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TimeQuest
Ardustry Home Entertainment // R // June 10, 2003
List Price: $24.98 [Buy now and save at Amazon]
THE MOVIE
November 22, 1963: Lee Harvey Oswald sits near a window on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository and waits for the Presidential Motorcade. Meanwhile, John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jacqueline race back to Washington, D.C. aboard Air Force One.
Wait a minute…that's not how it happened. But that's how it could have happened if someone had gotten to the President before the assassin's bullet did. And that's the interesting idea that TimeQuest proposes: how would our world be different today if JFK had lived?
The Waltons' Ralph Waite plays the time traveler, who arrives in the presidential suite in Fort Worth, Texas not long before the President (Victor Slezak) is scheduled to leave for Dallas. There, he tells the Kennedy family (Bobby Kennedy – played by Vince Grant - is flown in via Air Force jet) about the assassinations that both men face. It takes a bit of convincing, but the time traveler is able to prove to the brothers that what he says is true.
TimeQuest presents an interesting idea – in that it not only poses the question of what would happen if JFK survived…but what would happen if he survived and had knowledge of what the world had become after his assassination. Written and directed by Robert Dyke, the rewritten future presents some great positives (a city on the moon, a Robert Kennedy/Martin Luther King administration in the late '70s) and a few negatives (The Beatles, it seems, are now just a footnote in rock & roll history). While it took a while for me to accept Slezak and Grant in the lead roles (to me, Thirteen Days' Bruce Greenwood and Steven Culp will always be the definitive on-screen Jack and Bobby), the script here really boosts the story…it's one of the best What If ideas for a movie I've ever seen, and one only wishes the budget for this film (which is TV movie-of-the-week low) had been bigger, because a great movie could have been made out of this story, instead of a very good one – which is what we have here.
I won't spoil any more of the story, but will mention that the plot jumps back and forth between future, past and present (look for a cool cameo by Bruce Campbell as an Oliver Stone-like director), as we see the effect that the Kennedys surviving has on the course of human history.
THE DVD
Video:
Presented in full-frame format, I'm unsure if this is a direct-to-video title shot in full-frame, or if we're getting a pan and scan version of a movie shot in widescreen. The movie does appear to be shot on video rather than film, and some scenes are a lot more grainy than others, although I don't know if this was the intent of the director or not. Wide-shots seem to be crystal-clear, while some close-ups are full of grain, so without any commentary track on the DVD, it's really hard to say if this is a screw up in the transfer or the director's intent. I'm giving the director the benefit of the doubt in my video rating however, which ranks just a little better than average.
Audio:
The audio is presented in 2.0 Dolby, but it sounds pretty good overall. Even though this is a sci-fi movie, the only real action sequences involve guns and a few computer effects here and there (the computer generated Air Force One looks particularly nice…well, at least better than the computer generated one in Harrison Ford's Air Force One). So, being a movie that primarily focuses on dialogue, the audio track here is quite serviceable, although far from exceptional.
Extras:
The only extras on this DVD are five Trailers for titles from Ardustry Home Entertainment, including the trailer for TimeQuest. Other than a chapter selection, no other extras are included on this DVD. Because I liked this movie so much, I really wished there could have been a commentary track or some interviews with the actors as to why they took and how they approached their roles. Perhaps if enough people take notice of this film, we can get a special edition sometime in the future, although given the fact that I personally had never heard of this movie prior to seeing it was available on DVD, I suppose it's perfectly understandable why Ardustry didn't want to invest in more extras.
THE BOTTOM LINE
I only came across TimeQuest accidentally, while browsing on an online retailer one day. The premise intrigued me enough to pick up a copy, and I'm happy to say that it proved to be a worthwhile purchase. While staunch Republicans may prove to be this film's most harsh critics (maybe they'll fire back by producing a "What if Watergate never happened?" movie), only the most cynical will be able to deny the kind of hope for the future that is presented by TimeQuest. It reminds us that, once, important men really did try to make a difference – and hopefully, someday America will find a leader who will take us into that New Frontier that was promised so long ago, and lost somewhere along the way.
November 22, 1963: Lee Harvey Oswald sits near a window on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository and waits for the Presidential Motorcade. Meanwhile, John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jacqueline race back to Washington, D.C. aboard Air Force One.
Wait a minute…that's not how it happened. But that's how it could have happened if someone had gotten to the President before the assassin's bullet did. And that's the interesting idea that TimeQuest proposes: how would our world be different today if JFK had lived?
The Waltons' Ralph Waite plays the time traveler, who arrives in the presidential suite in Fort Worth, Texas not long before the President (Victor Slezak) is scheduled to leave for Dallas. There, he tells the Kennedy family (Bobby Kennedy – played by Vince Grant - is flown in via Air Force jet) about the assassinations that both men face. It takes a bit of convincing, but the time traveler is able to prove to the brothers that what he says is true.
TimeQuest presents an interesting idea – in that it not only poses the question of what would happen if JFK survived…but what would happen if he survived and had knowledge of what the world had become after his assassination. Written and directed by Robert Dyke, the rewritten future presents some great positives (a city on the moon, a Robert Kennedy/Martin Luther King administration in the late '70s) and a few negatives (The Beatles, it seems, are now just a footnote in rock & roll history). While it took a while for me to accept Slezak and Grant in the lead roles (to me, Thirteen Days' Bruce Greenwood and Steven Culp will always be the definitive on-screen Jack and Bobby), the script here really boosts the story…it's one of the best What If ideas for a movie I've ever seen, and one only wishes the budget for this film (which is TV movie-of-the-week low) had been bigger, because a great movie could have been made out of this story, instead of a very good one – which is what we have here.
I won't spoil any more of the story, but will mention that the plot jumps back and forth between future, past and present (look for a cool cameo by Bruce Campbell as an Oliver Stone-like director), as we see the effect that the Kennedys surviving has on the course of human history.
THE DVD
Video:
Presented in full-frame format, I'm unsure if this is a direct-to-video title shot in full-frame, or if we're getting a pan and scan version of a movie shot in widescreen. The movie does appear to be shot on video rather than film, and some scenes are a lot more grainy than others, although I don't know if this was the intent of the director or not. Wide-shots seem to be crystal-clear, while some close-ups are full of grain, so without any commentary track on the DVD, it's really hard to say if this is a screw up in the transfer or the director's intent. I'm giving the director the benefit of the doubt in my video rating however, which ranks just a little better than average.
Audio:
The audio is presented in 2.0 Dolby, but it sounds pretty good overall. Even though this is a sci-fi movie, the only real action sequences involve guns and a few computer effects here and there (the computer generated Air Force One looks particularly nice…well, at least better than the computer generated one in Harrison Ford's Air Force One). So, being a movie that primarily focuses on dialogue, the audio track here is quite serviceable, although far from exceptional.
Extras:
The only extras on this DVD are five Trailers for titles from Ardustry Home Entertainment, including the trailer for TimeQuest. Other than a chapter selection, no other extras are included on this DVD. Because I liked this movie so much, I really wished there could have been a commentary track or some interviews with the actors as to why they took and how they approached their roles. Perhaps if enough people take notice of this film, we can get a special edition sometime in the future, although given the fact that I personally had never heard of this movie prior to seeing it was available on DVD, I suppose it's perfectly understandable why Ardustry didn't want to invest in more extras.
THE BOTTOM LINE
I only came across TimeQuest accidentally, while browsing on an online retailer one day. The premise intrigued me enough to pick up a copy, and I'm happy to say that it proved to be a worthwhile purchase. While staunch Republicans may prove to be this film's most harsh critics (maybe they'll fire back by producing a "What if Watergate never happened?" movie), only the most cynical will be able to deny the kind of hope for the future that is presented by TimeQuest. It reminds us that, once, important men really did try to make a difference – and hopefully, someday America will find a leader who will take us into that New Frontier that was promised so long ago, and lost somewhere along the way.
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