Time Travel in the Movies and Other Dilemmas
SPOILER ALERT
In “Somewhere in Time” (1980), Richard Collier (Christopher Reeve) travels back to 1912 through self-hypnosis so he can meet the beautiful actress (Jane Seymour) with whom he falls in love from seeing her photograph at the Grand Hotel. His initial efforts fail; he needs to have faith in the process and must surround himself with objects and clothing from that era. Eventually, the procedure works. But unfortunately for Richard, he later picks up a coin on the floor from his own time period and the magic is undone. He returns to his own era and can’t go back to his love no matter how hard he tries; it is a poignant scene at the end of the sentimental fantasy-romance.
Several movies explore the notion of time travel. In “The Time Machine” (1960), H. G. Wells (Rod Taylor) builds a strange vehicle for this purpose. In “Back to the Future” (1985), Emmet “Doc” Brown (Christopher Lloyd), an eccentric scientist, humorously customizes a DeLorean for such a journey; his fuel source, plutonium, is probably the most credible catalyst for the job in the film genre. In “Austin Powers in Goldmember” (2002), the Ministry of Defense hilariously adapts a 1976 Cadillac Eldorado into a “Pimp-Mobile” so that Powers (Mike Myers)—a man no stranger to time travel—can rescue his father back in 1975. Wait a minute; can a 1976 Caddy return to 1975? It doesn’t matter. Filmmakers usually have their own take on how time travel works or doesn’t work.
But returning to Richard’s dilemma in “Somewhere,” if he was able to go back in time once, why can’t he do it again? The problem with the notion of time travel in film is that it frequently defies its own internal logic (let alone, physics). A photo from the internet reminds us of this fact. It states: “What do we want? Time travel. When do we want it? It’s irrelevant!” Its approach, though humorous, recalls the tactics of strikers at a picket line demanding a right being denied to them. According to its own logic, if we do it right the first time it should work ad infinitum. “Try harder, Richard; just try harder!” is what we want to tell him.
Richard’s downfall is actually the anachronism of picking up the modern coin. His dilemma reminds me of my own in watching certain period films. In discovering chronological errors overlooked by the filmmakers, they pluck me from the intended time period and jarringly return me to my own. In essence, for me, they cancel out the credibility they had intended. They make me travel back to my own time unexpectedly and prematurely. This often occurs in regards to women in Westerns of the 1940s through at least the 1960s. Their hairstyles often reflect the date when the film was made and not those of the late nineteenth century.
A similarly annoying anachronism for me can be found in “Girl With a Pearl Earring,” (2003). And yet, this is a film I have often assigned to my university students when teaching seventeenth century art history because its makers painstakingly recreated—and brilliantly bring the viewer to—Holland of the Baroque era. “Girl” imagines a storyline explaining the creation of Vermeer’s painting of circa 1665 (based upon the 1999 novel by Tracy Chevalier). The movie works well in many respects because less documentation for Vermeer’s life exists than for other Dutch artists of the period. Scarlett Johansson plays the girl in question but, for me, the troublesome anachronism is her lips. At the turn of the millennium, when the movie was created, many women plumped their lips through injections and other less invasive methods. I have no idea what, if any technique Johansson used, but her overly pouty appearance seems unnatural and tells me this is not a seventeenth-century girl. In fact, it is a distraction because she also seems about to say “oooooooh” in many scenes where it would have been inappropriate.
OK. I got that off my chest. And I guess that if I could just jump into my 1976 Pimp-Mobile, I would return to the production of this film and suggest that adjustments be made. And not only that, I would also give Richard Collier a ride back to the Grand Hotel in 1912 so he could be with his lady.