)
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Timestalkers
- Filming locations
- 3491 Tapo Street, Simi Valley, California, USA(Scott McKenzie's house)
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
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