Beyond the Time Barrier

"Beyond the Time Barrier" is the type of late 50s/early 60s Sci-Fi film of which you know, after approximately five minutes already, that it could have been a fantastic contemporary genre highlight if only the cast and crew didn't have to work with such a minimalist budget! Most of the conceptual ideas are really great and well- elaborated, but the cheap looking set pieces and the pitiable special effects have an immensely restraining impact on the overall plausibility and entertainment value. In case you serve an ambitious plot that is dealing with time-traveling and largely takes place in a futuristic dystopia, you can't afford to use paper made spaceships or drawings of the metropolis and you most certainly cannot speak of horribly deformed mutants the entire time without properly showing their faces! So, in an attempt to cover up for the budgetary weakness, Edgar G. Ulmer does what every experienced veteran director would do: replace the action sequences with endless intellectual speeches and complicated time warp theories as much as you can! In 1960, Major William Ellison has the honor and privilege to test-fly a brand new and hi-tech type of army fighter plane. The speed of the aircraft is even a little too successful, as Ellison breaks through the time barrier and ends up in the year 2024. It takes quite a while before our Major properly realizes that he fast- forwarded 64 years into the future, and the technical details are explained to him by three other scientists that went through the same experience. By the way, I didn't understand one iota about those time-traveling theories, but I also figure that incomprehensible speeches are a mandatory aspect of 50s Sci-Fi… Ellison immediately gets confronted with the terrible state of our planet and civilization in the year 2024. Apparently an all- devastating kind of cosmic plague made the entire world population sterile (the last child was born more 20 years ago) and gradually transforms the remaining survivors into mutants. There's also good news, however, as the last fertile woman on earth is a beautiful princess and she has chosen him to re-populate the planet! She – Trirene – is a deaf-mute with telekinetic powers and she can read Ellison's thoughts, which results in at least one (unintentionally?) hilarious sequence: "I know you can read my mind…. Although right now I probably wished you couldn't" and then he gets slapped in the face! Admittedly "Beyond the Time Barrier" principally got made to cash in on the tremendous success of H.G. Wells' "The Time Machine" and also borrows many elements from Fritz Lang's "Metropolis", but it's an engaging and occasionally suspenseful tale. I even like to think that some nifty ideas from this film were copied years later in massive Hollywood productions (for example the sterility in "Children of Men"), although I'm probably mistaken.

The legendary cult director Edgar G. Ulmer certainly had made better movies than this but that doesn't mean that this isn't fun to some degree. The main problem is that the (lack of a) budget shows: there's a lot more exposition here than action. But the actors are sincere, the visuals and atmosphere are decent, and there's a nifty twist ending that one might not see coming. The result is a minor but amusing effort that kills time easily enough.

Robert Clarke (also the producer of the movie), who'd previously starred for Ulmer in "The Man from Planet X", plays William Allison, an Air Force pilot who goes on an experimental flight. Somehow, he breaks the time barrier and ends up 64 years in the future, where a plague has decimated most of mankind and where various people hole up in an underground building dubbed The Citadel. The plague has caused various stages of mutation in people; some folk have become deaf-mutes, such as Princess Trirene (Darlene Tompkins); others are more sickly. The people of this future don't trust Allison, which just makes things more difficult for him as he seeks to find out how to get back to his own time.

The supporting cast consists of performers such as Vladimir Sokoloff, Boyd 'Red' Morgan, Stephen Bekassy, John Van Dreelen, and director Ulmers' pretty daughter Arianne in a major supporting role as the dubious Captain Markova. Co-star Tompkins is positively gorgeous and may serve as a distraction for any viewers who are otherwise bored with the movie. (One can't completely knock any movie where female outfits of the future include miniskirts.)

This may be no classic of the genre but it does entertain, and only runs an hour and 15 minutes anyway.

The makeup effects are by the great Jack Pierce.

Six out of 10.

"Major William Allison" (Robert Clarke) is a test pilot for the United States Air Force who has been assigned to fly an experimental jet into space at speeds never before attempted by mankind. Unfortunately, his mission accidentally takes him 64 years into the future to a time when a plague has decimated most of the population and created hostile mobs of mutants who seek to wreak havoc on the few less infected people living underground. Yet while these people don't quite suffer from the full ravages of the plague the disease has rendered all of them deaf, mute and completely sterile. All but one that is and the arrival of Major Allison gives them hope that perhaps he and a beautiful woman named "Trirene" (Darlene Tompkins) can offer them a chance of repopulating the human species. But there is another opportunity presented with Major Allison's arrival which another group has formulated, and it conflicts with the plans of the establishment. Now rather than reveal any more of this movie and risk spoiling it for those who haven't seen it I will just say that this was a decent science fiction film for the most part. Admittedly, being produced in 1960 it lacks the special effects of movies made during the present time and the film lacked depth and substance to a certain degree as well. But in any case, I kind of enjoyed it and so I rate this movie as about average and recommend it to fans of this particular time and genre.

Beyond the Time Barrier (1960)

** (out of 4)

Sci-fi has a military test pilot (Robert Clarke) goes into flight during 1960 and moments later he lands his spaceship in a strange land. After walking around for a bit he's finally taken captive by a group of people who don't make much sense to him but before long he realizes that his little trip actually sent him through a time barrier and he landed sixty-four years after taking off. The world has been destroyed due to a plague so he tries to get back in time to prevent it. This is an ultra low-budget movie that has a few ideas going for it but unfortunately there's not too much that can be done in regards to the science fiction because the budget didn't allow for it. The "future" city looks just like any abandoned city of 1960 and there special effects just aren't all that convincing. Fans of Edgar G. Ulmer will probably say that his keen eye manages to take the low budget and do more with it than most would. I'll buy that to a certain level but there's still no question that the majority of the film is dialogue scenes that really just talk about stuff instead of us ever actually getting to see it. I thought Clarke was good in his leading role as the pilot turned hero. Clarke is always fun to see in these low-budget movies and he does a nice job with the part. Darlene Tompkins plays the love interest, a princess in the future and she too is good. Vladimir Sokoloff plays "The Supreme" and isn't too bad. Universal horror fans will be happy to see Jack Pearce's name pop up in the credits for the special effects. There's talk of mutants in the film but sadly those hoping to see the make-up legends work on them will be disappointed because they're just normal people in bald caps. Pearce does get to do a little make-up at the end but I won't reveal with what as it will give away a major plot twist. This twist is actually pretty good and I think the final five-minutes are actually quite effective.

I have always been fascinated by the philosophical aspects of space and time, for example, such as the possibility of time dilation. That is why movies such as "The Time Machine", "World Without End" (especially, "World Without End" being one of my all-time favorite SF films), and this one, "Beyond the Time Barrier" have a great deal of appeal.

The highlights of the film and worth far more than the price of admission are the scenes in which Robert Clarke first breaks the time barrier up in space (in physics, this sounds like what is currently referred to as a "wormhole" in contrast to the older concept of time dilation) and the scenes after he touches back down to earth. The scene in which Robert Clarke observes the exterior of the futuristic city along with the pulsating solar energy tower is fascinating. (I first saw this when I was ten years old and never forgot it.) Also the scenes of Darlene Tomkins are also a delight for the eyes (especially the swimming pool scene - I never forgot this either). I also liked the triangular designs. They looked almost out of Die Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) Gruppe - the Munich Art School that specialized in abstract expressionism (producing such greats such as Klee, Marc, Kandinsky, others) or, perhaps out of the Bauhaus School of Architecture which produced such greats such as Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and others who pioneered modern futuristic design. For this, the art designer for the movie, Ernst Fegte should take a bow.

However, the overall plot is somewhat disappointing after Robert Clarke is captured. The idea that the human race can bring the earth to such a state in which it is perilous to walk the actual surface of the earth due to excessive radiation because the protective atmospheric screens had been decimated (the ozone layer in the stratosphere, for example) seems very dreary indeed (The scientist played by Istvan Bekassy mentions the ionosphere being contaminated by nuclear particles). Furthermore, what happened to the various animal and plant species ? Were they decimated, too ? Perhaps the writers could have planned a less dismal story. As the story progresses, the plot becomes even more pessimistic with the sterility of the population, the evil scientists, the barbarity of the mutants, the almost complete resignation to the eventual extinction of the human race as voiced by the Supreme, Vladimir Sokoloff, and the murder in the final reel of Trirene, his daughter, played by Darlene Tomkins. In general, the writers could have done a lot better, in terms of plot, theme, and characters.

Not the best, not the worst.

Worth watching for the art design and certain aspects of the story which make a person think.

6/10

Dan Basinger