Beyond the Time Barrier

Beyond the Time Barrier

Director – Edgar G. Ulmer

Writer – Arthur C. Pierce

1960, USA

Stars – Robert Clarke, Darlene Tompkins, Arianne Ulmer

 

A pilot (Robert Clarke) accidentally breaks the sound barrier and finds himself in the troubled future of 2024 (!), where humankind has suffered a plague (!) that has left civilisation with widespread sterility and a taste for triangular architecture.

 

But as Jonathan Lewis notes, “This use of geometry as a replacement for big budget special effects really does pay off. Look for the scene in which Trirene (Tompkins) looks at her reflection in a triangular mirror.” Ernst Fegté’s set designs are a chief enjoyment in their ambition, even if it’s just that “dressed-up silo” look. And on the one hand it’s this “future on a low budget” that is the main appeal of ‘Beyond the Time Barrier’, as much of its failings can be enjoyed as “of its time b-movie”. Therefore, your pleasure will depend upon how much you go for this, but when Christopher Lloyd says, “It can only be enjoyed ironically”, that seems a bit harsh. The failings aren’t of a lack of ambition or of technical execution: direction and design aren’t the true flaws. Some old-fashioned staidness and underwhelming acting, a lack in effects… these things are expected going in to a b-movie of the era.  Its budget can’t meet its over-reach and it may rely on tropes - it's the kind of film that made laughing at old films a passtime - but it’s swift, the dying civilisation set-up is enjoyable pulp fodder and, as implied before, Edward G Ulmer gives the material more flair than expected. 

 

Ulmer knows how to direct around deficits and silliness and allows the triangular set-design to distinguish it. The plot relies more upon paranoia and this civilisation’s central dilemma – they think Clarke is a spy from aggressors, but we don’t really get into that – so black/white villainy is less a driving force. Clarke’s first sighting of the futuristic city is memorable, although this is apparently an added insert by American-International when they took over the property: it’s memorable but arguably contradictory (I took it as just the overground deserted ruins to their underground city … but a working tower?). There are the usual allowances to make – a jet wouldn’t be able to land on an airstrip that’s 60+ years old, for example – but it would also seem that a lot of inconsistencies were because of changes made by American-International (more about these changes at Trailers From Hell). 

 

Again, it’s a film that warns you that you should never trust a second-in-command with a suspect beard, but even the Captain (Boyd ‘Red’ Morgan) is more motivated by desperation and paranoia that malevolent scheming. There’s also a gratuitous skinny-dipping scene (!), the time travel basis is under-explored and final rampage of the mutants has hints of a proto-zombie onslaught, despite unconvincing bald cap make-up.

 

No, it’s not as genuinely good and haunting as Ulmer’s ‘The Man From Planet X’ - and this is the man that made the film noir classic 'Detour' -  but as a slice of hokey b-movie retro-pulp, it’s intriguing and there’s worse.