To the Ends of Time

I love watching films, and tend to focus on a particular genre and year when choosing my pick of the day. Very rarely do I find something as obscure and underappreciated as 'To the Ends of Time' (it has just 291 ratings as of 18/06/2025!). It is very fitting that one of the main themes in this brilliant fantasy film is about love, as everything about it was made with so much love it makes your heart and soul almost feel nauseous.

In fact, it is mentioned in the 'Trivia' section that this film's talented director, Markus Rothkranz, made 'To the Ends of Time' with such a small budget and limited resources that he had to build and paint a number of the sets, props and miniatures himself, and created many of the costumes with his own hands. If that is not impressive, I do not know what is.

But it is not this fact which makes 'To the Ends of Time' stand out in my opinion, it is how charming and fantastical everything is, despite the limited resources which were available to the film-makers, of course. I cannot possible mention everything which stood out in this regard, but one special mention has to go to Joss Ackland's inspired performance as King Francis, who has to be one of my favourite characters in film of all time in my opinion, and the immortal theme of "Amor Vincit Omnia", which is rarely integrated as beautifully and as emotionally as in this film.

It is for all these reasons, and for many more but no amount of words can properly convey what my heart and soul have experienced in this film, that I believe that 'To the Ends of Time' is so underrated and such a hidden gem. If you are expecting something like 'The Lord of the Rings', you will be slightly disappointed though, for its style is more similar to 'The Princess Bride' (1987), although it would still be enjoyable.

This movie has very lovely message of "love is the strongest force there is". However, most of the characters are not exploited as one would expect. Joss Ackland is convincing, and I am a bit sad that Sarah Douglas didn't show her potential here, actually her cast was a bit neglected in this flick. she was the one to keep me interested to the very end of the movie. The odd thing is that throughout whole flick not once her character(Karnissa) has been mentioned by name!!!! Why? All in all, watchable but pretty naive.

This a lovely and charming epic fantasy with lots of heart. I got lost in this sweet film watching it at the Mann's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. It's truly romantic with a touching message.The artwork and the effects are visually striking and the fact that the director is an amazing artist is so apparent. The frames are like watching moving art. It also has a strong and talented cast of actors. What a wonderful surprise to see Joss Ackland, he is just a fairy-tale perfect King. Sarah Douglas is terrific as the villain and Christine Taylor and Tom Schultz make a lovely romantic pair. The fact that the movie was made on a ridiculously tiny indie film budget just blows me away. It may not be the slick Hollywood stuff we're inundated by but it's a really nice movie to rent and enjoy curled up on your sofa on a rainy Saturday. Don't forget the microwave popcorn. That's my advice. Just enjoy it.

This is one of the only films ever made with a sky kingdom & airship aesthetic. It is incredible how they keep accomplishing scene after scene of old school effects, miniatures, and costumes to sell a bigger scope. It is some kind of feat; no doubt the filmmakers could have scaled and built the scaffolds to a Ridley Scott film or something. The movie itself though is Power Rangers tier, practically unwatchable; but the rest is something the universe reacts to. It is a Herzogian feat, the stuff dreams are made of. It is simply not the viewers lowly place to tell them they succeeded or not. Massive respect.

Wretchedly Delicious. I watched this movie just to make fun of it. I can't believe it was made in 1996. I've seen better special effects on old Doctor Who episodes! I kept expecting Crow, Tom and Joel to pop up to make fun of the movie. The acting was horrible. The action was nonexistent. However, it's great laugh and I highly recommend it if you enjoy bad movies.