Time After Time Movie Review - Starring Malcolm McDowell, Mary Steenburgen, and David Warner
After Time is one of my favorite films about time travel. The movie stars Malcolm McDowell as H.G. Wells, the famous 19th century science fiction writer, who according to the film travels into the future in pursuit of Jack the Ripper (David Warner), who escapes in a time machine in which he has built. The movie is full of humor as well as horror, action, suspense, and romance.
The movie begins in London in 1893. John Leslie Stevenson, alias Jack the Ripper, is on the loose brutally killing prostitutes. Meanwhile, H.G. Wells invites several of his colleagues including Stevenson to dinner to show them his new invention - a time machine, which he has in his basement. Everyone thinks he mad, including Stevenson.
After showing the machine, the police arrive and announce that Jack the Ripper has struck in the neighborhood and is on the loose once again. They show his handbag, which he left at the scene of the crime. Wells says it belongs to Stevenson, whence the police now know his identity. However, Stevenson has managed to escape in Wells time machine. But Wells has kept the key, which ensures that the machine will return to him. He waits in the basement and watches the machine re-materialize. He opens the door and looks at the control inside to find it set for 1979, the time to which the Ripper has escaped. Wells is horrified since he thinks he let Jack loose onto a utopia!
Wells decides to pursue Jack into the future, so he takes some jewels and money with him and starts up the machine, keeping it set to 1979. He arrives about 45 minutes later in San Francisco, where the machine is now being kept on exhibit at a science museum. Upon exiting the machine, Wells is amazed at nearly everything he sees, including the exhibit dedicated to him. However, he learns that his time machine was never shown to work.
Next, Wells sets out in pursuit of Jack the Ripper. He looks for an English bank to exchange his currency and realizes that the Ripper must have done the same. Eventually, the next morning he finds the Chartered Bank of London. He surprised to find a woman in charge, but pleased in any case, since he anticipated women liberation. The banker, Ann Robbins, tells Wells that she seen an Englishmen fitting Jack description and referred him to the Hyatt Hotel. She also develops a crush on Wells, gives him her card, and flirts with him a bit.
After exchanging money, Wells hails a taxicab and rushes to the Hyatt. He finds Jack room and knocks on his door. Upon opening the door, Jack is shocked to find Wells in the future. Wells tries to get Jack to come to his senses and come back with him to Victorian England to be apprehended for his killings, but naturally Jack refuses. He then sits Wells down on the bed and shows him some TV. He flips through several channels, all showing various forms of modern-day violence and tells Wells that he at home in the future and it Wells who doesn belong there. Then Jack starts fighting Wells over the key, so that he can use the machine without worrying about Wells following him.
The two start fighting over the key. The maid walks in and they rush out. A chase ensues through the hotel and onto the street. Jack ends up getting hit by a car. Wells goes to the hospital where Jack had been taken and they tell him that Jack has died, though they won let him see the body.
Now lost in the future, Wells wanders back to the bank, where Amy finds him and insists on having lunch with him. The two dine at the revolving restaurant atop the Hyatt and enjoy a spectacular panoramic view of the city. Amy ends up shocking Wells by confiding to him much of her sex life. In any case, after lunch, she drives him across the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Woods. The two enjoy a very pleasant walk. They go back to the city and watch a movie, which frightens Wells. Amy decides to make him dinner. Meanwhile, the ripper turns out to be on the loose, killing prostitutes in San Francisco.
Amy ends up seducing Wells. Though a bit frightened at first, Wells makes love to her and ends up spending the night at her house. The next morning, Wells hears on the radio about a brutal slaying of a prostitute in the North Beach and realizes that the Ripper is still alive and on the loose. He tells Amy he after Jack but doesn tell her the details.
Later that day, Jack shows up at the bank to exchange more currency. Amy becomes frightened and calls Wells, who tells her not to panic but to try to detain him until he can get there. Jack soon realizes that Amy had told Wells where he was staying, so he tells her very threateningly to tell Wells to give him the key.
Amy is now terrified and insists that Wells go to the police. Wells obliges but doesn tell them his true identity for fear that they think he crazy. Instead, he uses the alias Sherlock Holmes. They ask the police if they can locate John Leslie Stevenson, but they have no record of him entering the country, so they don believe him. Meanwhile, Jack kills a third victim.
Now Wells decides to tell Amy the truth. She doesn believe him and becomes heartbroken, but nevertheless she decides to give him a chance to try to prove himself. Wells takes Amy back to the science museum and sneaks her into the time machine after closing time. He sends her three days into the future. She rushes out and soon realizes that Wells was right when she sees a newspaper dated three days later than it was. But she soon becomes horrified when she reads a story about how she been the Ripper fifth victim! Wells insists that they go back to pursue Jack.
After a bit of agonizing, Wells soon realizes that he has an advantage over Jack because he has the newspaper which says what Jack is about to do before he does it. Thus he knows about Jack fourth potential victim and figures he can show up early and surprise him. However, on the way to the scene, Amy gets a flat tire. By the time she able to repair it, they arrive too late. To make matters worse, Wells had called the police minutes before the murder took place to try to warn them, and they now believe Wells to be the killer.
The next day is the day Amy is to be killed according to the newspaper. Wells tells her he has to go out for a bit, but if he doesn come back to check into her favorite hotel. He gives her some brandy and she takes valium, which makes her fall asleep. Meanwhile, Wells goes out to buy a gun. Just before he returns, the police grab him and arrest him. He tries to yell for Amy to leave the house, but she still asleep.
In jail, Wells is interrogated by the police for several hours. He tries to tell them over and over again the truth, but naturally they don believe him. He even shows them the newspaper from the future, but they still don believe him. Finally, at 7PM, just half an hour before Amy is to be murdered, he strikes a deal with the police. He tells them to send a police car to Amy house and if Jack doesn show up he agrees to confess to the killings. The police rush out to Amy house, but they arrive too late and find a brutally murdered female corpse. They then release Wells.
Now all seems lost for Wells. He wanders back near Amy house. Amy calls out to him, still very much alive. It turns out that Wells had mistakenly murdered her friend whom she invited to dinner, so the paper was wrong. But it also turns out that Jack had kidnapped Amy and is still demanding that Wells give him the key. Wells obliges, hoping Jack will keep his promise as a gentleman to release Amy, but he refuses and kidnaps her at knifepoint. Wells takes Amy car and follows Jack back to the museum.
At the museum, Jack still threatens to kill Amy, but Wells pleads for him to let her go. Jack tries to force her into the time machine, but she manages to get away from him. Jack closes the door and attempts to escape once again in the machine, but Wells pulls out the hydrostatic equalizer on the outside and Jack ends up traveling to infinity without the machine. Wells remarks that this is the last anyone will ever hear of Jack the Ripper.
Now Wells insists on returning to the past to dismantle his machine and live out the rest of his life writing science fiction. As he starts up the machine, Amy knocks on the door. Wells stops the machine and she insists on traveling back with him.
