The Timekeepers of Eternity

In dramatic content, «The Timekeepers of Eternity» is not much different from other Stephen King stories that have been filmed. King is at his best, to my taste, when he's irrational and basic, like in «Carrie» and «Christine», or melodramatic like «Stand by Me.» But when he gets pompous, like the Woody Allen of American fantastique, discussing time and eternity with eye-rolling cavillations, just like when Woody flirts with childish concerns about the existence of God, King's literary limitations become transparent in their emptiness.

This is the case with «The Timekeepers of Eternity», which also does not reach the level of a cross between the pompous and the irrational, such as in the overrated «The Shining». What is mostly interesting here is the work of Greek director Aristotelis Maragkos, who turns his movie into obligatory viewing for creators of visual effects and animation. With support from the Onassis Foundation and the University of Kent, Maragkos (thankfully) reduced Tom Holland's three-hour miniseries «The Langoliers» (1995) to 62 minutes, based on King's novella of the same name. Maragkos copied the frames onto paper and animated the material using collage techniques.

We have seen the story many times in different versions: here, a plane takes off, crosses an aurora borealis and almost all the people on board disappear, except for 11 who together penetrate the "twilight zone", while a violent domestic drama is resolved. Businessman Craig Toomey (Bronson Pinchot) is haunted by the memory of his father, who assured him that, for being a bad boy, he would be eaten by creepy and voracious creatures known as "langoliers". And while he fights it, all the others are trapped in his hysterical nightmare.

So, a writer (Dean Stockwell) recites possible versions of the events, a blind girl (Kate Maberly) keeps saying something smells really bad, and the businessman gobbles up his colleagues with his uncontrollable portrayal of the overbearing Toomey. And the story gets more and more verbose and boring, but it ends soon.

The visual impression remains, the memory of what we saw and what dazzled us. The film allowed me to estrange myself from the story and see it as the work of a great craftsman, a lucky human being who had a university and a foundation to support his creative exploration. For this reason, I have worked for 43 years to create a film archive in Panama with all the wonderful creations of filmmakers from all over the world available to the public. This movie has already been added.