time travel movie review

• Search Please fill out this field.
• Newsletters
• Sweepstakes

The 23 best time travel movies of all time

From Back to the Future to Looper to Palm Springs, the time travel narrative traverses the film spectrum. Here are EW’s picks for 23 of the best. 

Despite time travel being considered more of a science fiction trope, there is something positively enchanting about the idea of being able to go back to another time or forward into the future, even if just for a moment. While this list deals with a mix of films, some of which consider the hazards of time travel (mostly through time loops), for the most part, these films see time travel as a net positive. Time travel is also a sphere that is mostly occupied by television, thanks to shows like Doctor Who , Quantum Leap , and Lost , even though the number of time travel movies has shot up over the past two decades or so.

Unfortunately, the earliest this list goes is 1962; while there are some time travel movies from the Old Hollywood days, they lack a lot of the imagination and thoughtfulness about the nature of time that the movies on this list bring. This list is a mix of straight dramas, killer action, rollicking comedies, and heartfelt romance — and sometimes, all of those elements exist in a single movie. This list is unranked, and mostly grouped together according to each movie's particular "genre" of time travel: conventional time machines, time loops, magical circumstances, and missions to save the past and the future at the same time. These are 23 of the best time travel movies of all time.

La Jetée (1962)

Kicking off an unranked list of time-travel movies chronologically seems like a good place to start, actually. La Jetée is also probably the most experimental of the films on this list. A French Left Bank short film set in a post-nuclear apocalypse future told through narration and photographs, this is not the first time-travel film by any means, but its impact on the time-travel movies that came after, like 1995's 12 Monkeys , cannot be understated.

A young prisoner (Davos Hanich) is forced to undergo torturous experiments to induce time travel by using impactful memories — and unlike those who came before him, he succeeds, but he ends up discovering a time loop in the process. This is an incredibly stylish telling of what is now a familiar type of story, but in 1962, it was absolutely revolutionary. Honestly, because of its unique technical and visual elements, it still is.

Watch La Jetée on Criterion Channel

Time After Time (1979)

Nicholas Meyer is behind not one, but two brilliant time-travel movies that made this list. For this particular film, he not only wrote the screenplay but also made his directorial debut. The tale of two 19th-century former friends, H.G. Wells ( Malcolm McDowell , unusually wide-eyed and adorable) and John Leslie Stevenson a.k.a. Jack the Ripper ( David Warner , never more menacing yet charming), as they chase each other through 1979 San Francisco thanks to Wells' time machine, Time After Time doesn't spend too much time on the science of time travel, and it's better for it.

This is, in essence, a romantic thriller, as Wells falls for quirky bank clerk Amy ( Mary Steenburgen , delightfully independent) while in search of his old friend turned enemy. It has chase scenes, interrogation sequences, gory murder (courtesy of Jack), and a delightful sense of humor as Wells learns to navigate the future. He thought it would be a utopia; instead, he finds a world in sore need of his idealism, kindness, and dedication to justice.

Where to rent or buy Time After Time

The Back to the Future trilogy (1985, 1989, 1990)

While it's true that the first Back to the Future movie is probably one of the greatest time-travel movies of all time, with its two sequels living in its shadows, all three are essential to understanding the character of Marty McFly ( Michael J. Fox ). The Back to the Future trilogy is an '80s version of a bildungsroman about a teenager who has to learn that there's much more to life than being, well, a teenager. The first film, confidently directed by Robert Zemeckis , is imbued with so much humor and heart, it's all too easy to get sucked into a plot that should be convoluted, but that works so awfully well.

Back to the Future Part II evokes a bit less feeling than the original, and it's significantly grittier, but it's still " another fantastic voyage " as EW's Ira Robbins wrote, flinging Marty and Doc Brown ( Christopher Lloyd ) into a slightly prescient future version of 2015. Back to the Future Part III , meanwhile, restores the heart, but its story is slighter as it wraps up Marty's saga, sending Doc off on a brand new adventure all his own. While the first Back to the Future movie is required viewing for any time travel enthusiast, stick around for the rest of the trilogy, too: Even if this franchise's view of time travel is riddled with potential paradoxes, they are entertaining paradoxes nonetheless.

Watch the Back to the Future trilogy on Tubi

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)

"Be excellent to each other" is the reigning philosophy of Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure , the adventurous, fun-loving, stoner time-travel comedy that spawned a franchise, including a third installment released in 2020. Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves absolutely triumph in the roles of lackadaisical teenagers Bill and Ted, respectively, as they journey through time to bring back legends in order to pass their history class.

If the film seems silly, that's because it is meant to be. Whereas the Back to the Future franchise intended to craft a legend, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure kicks off the journey with George Carlin as the duo's time travel guide and mentor, Rufus, who intends to enlighten the pair on their mission and destiny. In any other film, the two budding legends, with their free-wheeling ideals and misadventures, would bring down the fabric of time and space itself. However, Excellent Adventure is not a time-travel film that forces you to think too hard about its premise; instead, it invites you to just kick back and have a good time.

Watch Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure on Amazon Prime Video

Meet the Robinsons (2007)

Meet the Robinsons received mixed reviews when it first debuted, but of the 3-D animated movies that came out of Disney Animation in the 2000s, it's probably the most imaginative and outstanding of the bunch. Following a young orphan as he goes on a fantastic voyage into the future with another young boy who is a time traveler (kind of), Robinsons is stylish to a point and is filled with heart. It's probably also the most kid-friendly entry on this list, but its good-natured humor and complicated emotional palette will appeal to adults, too.

It also fits neatly into a more classic genre of time travel, with time machines, eccentric inventors, and kids looking to make an impact — not just on their time, but on the time they find themselves in, be it the near future or the distant past.

Watch Meet the Robinsons on Disney+

Run Lola Run (1998)

This is, in many ways, the time loop movie; debuting in 1998 to rave reviews, Run Lola Run , a German experimental thriller, is one you will not be able to shake, long after you've finished a viewing (or even a second, to catch what you missed the first time). The protagonist, Lola (Franka Potente, in a punishingly physical performance), is forced to relive a scenario, again and again, involving saving her boyfriend Manni (Moritz Bleibtreu) from certain death.

Potente's performance alone is worth the watch, and of the films on this list, Run Lola Run is actually one of the shorter ones, using its 80-minute runtime to its full advantage. The other time loop movies on this list are also worthy viewing experiences in a lot of ways, but for a pure shot of adrenaline, you can't miss the film EW deemed "a masterful pop piece, humming with raw romance, youth, and energy." If you're interested in more of director Tom Tykwer 's work, he also codirected 2012's Cloud Atlas with the Wachowskis , which, while not a pure time-travel movie, certainly plays with the intertwined nature of time and memory.

Where to rent or buy Run Lola Run

Source Code (2011)

Duncan Jones made a splash with his 2009 feature directorial debut Moon , a moody, philosophical insight into possible lunar labor practices in the future. He followed that thoughtful film up with Source Code , which, while not a movie that could always be described as "thoughtful," could certainly be described as moody. Hitchcockian in a sense, Source Code follows the misadventures of a U.S. Army pilot ( Jake Gyllenhaal ), as he attempts to stop a terrorist attack on a Chicago commuter train — repeatedly.

Source Code does have something to say about the commodification of bodies and minds in the service of the so-called "greater good"; while Gyllenhaal's Captain Stevens' services are no doubt helpful, are they necessary, the film asks. Is it really a good idea to force someone to relive an incredibly stressful idea, over and over again? The movie has its funny moments, even in the thick of all the intense chase scenes through the train; EW noted back in 2012, "The director finds moments of humor in unlikely corners of that train of fools." Indeed. If you enjoyed a film like The Commuter (2018), but thought it could use a time loop and the potential of alternate realities, Source Code is your next mandatory viewing.

Watch Source Code on Showtime

Looper (2012)

Before Rian Johnson introduced us to Benoit Blanc or journeyed to a galaxy far, far, away , he made the tangled time-travel film fittingly called Looper . Starring Bruce Willis , Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a younger Bruce Willis, and Emily Blunt , Looper tells the tale of a contract killer sent after his next target: himself. This is a complicated film, and it is imperfect in a lot of ways, but its brutal appraisal of a possible dystopian future, and the efforts one man takes to prevent that future, are worth the amount of head-scratching you might find yourself doing throughout.

That Johnson likes his narratives to be impenetrable Gordian knots that only his designated protagonist can solve can perhaps be frustrating to the audience. However, if there's one thing that the Knives Out franchise seems to have reinforced, it's that not trying to unpack the mysteries of his work might work to your advantage as a viewer, because Johnson will probably have someone explain what just happened by the end, anyway. Like most of his films, Looper has a social conscience lurking within it as well. As EW's Lisa Schwarzbaum noted , "It's time to wipe the drops from our eyes or else get stuck in a loop, an endless cycle, a rut" about Looper 's core tenet back in 2012. It's a worthy takeaway from a film obsessed with self-fulfilling prophecies people find themselves within.

Watch Looper on Freevee

Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

Time loop movies need some incredible editing in order to really succeed, and Doug Liman 's enthralling Edge of Tomorrow certainly does so on that point. While Tom Cruise is the lead as a cowardly lion–turned–near-super soldier, all eyes are on Emily Blunt as Rita Vrataski, who rules this movie as one of the few heroes this dystopian, post-alien invasion world actually has left. While the quest Cruise and Blunt go on may be a bit convoluted, the film is so incredibly entertaining because it's so sharply cut, keeping up the pace even as we see similar things over and over and over again.

A tip of the hat must, of course, go to the action, which is as compelling as you would expect from a mega-star who seems determined these days to do all of his own stunts. In an era of often depressing science fiction, Edge of Tomorrow , as EW's Chris Nashawaty mentioned , is a fun, "deliciously subversive kind of blockbuster" to immerse your senses in for two hours, if nothing else.

Watch Edge of Tomorrow on Max

Interstellar (2014)

While this film might technically be considered more of a space opera than a time-travel movie, there's no reason it can't be both. Christopher Nolan 's Interstellar is a dazzling portrait not just of space travel, but of the love between a father and daughter that stretches over the thin fabric of both time and space. Matthew McConaughey as the astronaut father has never been so serious, but acclaim needs to go to Jessica Chastain and Anne Hathaway as Nolan's strongest women characters to date.

Interstellar varies between being almost too tense to stand, and, at other points, utterly relaxed. As a cinematic experience, it feels all-encompassing, using every possible outstanding special effect to draw its viewers in before the script hits them with emotional truth. While Nolan can certainly be considered " cold and clinical " as EW noted, his space-journeying meditation on the intersection between love and time is anything but.

Watch Interstellar on Paramount+

Palm Springs (2020)

Releasing a time loop movie during a global pandemic where life felt increasingly repetitive and bizarre was certainly a strategy for Hulu and Neon with Palm Springs , but it paid off. While the film was certainly developed long before COVID-19, the scenario of two wedding guests trying to escape the situational loop they've found themselves definitely resonated at the time, and it still does. Palm Springs may seem serious from the above description, but it is actually a fun sci-fi-tinged tale that is largely driven by the comedic skills of leads Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti .

EW noted that the movie avoids " true discomfort comedy ," and honestly, it's all the better for it. If Palm Springs had been angrier, it wouldn't hit home so hard, and it also wouldn't be nearly as entertaining. Instead, it's an often sweet rom-com that doesn't take itself or its completely made-up time loop physics too seriously. It was a Sundance darling for a reason, never quite letting up on the wild ride it takes its characters or its viewers on over the course of its 90 minutes.

Watch Palm Springs on Hulu

Somewhere in Time (1980)

Somewhere in Time might employ one of the strangest methods of time travel of all the movies on this list: time travel by hypnosis, of all things. (And self-induced hypnosis, for that matter.) Time travel on such shaky ground can't possibly hold up, and it somewhat doesn't, in the end. Science fiction great Richard Matheson adapted his own novel into a lackadaisical screenplay for this film, starring Christopher Reeve in a perfectly tragic role as the young man who gives his all for a woman (Jane Seymour) he can never really have.

In many ways, Somewhere in Time feels like a curio of the era from which it came, serving as a time capsule of how stories were told in the late-'70s and early-'80s. That is actually not a mark against it; this is a film that is just a peak tragic romance in a lot of ways; special nods must also go to Christopher Plummer as the young woman's cynical mentor, who seems to possess a certain foresight about the impossibility of Reeve's character. If you want a time-travel movie that is beautifully romantic, from its iconic score to its grand cinematography, you shouldn't stray from Somewhere in Time .

Watch Somewhere in Time on Tubi

Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)

The tale of a grown, about-to-be-divorced woman forced to relive her high school days and her courtship with a dorky-cool musician, Peggy Sue Got Married might be one of Francis Ford Coppola 's most small-scale movies, but it decidedly has the most soul of his catalog of mostly epics. Peggy Sue ( Kathleen Turner , in an Oscar-nominated performance) just wants to leave Charlie (Nicolas Cage) behind, but her time-traveling coma dream conspires against her to force her to reconsider. (It forces Charlie to become a better person, too.)

The film combines the cynicism of a rightfully embittered '80s housewife with the unbridled idealism of a '60s teenager to make one heck of a sincere cinematic concoction. That the film starts at a high school reunion could mean it becomes awkward very quickly, but instead, it's completely joyful. Whether Peggy Sue Got Married started a tradition of "person has some sort of crisis and subsequently ends up in another time" movies is unclear, but it does have a rather clear descendant in one of our next entries.

Where to rent or buy Peggy Sue Got Married

Kate & Leopold (2001)

Doesn't everyone want a young Hugh Jackman from the 19th century to fall out of the sky and into their lives? Leopold (Jackman) is a foppish and geeky, if not perfect, gentleman who quickly has Kate ( Meg Ryan ) falling for him despite her modern understanding of the world. That so many time-travel movies somehow end up in romantic territory is an interesting phenomenon, but one that does make sense. There is something appealing about falling for someone whose time is not your own.

Kate & Leopold is decidedly not a perfect film, although it is the first of director James Mangold 's and Jackman's collaborations (see 2017's Logan for the much grittier future fruits of their labor). It's fluffy, it's light, and it creates a paradox without even really acknowledging it. Someone looked at the Meg Ryan comedies of the '80s and '90s and asked, "But what if we made them science fiction?" It works in spite of itself, with Jackman's physical comedy as he plays " a doll of a boyfriend " and Ryan's sardonic tone carrying the day.

Watch Kate & Leopold on Paramount+

13 Going on 30 (2004)

When a 13-year-old girl is crushed after being tricked at her own birthday party, she makes a wish to be "30, flirty, and thriving," quickly waking up the next day to find herself just that, in the body of Jennifer Garner . Instead of traveling back to the past à la the protagonist of Peggy Sue Got Married , Jenna (Garner, Christa B. Allen) ends up in a potential future, where she is all the things she wished for, but definitely not as happy as she thought she would be.

The 2004 rom-com is a magical time travel tale — there's literally "magic wishing dust" — but that doesn't take away from the hilarity that comes with a 13-year-old trying to navigate an adult woman's life. Of course, in the end, Jenna learns her lesson — it's okay to just be young, for a little bit longer — but the journey she goes on as she discovers not just herself but also her true love ( Mark Ruffalo ) is worth all the silliness in the end.

Watch 13 Going on 30 on Max

Mirai (2018)

This lovely little gem directed by Japanese animation visionary Mamoru Hosoda tells the story of a little boy who unhappily gets a baby sister and ends up learning a lot of lessons about the past and the future. Kun (Moka Kamishiraishi) gets a chance to meet not only the grown, future version of his sister Mirai (Haru Kuroki) but also members of his family at different points in their lives. Mirai is a delightfully imaginative film with some gorgeous animation that contains some " mind-boggling visuals " as EW's Christian Holub pointed out.

It is also a genuinely heartwarming tearjerker; while all ends well for little Kun, the meditations this film offers on the nature of family bonds over the course of multiple generations might just leave you in a state of reflection on your own ties that bind. While many time-travel movies tell their stories from the perspective of youth, few unveil them through the eyes of a rambunctious preschooler, and gaining that perspective, in this case, allows for a truly precious journey.

Where to rent or buy Mirai

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)

If you know anything about Star Trek , you know the fourth film is "the one with the whales," but if you don't know anything about the franchise, you probably also know that this one is "the one with the whales." Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home often gets acclaim as the funny Star Trek movie, but it brings a lot more than just comedy. The original crew of the Enterprise fling themselves back in time to save humpback whales in the past in order to save the future from a strange probe that threatens Earth...and will stop, but only if it hears some natural whalesong.

The crew finds themselves in 1986 San Francisco, so it's great that Time After Time's Nicholas Meyer returned to the franchise not as director (he helmed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan ), but as a screenwriter. Watching these characters from a literal utopia navigate a world not designed for them creates not only dynamic humor but great tension as well. As they almost always do, the Enterprise team breaks all the rules in order to save the future as well as the whales. Or, as EW noted in a tribute to the film: "It has heart, and passion — Save the Whales! — and a tremendous sense of fun."

Watch Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home on Max

Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Star Trek: First Contact doesn't particularly feel as much like a Star Trek movie as Voyage Home does, and EW, in fact, says it harnessed "a sleek, confident style fully independent of its predecessors." As a Trekkie, this may not be the most complimentary way of looking at it, but as a film fan, however, it might be the highest honor someone could bestow upon a movie within this franchise. Captain Jean-Luc Picard ( Patrick Stewart ) turns from a peace-loving diplomat to a Borg-slaying action star while the rest of his crew tries to get the inventor of the Warp Drive (the technology upon which the future relies) to stop drinking so much and actually invent the thing. James Cromwell, as the inventor, Zefram Cochrane, serves as the comedic relief for a remarkably serious and often scary film.

The Borg, '90s Star Trek 's biggest villain, are the main antagonists here, and they do provide some chilling action, even if the introduction that they can easily time travel would really wreck things for some future Trek series. Stewart manages the transition from his mild-mannered diplomat to traumatized warrior well, turning in one of his most ferocious performances. Star Trek: First Contact also gives us a look at a post-apocalyptic world in the midst of a recovery, and in that respect, it makes it both a thoughtful entry in the Trek canon and a time travel action-thriller with a brain.

Watch Star Trek: First Contact on Max

The Terminator (1984) and Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

What would a best time-travel films list be without including at least one of the Terminator movies? While an often brutal franchise with diminishing returns after James Cameron 's first two installments, the misadventures of an evil cyborg-turned-good (played to physical perfection by Arnold Schwarzenegger ) in a consistently dangerous world are always thrilling and entertaining.

Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor, mother of the future's savior (and much, much more), is also due an acknowledgment; while the films are remembered for Schwarzenegger's portrayal of the T-800, Hamilton is the heart of this franchise a great deal of the time, as she refuses to die or let her son face the same fate, either. The first two Terminator films are so much more than "scary robots take over the world, everybody dies" – they're action-packed, bloody thrillers with startling narratives, pioneering visual effects, and, of course, time travel as the catalyst.

Watch The Terminator on Max

Where to rent or buy Terminator 2: Judgment Day

Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

"Wanted: Somebody to go back in time with me. This is not a joke...I have only done this once before. SAFETY NOT GUARANTEED": This is part of the joke classified ad from which this movie was inspired. You might inspire a more risky movie from the tone of the ad, but what you get is a light comedy that served as the first leading film role for Aubrey Plaza . This Colin Trevorrow -directed film isn't so much about time travel as it is about the cultural assumptions that surround the concept, and those who think it might be possible.

In that sense, it's a meta-narrative on nearly every time travel story which has come before it, and quite possibly, that will come after it. EW called it " a fable of 'redemption' "; redemption, and the acts of salvaging something, anything, for the benefit of the future, is a regular time travel theme, from all those time machines to all those time loops. Safety Not Guaranteed manages to explore these themes with a lot of irony and a splash of heart.

Where to rent or buy Safety Not Guaranteed

Related content:

• The Terminator movies, ranked
• Back to the Future cast: Where are they now?
• Let's talk about the plot of Interstellar

Related Articles

Things you buy through our links may earn  Vox Media  a commission.

The 25 Greatest Time-Travel Movies Ever Made

It must say something, surely, about humans, how often time-travel movies are about returning to the past rather than jumping to the future. As Mark Duplass’s forlorn character says in Safety Not Guaranteed , “The mission has to do with regret.” With all the potential to explore the unknown world of the future, so often when our minds conspire to bend the rules of time it’s instead to rehash the old. It’s compelling to watch a character in a movie do what we cannot — right past wrongs or uncover the reason for or meaning behind the events in their lives, whether they be emotionally catastrophic or merely geopolitically motivated.

So absent is the future from the canon, in fact, that when it is involved, typically future dwellers are leaving their own time to come back to the present. Back to the Future Part II aside, it seems as if there’s something about going forward in time that just doesn’t track for humans. (Of course, you could argue that this is because the present-day concept of bidirectional time travel would infinitely multiply or change beyond recognition any future that may occur, but that’s a knot for another article.)

In any case, the time-travel stories deemed worthy of Hollywood budgets aren’t always straightforward in their mechanics. Some films on this list barely qualify as time-travel movies at all; others could hardly qualify as anything else. There are movies about trips through time but also ones about the bending and fracturing and muddying thereof; then there are those about, as Andy Samberg aptly puts it in Palm Springs , “one of those infinite time-loop situations you might have heard about.” There’s even a movie in which we get only 13 seconds’ worth of time travel, when it functions more like a joke whose punch line hits at the film’s climax.

What these films all do have in common is a fascination with changing the way time works. That being said, the list leaves out movies in larger, more extended franchises in which time meddling is a one-off dalliance thrown into a sequel with little by way of foreshadowing: think Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban , Avengers: Endgame , and Men in Black III . (It also leaves off perhaps the Ur-time-travel movie, Primer , and the quite good Midnight in Paris because their directors don’t deserve the column inches.) We’re looking at self-contained stories using time mechanics from the start, with preference given to those that involve themselves more intently with the ins and outs of time travel; that ask questions about time, aging, memory and so forth; and that try to succeed at it in new and interesting ways. So let’s get to it.

25. Galaxy Quest (1999)

Does Galaxy Quest really count as a time-travel movie? Some compelling reasons argue that it doesn’t: Time travel isn’t a major factor in the plot, and the time traveling that does occur is, yes, only a 13-second jump. But its use of time travel is meaningful insofar as the movie itself is a loving spoof of Star Trek , which makes use of time travel in three films ( one of which made this list ), not to mention dozens of episodes across its various TV iterations. Tacking on time travel as a deus ex machina for the actors in a Star Trek– like show pressed into service as an actual space crew by an endangered alien race is the exact right amount of ribbing in a movie that’s as on point as it is hilarious.

Galaxy Quest is available to rent on Amazon .

24. Happy Death Day (2017)

Pick away at the surface of a time-loop movie and you find a horror movie. Most of the entries on this list are covered in enough feel-good spin to land as comedies, but Happy Death Day stares the horror of the time-loop phenomenon right in the face. (It’s also quite funny.) Reliving the same day over and over is an unimaginably potent form of psychological torture, and adding murder to the equation does little to dull that edge. The film follows a college-age protagonist struggling to escape from a masked slasher hell-bent on killing her again and again while she tries to solve the mystery of how she got stuck in a time loop.

Happy Death Day is available to rent on Amazon .

23. Back to the Future Part II (1989)

Seriously, this may be the only good movie in which the film’s whole focus is using a time machine to travel into the future. The fact that it’s a sequel is telling — the characters already traveled into the past in the first movie , and the filmmakers decided to save “traveling even further into the past“ for the third film in the trilogy. Still, Back to the Future Part II is a fun time that makes great use of sight gags and references, recasting scenes from the first film in the distant future year of 2015 with all its hoverboards and self-lacing Nikes.

Back to the Future Part II is available to rent on Amazon .

22. See You Yesterday (2019)

It’s a dirty little secret of time-travel movies that they tend to be, well, pretty white. Tenet ’s Protagonist aside, if Hollywood’s sending someone through time, they’re almost certainly not a Black person, and for obvious reasons: Most of post-contact North American history is deeply unfriendly to people of color, and the problems a person running around out of time and place is going to encounter are deeply compounded if they’ll likely be the target of racist abuse or violence — which makes See You Yesterday all the more compelling. Produced by Spike Lee and featuring one of filmdom’s most famous time travelers in a cameo role, it follows a Black teenage science prodigy who uses a time machine to try to save her brother from being killed by a police officer.

See You Yesterday is streaming on Netflix .

21. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989)

No offense to the Back to the Future franchise, but time travel never looks more fun on film than it does in the first Bill & Ted movie. It’s a concept that feels distinctly of a different era, so pure is its zaniness, that it’s hard to imagine anyone concocting it today. The titular duo, Californian high-school students in the ’80s, travel through the past looking for historical figures in order to ace a history project, then bring them all back to the present. High jinks ensue! We get Genghis Khan in a sporting-goods store and Mozart on an electric keyboard. What more could you want?

Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure is streaming on HBO Max .

20. Source Code (2011)

Time-travel-film aficionados know this won’t be Jake Gyllenhaal’s only stop on this list, but no matter. Source Code finds him repeating the same eight minutes over and over as he struggles to find the culprit in a train bombing — with each replay ending in his own death by explosion. For some reason, a romantic subplot is shoehorned into this, along with a bunch of frankly unnecessary technical mumbo-jumbo, but the core idea is a compelling mix of the time-loop movie and the train whodunit that Gyllenhaal is a perfect fit for.

Source Code is available to rent on Amazon .

19. 12 Monkeys (1995)

Some sort of law of nature dictates that every genuinely good idea and/or piece of true art has to at some point be turned into a Hollywood movie. Thank God La Jetée was adapted into something that can stand on its own feet artistically. 12 Monkeys may not retain its source material’s black-and-white look or stripped-down, static-image presentation, but it is a rollicking good time nonetheless. That’s in no small part due to director Terry Gilliam getting the best out of Bruce Willis and a young Brad Pitt, and recasting World War III as a planet-decimating virus. Which, like at least one other movie on this list , “speaks to the present moment,” or whatever.

12 Monkeys is available to rent on Amazon .

18. Run Lola Run (1998)

Unlike almost all of the other films on this list, the terms time travel and time machine don’t show up anywhere in Run Lola Run . Rather, it’s a sort of de facto time-loop scenario in which the protagonist tries repeatedly to pay a ransom to save her boyfriend’s life. In fact, if not for a few key details, it could easily be characterized (and often has been) as an alternate-endings movie rather than a time-travel film. But the fact that Lola seems to be learning from her past attempts with each successive one suggests that she is, indeed, using knowledge gained from previous loops to bring a satisfactory end to this situation.

Run Lola Run is available to rent on Amazon .

17. Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

One of the most striking things about Groundhog Day is the mutability and replicability of its core conceit. Perhaps the best case in point is Edge of Tomorrow , sometimes known as Live. Die. Repeat. after its original tagline. It’s the kind of physically grueling movie only an actor as genuinely unhinged as Tom Cruise could pull off. A noncombatant thrust into a war against invading aliens, Cruise’s character finds himself reliving day one of combat over and over, slowly but surely refining his techniques in order to survive the extraterrestrial onslaught. Like the central twosome in the much less violent Palm Springs , he winds up with a partner in (war) crime, teaming up with the similarly time-trapped Emily Blunt, and the explanation for the replay glitch here is actually pretty satisfying.

Edge of Tomorrow is streaming on Fubo TV .

16. Star Trek (2009)

If you could create some sort of an advanced stat to measure controversy generated per unit of interesting filmmaking decisions, J.J. Abrams would have to be near the top in terms of his ability to rig up movie drama from almost nothing. This is a guy whose filmography is like Godzilla rip-off, Spielberg homage, safe reboot of cherished IP, repeat. Star Trek may be his best film, though, a sure-footed reinvention of a dorky sci-fi franchise that made it, well, cool. Somehow, the beauty of Spock and Kirk’s bromance being woven through chance encounters with future selves kind of … works?

Star Trek is available to rent on Amazon .

15. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2006)

There’s a relative dearth of time travel in animated film, which perhaps is a function simply of the fact that it’s less impressive to stage in a world that’s already unreal. If you can Looney Tunes your way through physics, what’s so special about grabbing the flow of time and tying it into a bow? Still, the original Girl Who Leapt Through Time deserves mention here. It’s a beautiful story that interlaces the complexity of time leaping with the intensity of teenage emotion and the thorny process of growing up where the opportunity to redo things leads, over time, to growth — a less shitty Groundhog Day , in a way.

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is available to rent on Amazon .

14. Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

She may not be the most famous, decorated, or emulated actress of her generation, but Aubrey Plaza is someone whose personality spoke to the irony-soaked 2010s in a way that simply could not be denied. Her character on Parks and Recreation , April Ludgate, was, by all accounts, created specifically to channel Plaza’s real-life personality to the screen, and she plays essentially the same character in Safety Not Guaranteed . Here, she’s a sarcastic intern at a magazine working on a story about a would-be time traveler and using her feminine wiles to slowly gain his trust. The chemistry between Plaza and Mark Duplass is probably the film’s high point; the subplot about the FBI feels like it was clipped out of a bad X-Files episode.

Safety Not Guaranteed is streaming on Tubi .

13. La Jetée (1962)

At only a 28-minute run time, La Jetée is arguably too short to merit inclusion on this list. However, what it lacks in content (and in, well, moving images; it’s almost exclusively a collection of static black-and-white shots set to voice-over), it more than makes up for in inventiveness and influence, and it would be a travesty to leave it out in favor of more recent by-the-book fare. Tracing the tale of a man held prisoner in post-WWIII Paris being used in time-travel experiments as his captors seek to remedy the postapocalyptic state of the world, he’s sent into both the future and the past and ends up unraveling a lifelong personal mystery while he’s at it.

La Jetée is streaming on the Criterion Channel .

12. Planet of the Apes (1968)

Unlike the worse but more straightforwardly time-traveling Tim Burton remake, the relationship between the original Planet of the Apes and time travel is inexact — technically, the astronaut crew that lands on the titular planet does travel forward 2,000 years, but it’s not done via a time machine. The travel isn’t instantaneous: It literally does take them 2,000 years to get there; they’re just unconscious and on life support. Still, the way the film’s ending handles the iconic reveal is exactly in line with the best of the time-travel canon, the telescoping, mise en abyme feeling of the world shifting in front of your very eyes without your moving an inch.

Planet of the Apes is available to rent on Amazon .

11. Groundhog Day (1993)

The famous Bill Murray vehicle essentially invented the infinite-time-loop genre (and it’s hardly a movie that succeeds on the strength of its concept alone), but the idea at its core is so steeped in the casual misogyny of late-’80s and early-’90s cinema that it’s hard to watch today without cringing. Murray’s character employing what amounts to PUA-style techniques over and over and over in a desperate bid to fuck his hapless co-worker just doesn’t hit the way it did back then. If the story arc didn’t present a guy detoxifying himself of the worst aspects of masculinity in order to be worthy of a woman’s love as the primary way for a 20th-century white man to achieve full personhood, this would be much higher on the list.

Groundhog Day is streaming on Starz .

10. Predestination (2014)

This is probably the most complicated film on the list. Following a “temporal agent” (played by Ethan Hawke) who’s trying to prevent a bombing in 1970s New York, it’s based on a Robert A. Heinlein short story and features Shiv Roy herself, Sarah Snook, in a star-making turn as someone with a complicated backstory and a secret. Like the best sci-fi, the film’s premise raises all kinds of fascinating questions about the titular concept and throws in some interesting musings on sex, gender, and the self in the process.

Predestination is streaming on Tubi .

9. Looper (2012)

Wes Anderson gets a lot of flak for his overwrought twee visuals, but Rian Johnson has a knack for making movies that feel and function like dioramas even if they don’t look it. Narratively speaking, everything here is constructed just so — and there’s a certain beauty in that — but who ever had a profound experience of art by looking at a diorama? Looper was probably Johnson’s least precious pre– Star Wars film, which is nice because the temptation to drastically overmaneuver the mechanics of a time-travel story can lead to disaster. The tech used to Bruce Willis–ify Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s face is distracting, and the third act’s retreat from the postapocalyptic city of the future to the postapocalyptic corn farm of the future is a brave choice that the film struggles to land. Still, Johnson’s vision of a future in which organized crime runs time travel is compelling and well worth a watch.

Looper is streaming on Netflix .

8. Donnie Darko (2001)

Donnie Darko is a bit of a genre mash-up. Part high-school movie, part sci-fi flick, part bleak meditation on the soullessness of late-’80s America, it’s nevertheless a weirdly successful piece of filmmaking that makes fantastic use of a young Jake Gyllenhaal, a great supporting cast (Maggie Gyllenhaal, Drew Barrymore, Jena Malone, and Patrick Swayze among others), and an absolutely iconic haunting cover of Tears for Fears’ “Mad World.” Watching high schoolers navigate parallel universes, wormholes, and time travel is a dicey proposition, but director Richard Kelly makes it work, somehow.

Donnie Darko is streaming on HBO Max .

7. Back to the Future (1984)

While it’s clearly superior to the sequel (and leagues ahead of the final film in the trilogy), the original Back to the Future is a bit of a mess (John Mulaney was right , to be honest). Its racial and gender politics are cringey, and the incest subplot is weird (“It’s your cousin Marvin. Marvin Pornhub . You know that new plot element you’ve been looking for?”), but there’s a clear interest in time travel beyond its shimmering surface: the very real addressing of the “grandfather problem” in time travel via the slow disappearance of Marty from his family photo, the accidental invention of rock music, and a genuine curiosity about the nuts-and-bolts mechanics of time machines. Ahh, what the hell. It’s a romp.

Back to the Future is available to rent on Amazon .

6. Palm Springs (2020)

No offense to Gen-Xers and boomers, but the best time-loop movie of all time is Palm Springs . The film isn’t without its missteps, but it’s much more curious about life than Groundhog Day was through the eyes of Murray’s misanthrope. Cristin Milioti and Andy Samberg‘s characters, stuck in the loop together, are a perfect comedic match, and their shared humanity makes for a beautiful arc. The film raises questions about what’s worth doing in life when nothing lasts and how to stay sane when every day is the same. Of course, as a sort of polar opposite of Tenet , it benefited from coming out during the pandemic by speaking, as it does, to the experience of lockdown.

Palm Springs is streaming on Hulu .

5. Tenet (2020)

Interstellar wasn’t enough for Chris Nolan, apparently. Tenet ’s legacy may end up being little more than that of the COVID action movie no one saw — a bloated thriller that Nolan fought to get into theaters and bar from home viewing reportedly to swell the size of his own pockets. It really did suffer from bad timing, though, because this is genuinely a quintessential big-screen popcorn movie whose absurdity is all the more palatable when it’s given the audiovisual bombast it deserves. Ambitious in scope as it traces a war on the past by the future (yes, you read that right), Tenet is as enamored of action tropes as it is in bucking them, and its investment in rendering visible the brain-bendingly knotty mechanics of moving through time is laudable, even when the movie itself remains opaque — as impenetrable as the future, as hazy as the past.

Tenet is streaming on HBO Max .

4. The Terminator (1984)

A partner to Blade Runner in the mid-’80s invention of sci-fi noir, The Terminator is a stunning film in many ways, despite the third act’s now-iffy visual effects. While it’s not James Cameron’s debut, and it would go on to be bested by its sequel , it functions as an incredible showcase for an emerging young director who would exclusively make big stories for the rest of his career. Arnold Schwarzenegger is perfectly cast as the relentless, unemotional killer cyborg sent back from the future to terminate the mother of the eventual resistance leader, and the film’s romantic subplot has just the perfect amount of time-travel-induced cheesiness for it to work.

The Terminator is streaming on Amazon Prime Video .

3. Interstellar (2014)

It’s not inaccurate to say Christopher Nolan is a director who’s more interested in scale and scope than in expressing the minutiae of the human experience in its purest form. But in Interstellar, a Nolan movie in its titular ambitions, there’s a core element of time travel wrought not as sci-fi fireworks but as a paean to the sheer force and will of the power of love. It both does and doesn’t work, depending on your capacity for cheese in space, but even besides that, Nolan’s use of time as story arc — the way Miller’s planet functions, in particular — is conceptually masterful in the best kind of time-travel-movie way.

Interstellar is streaming on Paramount+ .

2. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

Whereas the franchise’s first movie spends more time on the question of time travel, in the second it takes a bit of a back seat to the action itself. It’s hard to fault director James Cameron for this decision; T2 remains one of the best action movies of the ’90s and — along with Jurassic Park and The Matrix — one of the decade’s best when for special effects. The groundbreaking T-1000 would honestly be enough to get this movie on the list; a tween John Connor grappling with questions of predestination and the fact that he is vicariously responsible for his own conception feel almost like icing on the time-travel cake. Much as in 12 Monkeys , time travel here is mistaken for delusion, as valiant Sarah Connor, in a Cassandra-esque nightmare, has to battle against the future only she knows is coming. Of course, Cassandra never had access to any firepower stored in underground desert arsenals.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day is streaming on Netflix .

1. Arrival (2016)

It’s fair to wonder whether Arrival really is, in fact, a time-travel movie. The Ted Chiang short story it’s based on isn’t about time travel per se; rather, it’s an exploration of alternate forms of temporal understanding. The linguist protagonist, played by Amy Adams, doesn’t travel through time so much as come to experience it differently. Still, the plot ends up hinging on foreknowledge that she is granted not via visions but by actually experiencing her future simultaneously with her present and past. For our purposes, though, that’s time fuckery enough to merit inclusion, and boy howdy does the film deliver in overall quality. Partly, that’s simply a question of the source material. Chiang is arguably the most talented (and possibly the most decorated) American sci-fi writer of his generation. But the source story is not especially Hollywood friendly, and director Denis Villeneuve has adopted it lovingly, borrowing a plot device from another of Chiang’s stories, the more straightforwardly time-travel-based “The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate,” in order to add some third-act blockbuster flavor. The result is a beautiful meditation on love, choice, and courage that packs art-film ethos into a genuine sci-fi blockbuster.

Arrival is streaming on Hulu and Paramount+ .

• vulture homepage lede
• timey-wimey
• vulture lists
• time travel
• vulture picks

Most Viewed Stories

• Cinematrix No. 157: August 30, 2024
• The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Premiere Recap: Sauron Unmasked
• This Is Not Angelina Jolie’s Big Comeback
• Welcome to New MILF Cinema
• Babygirl Might Just Be The Year’s Hottest Movie
• A Breakdown of Armie Hammer Allegations, Controversies, and Time-share Drama
• The Real Housewives of Orange County Recap: Traitor Joes

Editor’s Picks

Most Popular

What is your email.

This email will be used to sign into all New York sites. By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy and to receive email correspondence from us.

Sign In To Continue Reading

Create your free account.

Password must be at least 8 characters and contain:

• Lower case letters (a-z)
• Upper case letters (A-Z)
• Numbers (0-9)
• Special Characters (!@#$%^&*)

As part of your account, you’ll receive occasional updates and offers from New York , which you can opt out of anytime.

The 32 greatest time travel movies

You don't need a DeLorean to revisit these time travel gems

If you had the means to travel in time, where would you go? The past, or the future? For so long, filmmakers have wondered this same question, with more time travel movies than you can count. At least some of them happen to be - ahem, timeless classics.

While time travel has existed in the human imagination for centuries, with examples found in Hindu and Islamic mythologies, our modern understanding of time travel begins with early science fiction tales. Stories like The Year 2440 by French author Louis-Sébastien Mercier, Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy, and The Time Machine by H.G. Wells are some of the earliest and most popular uses of time travel in sci-fi. 

It should be no surprise that as soon as humans invented moving pictures, time travel became a recurring genre. (This is not to be confused with time loop movies, in which stories involve a set and finite time frame that "loop" back and start all over again.) Whether it's to prevent catastrophes or just fall in love, filmmakers have obsessed over time travel as a story device to explore what it really means to be human. With so many time travel movies to choose from, here are 32 of the greatest time travel movies ever made.

32. The Time Machine (1960)

It should be no surprise that the first feature film adaptation of H.G. Wells' seminal science fiction novella The Time Machine also qualifies as one of the best time travel movies ever made. Rod Taylor stars as a scientist inventor, also named "H. George Wells," whose invention of a time machine flings him to Earth's distant future where he sees mankind split between peaceful, gentle Eloi and the predatory Morlocks who feed on them. Though its primitive effects may be hard on modern eyes, George Pal's movie splits the difference between pulp slop and old-school magnificence.

31. Timecop (1994)

It's not saying much that Timecop, an adaptation of comic strips published by Dark Horse, is one of the best movies starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. But JCVD is in top form in Peter Hyams' corny '90s gem. Van Damme stars as a police officer in the Time Enforcement Commission who must stop a corrupt politician (played by Ron Silver) from influencing the past for personal gain. Although Timecop's comic book-y premise and wham-bam filmmaking renders it indistinguishable from other Van Damme flicks, it also happens to feature one of Van Damme's finest performances. 

30. The Time Traveler's Wife (2009)

Based on Audrey Niffenegger's hit debut novel, The Time Traveler's Wife stars Rachel McAdams as the wife of a Chicago librarian (Eric Bana) who suffers from a genetic disorder that causes him to spontaneously travel through time, making a stable life in the present difficult to maintain. Written by Niffenegger as an elaborate metaphor on her failed relationships, the sentimental and sappy movie version - from director Robert Schwentke - efficiently captures that painful desire to stay still in a life that pulls us apart. 

29. Déjà Vu (2006)

In their third collaboration together, actor Denzel Washington and director Tony Scott teamed up for the time travel thriller Déjà Vu. Washington plays a special agent who goes back in time to prevent a terrorist attack in New Orleans. While doing so, he falls in love with a beautiful victim (Paula Patton) and becomes determined to save her. While Déjà Vu isn't the best movie by Scott nor even the best from Scott and Washington's creative tag-teaming, it's still a gritty action thriller with a novel science fiction bent.

Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter

Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more

28. Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

While it may feel too "Tumblr twee" for some, Colin Trevorrow's Safety Not Guaranteed is an emotional comedy-drama about having trust in the impossible. A group of magazine journalists (played by Aubrey Plaza, Jake Johnston, and Karan Soni) investigate a curious classified ad that promises a time travel adventure; Mark Duplass plays the socially awkward grocery clerk who placed the ad, claiming to have a time machine. Safety Not Guaranteed notably launched Trevorrow into the realm of big budget blockbusters, with the director landing the gig of helming Jurassic World shortly after and, for a time, attached to the coveted ninth Star Wars movie. Safety Not Guaranteed is small fries in comparison, but the movie's flightful sensibilities showed what Trevorrow was capable of. 

27. Donnie Darko (2001)

It's a bit of a spoiler to detail exactly how time travel factors into Richard Kelly's morbid teen drama Donnie Darko. But in its tale about a troubled suburban teenager (Jake Gyllenhaal) who receives cryptic psychic messages from an ominous figure in a scary bunny costume, Donnie Darko explores adolescence as a vehicle to meditate on the nature of reality. Years later, Donnie Darko remains a cult classic, not only for its dark and cerebral tone and surprisingly star-studded cast, but for its enthralling portrait of teenage angst and depression through the lens of science fiction and comic book tropes.

26. Star Trek (2009)

In this modern reboot of the classic 1960s sci-fi television saga, the past and present collide in unexpected ways when villainous Romulans (led by Eric Bana) are flung to Starfleet past, changing the course of Star Trek history forever. As the starting point for what has been called the "Kelvin Timeline" - an alternate timeline diverting from original Star Trek canon - J.J. Abrams ' Star Trek satisfies fans both new and old with a zippy, crowd-pleasing blockbuster that is secretly about the burdens of history and legacy and the virtues of pursuing one's own path.

25. Midnight in Paris (2011)

Leave it to Woody Allen to create a time travel movie that isn't about aliens or A.I., but hanging out with famous literary icons. Owen Wilson stars as a dissatisfied screenwriter who, while on a trip to Paris with his fiance (Rachel McAdams), finds himself able to travel to 1920s Paris, meeting the likes of F. Scott Fitzgerald and befriending Ernest Hemingway. After a long period of movies that failed to live up to his established reputation, Allen enjoyed a brief career resurgence with his critically acclaimed Midnight in Paris, a jovial gem (with an excellent Corey Stoll as Hemingway) that romanticizes Paris regardless of whatever era you're seeing it. 

24. X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)

While parsing out the X-Men movie timeline can induce psychic shock, the 2014 tentpole X-Men: Days of Future Past is still one of the franchise's all-time strongest entries. Loosely adapting Chris Claremont's iconic comic book storyline, Bryan Singer's film version swaps Kitty Pryde for fan-favorite Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) who is psychically sent back in time to the 1970s to prevent Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage) from creating his menacing Sentinels that will doom mankind and mutantkind alike. With memorable set-pieces and a locked-in Jackman anchoring alongside Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy, the past and present collide like never before in this exquisite sci-fi superhero spectacle.

23. When We First Met (2018)

After falling in love at a Halloween party in 2014, lovestruck Noah (Adam Devine) uses a magical photo booth to relive the night he met the gorgeous and funny Avery (Alexandra Daddario), who only sees Noah as a friend. While Noah tries to relive and redo that night all over again, he quickly finds out that love is sometimes set in stone. Though Ari Sandel's sugary rom-com for Netflix may leave some audiences in the friend zone, for anyone familiar with the pangs of unrequited feelings, When We First Met is a breeze of a movie that can help us figure out why things happen for a reason - or for no reason at all. 

22. Hot Tub Time Machine (2010)

Raunchiness meets bitterness in the R-rated time travel comedy Hot Tub Time Machine. John Cusack, Rob Corddry, and Craig Robinson (plus Clark Duke, as Cusack's nephew) play unsatisfied adult men who - after a freak accident involving a hot tub and an energy drink spillage - find a way to time travel back to one fateful night in 1986. Determined to change their mediocre lives for the better, the men embark on reliving the greatest night of their young lives. With surprising depths of darkness, wistful nostalgia, and an underlying message to never take even one second for granted, Hot Tub Time Machine is more than its simplistic title leads on.

21. Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)

If your life ethos is to "Be excellent to each other!" and "Party on, dudes!" then you have Bill and Ted to thank. In this cult classic from 1989, Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter co-star as dim-witted high school students and aspiring rock stars who are desperate to pass their history class and avoid being enrolled in military school. With the help of an enigmatic figure - played by the legendary George Carlin - Bill S. Preston Esq. and Ted "Theodore" Logan travel in time to collect the world's greatest figures in history to help them pass. While Bill and Ted inadvertently threaten to change history, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure is, indeed, an excellent movie about the virtues of friendship and being true to oneself. 

20. Synchronic (2020)

In this time travel horror movie, two New Orleans paramedics - hard-drinking playboy and terminally ill Steve (Anthony Mackie) and family man Dennis (Jamie Dornan) - find a series of bizarre deaths linked to a designer drug called Synchronic, which induces abilities to travel in time. Dennis grows alarmed when his daughter goes missing at a party where Synchronic was rampant. With its explorations of loss and friendship, Synchronic is unlike many other time travel movies with a distinctly dark and grim atmosphere. It's complimented by the skillful filmmaking of Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, who have helmed films like Spring (2014), The Endless (2017), Something in the Dirt (2022), and the Marvel shows Moon Knight and Loki.

19. Click (2006)

Ever wondered what the "Beyond" was in Bed, Bath, and & Beyond? Adam Sandler found out in the 2006 comedy Click, where Sandler plays a workaholic family man who finds a universal remote that lets him travel in time. Though Sandler has fun "fast-forwarding" mundane moments, he soon finds out how critically important it is to relish every single minute you get in life. While Click initially polarized audiences and critics, it has slowly accrued goodwill, with some observers calling it one of Sandler's best and most mature movies behind Uncut Gems. 

18. Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002)

Oh, behave! In the third installment of the Austin Powers series, the out-of-time special agent Austin Powers (Mike Meyers, reprising one of his most iconic characters) is flung from 2002 back to 1975, teaming up with feisty FBI agent Foxxy Cleopatra (Beyoncé) and his own distant father, Nigel Powers (Michael Caine) to stop the mastermind known as "Goldmember." After spoofing spy-fi media of the 1960s, Jay Roach's Goldmember roasts the grittier, funkier era of '70s James Bond and Blaxploitation classics like Foxy Brown. 

17. Kate & Leopold (2001)

Can love transcend time? That's the idea behind Kate & Leopold, a most enchanting romantic comedy from James Mangold and starring Meg Ryan opposite Hugh Jackman. Jackman plays Leopold, the handsome Duke of Albany from the 19th century who falls through a time portal and ends up in 2001 Manhattan. While adjusting to the 21st century, he begins wooing a successful but lonely ad executive (Ryan). Kate & Leopold is good old fashioned Hollywood magic at its best, being a mismatched couples comedy that champions how love can triumph over all - even time itself.

16. About Time (2013)

Several years after The Time Traveler's Wife, Rachel McAdams again fell in love with a time traveler in Richard Curtis' sappy but sweet romantic dramedy About Time. Domnhall Gleeson plays an ordinary man who inherits a remarkable family power: the power to travel in time. (The only catch: They can only travel in their lived timeline, and never forwards.) Determined to use his power to find love, he becomes smitten with beautiful Mary (McAdams), though using time travel to maintain a perfect life involves a lot more risk than it seems. About Time plays fast and loose with its time travel rules, but the movie's irresistible premise and picturesque romance is enough to thaw even the most cynical of hearts.

15. Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)

After revolutionizing Hollywood filmmaking with his acclaimed gangster epics The Godfather and The Godfather Part II, Francis Ford Coppola lightened up with his lively comedy about middle-age regret and baby boomer nostalgia. In Peggy Sue Got Married, dissatisfied Peggy Sue (Kathleen Turner) is on the brink of divorcing her unfaithful husband Charlie (Nicolas Cage) when she faints at her 25th high school reunion. When she wakes up, she's back in her senior year of high school, learning she's been given a second chance at changing her life for the better.

14. Looper (2012)

Brick star Joseph Gordon-Levitt and director Rian Johnson reunite for one of the best time travel thrillers of the 2010s. Looper, released in 2012, takes place in a near future reality where time travel is possible but illegal; "loopers" are hired assassins who are sent back in time to kill specific targets. Things get complicated for a looper named Joe (Gordon-Levitt) who must "close the loop" when his older self (Bruce Willis) is sent back for him to kill. A trippy action-thriller that was critically acclaimed for its ingenious depiction of time travel, the buzzy success of Looper undoubtedly put Johnson on the map to later helm Star Wars: The Last Jedi in 2017.

13. See You Yesterday (2019)

Time travel whimsy meets timely social commentary in See You Yesterday from director Stefon Bristol and producer Spike Lee. Teenage science prodigies and best friends C.J. (Eden Duncan-Smith) and Sebastian (Danté Crichlow) invent backpacks that enable time travel; they use their inventions to save C.J.'s brother, who was killed by a racist police officer. But in trying to save her family, C.J. finds unforeseen problems in trying to alter the past. A beautiful mix of Amblin-esque adventure and the full weight of systemic racism, See You Yesterday - a sweeping picture about love and the ethics of genius - elevates the time travel genre into something more. 

12. Avengers: Endgame (2019)

To mark the end of Marvel's acclaimed Infinity Saga, directors Joe and Anthony Russo and writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely invited Marvel fans to take another lap around the Marvel Cinematic Universe with the time travel-oriented finale Avengers: Endgame. Following up on the events of Avengers: Infinity War, Endgame sees the Avengers reunite and hatch a scheme to reobtain the powerful Infinity Stones - all scattered throughout the MCU's vast canon - and restore a vanished populace, not to mention stop Thanos for good. Avengers: Endgame needs no introduction; it was and still is one of the biggest movies of all time.

11. Time Bandits (1981)

Terry Gilliam brings his strange sensibilities to a more mainstream family audience with his 1981 classic time Bandits. Craig Warnock stars as Kevin, a young boy with a fascination for history who is visited by time-traveling dwarves who plunder treasures from different historical periods. As Kevin joins the dwarves, they escape capture by Evil (David Warner), a malevolent entity who wants to steal the dwarves' map that lets them travel through portals. Time Bandits stands the test of, ahem, time, to look and feel like a riveting children's storybook come to life. 

10. Primer (2004)

In Shane Carruth's debut feature film, two engineers (played by Carruth and David Sullivan) accidentally discover the means of time travel. While experimenting with their discovery, they find out that time travel is a lot more complex than they thought it would be. Still an underground indie favorite to this day, Primer is remembered for its experimental plot structure that mixes philosophical theory with hard mathematics. Primer was concocted by Carruth, who actually majored in mathematics in college and previously worked as an engineer prior to becoming a filmmaker. Primer was a huge hit at the Sundance Film Festival and is still beloved for its cerebral exploration of the ethics of scientific discovery.

9. Time After Time (1979)

Nicholas Meyer pays tribute to the granddaddy of time travel storytelling, H.G. Wells, with his delectable time travel fantasy Time After Time. Malcolm McDowell plays H.G. Wells, who uses his time machine to finally apprehend Jack the Ripper (David Warner) after the famed serial killer escapes to modern-day San Francisco. While Time After Time tries to be a dark thriller, it can't help but have fun with H.G. Wells and Jack the Ripper exploring a most alien environment loaded with fast food chains and disco nightclubs. 

8. Somewhere in Time (1980)

Have you ever been in love so bad you were willing to get lost in time? Shortly after Christopher Reeve took off with Superman: The Movie, the actor strove to play against typecasting with Somewhere in Time. Directed by Jeannot Szwarc, Reeve stars as a playwright who becomes smitten by a beautiful stage actress (Jane Seymour) seen in a portrait dated 1912. Under hypnosis, Reeve's character ends up in 1912 and tries to find and woo the woman. He succeeds, but we won't spoil the devastating ending. While the movie endured bad reviews during its original release, it has since become a beloved romantic classic. The Grand Hotel in Michigan, where the majority of principal photography, hosts annual anniversary screenings of the picture every October.

7. 12 Monkeys (1995)

Terry Gilliam is no stranger to science fiction and time travel stories. One of his most successful Hollywood films to date is still the 1995 classic 12 Monkeys. Bruce Willis plays a convict from 2035 who is sent back in time to 1996 (though he ends up in 1990) to gather information about the terrorist plot that led to a virus wiping out most of humanity. Arriving at the right time to observe the paralyzing inundation of information at the end of the 20th century, 12 Monkeys mesmerized critics and audiences to become the number one movie for two weeks in January 1995. While not strictly a remake of the French New Wave sci-fi La Jetée by Chris Marker - Gilliam even claimed he hadn't even seen it before production - Universal Studios obtained the remake rights to Marker's film after producer Robert Kosberg successfully pitched the studio 12 Monkeys as a movie heavily inspired by it. In 2015, a hit TV series remake premiered on Syfy.

6. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)

Time travel isn't exclusive to science fiction. In the 2004 sequel to the hit fantasy film saga, Mexican auteur Alfonso Cuarón adapts the book of the same name which sees the increasingly aging Hogwarts trio - Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermoine (Emma Watson) and Ron (Rupert Grint) - meet the wizard criminal Sirius Black (Gary Oldman) who has connections to Harry's family. A key part of Prisoner of Azkaban's story involves a magical device that lets the characters travel in time; some of the film's most memorable and deliciously staged set pieces center around ingenious depictions of time travel.

5. Source Code (2011)

In the aftermath of major events like 9/11, some Hollywood filmmakers dared to ask if time travel could stop acts of terrorism. Enter: Source Code, from director Duncan Jones. Jake Gyllenhaal stars as a U.S. soldier tasked with using a cutting-edge government program called "Source Code" to relive the final minutes of a commuter train prior to its bombing and identify the terrorist behind it. The catch is that Gyllenhaal's character enters the program inhabiting the body of another unknown man, which creates problems for both himself and the unknown man's beautiful companion (Michelle Monaghan). Jones' movie is a muscular action-thriller that successfully combines time travel with time loop stories, perfectly balancing the two to become something totally unique. 

4. Tenet (2020)

Christopher Nolan is a filmmaker obsessed with time as a thematic motif. But in 2020, Nolan was in top form with his summer sci-fi Tenet. John David Washington stars as the nameless agent, going only by "The Protagonist" who must navigate the twilight world of international espionage to stop the powerful arms dealer Andrei Sator (Kenneth Branagh) and prevent World War III. To accomplish this, he teams up with another enigmatic agent (Robert Pattinson) and the beautiful wife of Sator, Kat (Elizabeth Debicki), all while using the newest tool in his arsenal: inverted entropy, basically the reverse physics of an object in time. Confused yet? A lot of people were. But that hasn't stopped Tenet from amassing a dedicated fanbase who insist that Tenet isn't a movie you think about, but rather feel.

3. Your Name (2016)

In this sweeping animated romantic fantasy by acclaimed director Makoto Shinkai, two teenagers (voiced by Ryunosuke Kamiki and Mone Kamishiraishi in the original Japanese language, and Michael Sinterniklaas and Stephanie Sheh in the English dub) mysteriously find themselves swapping bodies. In their efforts to better understand what is going on, they find a deeper connection linked to a tragic natural disaster. A time travel movie unlike so many others, Your Name was celebrated upon release for its gorgeous visuals and equally breathtaking story about fate, love, and intertwined destinies that transcend time itself.

2. The Terminator (1984) and Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

Arguably the definitive time travel action blockbusters, James Cameron 's Terminator movies are simply unstoppable. Arnold Scwharzenegger is in top form as the T-800, who is initially dispatched to kill the mother of mankind's hero John Connor, a woman named Sarah (Linda Hamilton). In the bigger, somehow better sequel Terminator 2, Schwarzenegger returns as a repurposed T-800 to save both Sarah and her 12-year-old son John Connor (Edward Furlong). Despite numerous sequels, nothing can top the tech-noir transcendence of the first two Terminator entries.

1. The Back to the Future Trilogy (1984-1989)

Robert Zemeckis' '80s classic trilogy is, without question, one of the greatest time travel adventures ever told, an untouchable sci-fi trilogy if there ever was one. In the first movie, teenager Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) accidentally travels to 1955 and must figure out a way to get his own parents to fall in love again after his presence disrupts the whole town. In the sequels, Marty travels to the "future" year of 2015, and then the distant past of the Old West, all with the help of Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd) and a ridiculously tricked-out DeLorean. The Back to the Future trilogy is foundational for an entire generation, and it's not hard to see why. The movies are fast, fun, and unforgettable, a movie that doesn't need roads to take us away.

Eric Francisco is a freelance entertainment journalist and graduate of Rutgers University. If a movie or TV show has superheroes, spaceships, kung fu, or John Cena, he's your guy to make sense of it. A former senior writer at Inverse, his byline has also appeared at Vulture, The Daily Beast, Observer, and The Mary Sue. You can find him screaming at Devils hockey games or dodging enemy fire in Call of Duty: Warzone.

The 35 greatest Star Wars movie moments

Rumored The Mandalorian & Grogu actor confirms she'll be starring in the movie

Eric Barone says "I have not touched Haunted Chocolatier in a long time" because he's still working on getting Stardew Valley 1.6 to console

Most Popular

• 2 Visions of Mana review: "A beautifully sculpted 3D world that disappoints in a thousand small ways"
• 3 Star Wars Outlaws review: "An exceedingly fun Star Wars game that's hindered by poor stealth systems"
• 4 Madden 25 review: "A good game, but not a great one"
• 5 Black Myth: Wukong review – "A great action RPG that feels like God of War for Chinese mythology"
• 2 The Crow review: "Hard to imagine this forgettable take will enjoy the same legacy as its 1994 predecessor"
• 4 Kneecap review: "This fictional hip-hop biopic is an unruly mosh-pit of humor and energy"
• 5 The Outrun review: "Saoirse Ronan is exceptional in this affecting drama about addiction and hope"
• 2 Slow Horses season 4 review: "Apple TV's masterful spy drama remains one of the best shows on right now"
• 3 The Umbrella Academy season 4 review: "Like any good family reunion, most frustrations can be waved away, at least in the moment"
• 4 House of the Dragon season 2 episode 8 review: "Excellent sequences can’t save a finale that’s all set-up and no conclusion"
• 5 Batman: Caped Crusader review: "A reinvention of a classic"

The 35 Best Time Travel Movies

Ready for 1.21 gigawatts of sci-fi greatness?

These are the 35 best sci-fi films that explore the fluidity of time.

🤯 You love mind-bending science. So do we. Let’s nerd out over it together.

35. Timecop

Jean-Claude Van Damme is a cop who polices time. Don’t need to say more, but I guess I will. In 1994, time travel becomes a favorite pastime of criminals, and timecops like Van Damme must catch any chronal abusers and bring them to justice. As is often the case, Van Damme’s own time-muckery with the past creates different and divergent timelines that not even Doc Brown’s chalkboard could work out. But Timecop isn’t exactly a film that’s going for narrative clarity here.

34. The Final Countdown / The Philadelphia Experiment

Although most people would file this film under “flop,” The Final Countdown contains such an amazing premise it has to be recognized. The crew of the U.S.S. Nimitz enters a storm vortex and is transported to Pearl Harbor in 1941, turning a favorite imaginary war-game scenario into real life. Although the actual film elements aren’t necessarily memorable, it does give us an incredibly good look at the Nimitz (the film was shot on the actual carrier).

We tossed in The Philadelphia Experiment at the same spot, since it’s essentially the reverse of The Final Countdown .

33. Men in Black 3

By the time director Barry Sonnenfeld directed Men in Black 3 in 2012, the franchise was 15 years removed from its fun and campy original, and Men in Black 2 had sucked out much of the charm. That’s why MiB 3 , despite its faults, is still a surprising underdog of a film.

Agent J (Will Smith) goes back in time to stop an alien from mucking up the past and killing Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones/Josh Brolin). The film recaptures much of the original’s fun, and Josh Brolin’s portrayal of a young Tommy Lee Jones playing Agent K is simply awe-inspiring. Honestly, that acting work alone earns this spot for MiB 3.

32. Flight of the Navigator

Sort of like E.T. , but with time travel. What Flight of the Navigator lacks in a substantial plot, it more than makes up for in charm.

David Scott Freeman falls into a ravine and is knocked unconscious—for eight years. Although he doesn’t age, everyone he knows does, and he soon finds he’s part of something much larger. It’s a fun film that will never outshine any Spielberg classics, but its campiness is too genuine to ignore.

31. Time After Time

H.G. Wells, Jack the Ripper, and time travel ... that’s it . Just click the arrow.

30. Timecrimes

A film with perhaps the lowest budget on this list, Timecrimes is a Spanish-language movie that follows a typical time travel trope (many copies of one person causing major problems) but creates 92 minutes of truly enjoyable cinema. The fun moments of Timecrimes are the reveal after reveal after reveal, which snowballs into a fascinating plot.

29. Source Code

Source Code is like Groundhog Day and Edge of Tomorrow with a twist. Instead of going back in time as himself, Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) enters the body of someone else as he tries to stop a mass murder attempt. What the film lacks in depth, it more than makes up for in pulse-pumping action, and the premise itself is a refreshing take on the usual time travel idea.

It will likely never be considered an example of high science fiction, but as far as time travel goes, it gets good grades.

28. Donnie Darko

Perfect amounts creepy and perplexing, Donnie Darko is another strange example of time travel, which is why it belongs on this list all the more. Darko (Gyllenhaal again) is a high school kid with a less-than-sunny disposition. But when he begins seeing frightening hallucinations of a deranged and grotesque rabbit, things slowly begin to unravel, going from bad to weird pretty quickly.

For such a small-budget film (that was almost released straight to home video!) it’s made an outsized impact on science fiction and indie filmmaking. It’s a great movie, but also a polarizing one.

27. Safety Not Guaranteed

Director Colin Trevorrow’s debut film Safety Not Guaranteed follows three journalists—well, one journalist and two interns—on a road trip to meet the eccentric Kenneth (Mark Duplass), who placed an ad in a local newspaper looking for a time-travel companion. Although at its heart a romantic comedy, the film explores human perception of time and the indelible regrets, traumas, and even fantasies that fill our memories. Although the idea of actual time travel plays a significant role in the film, it’s used mostly as a symbol to analyze the importance of being present and always looking with hope toward the future.

26. X-Men: Days of Future Past

Smashing together the old X-Men guard with the new is what makes X-Men: Days of Future Past one of the more successful cinematic outings for the mutant team.

In the film, Kitty Pryde sends Wolverine back through time to stop apocalyptic events from unfolding. Maybe that’s not the most original plot, but it’s one that’s too fun to resist (if only for the Quicksilver scene alone ).

25. Predestination

Based on Robert Heinlein’s sci-fi short story “All You Zombies,” Predestination is a head trip, like any proper time travel film should be. With a strong performance from Ethan Hawke and a script that will keep you guessing, the film is one of the more solid time travel entries in recent years and is a film that garners a rewatch so you can catch every detail.

24. Star Trek: First Contact

The Next Generation ’s big screen outings are a mixed bag, to put it nicely, but the best film by far is the time-bending Star Trek: First Contact . Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the USS Enterprise-E travel to the past to prevent the cybernetic Borg from mucking with Earth’s history. It’s a good film all by itself, but even more excellent if you’re an invested Star Trek fan. We get to see huge, never-before-seen moments in the Star Trek universe, like humanity’s first encounter with the Vulcans, and the Borg are just an excellent adversary.

23. Army of Darkness

“Shop Smart. Shop, S-Mart.”

Depending on who you ask, Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness is either the best sequel to any film ever, or the worst—there isn’t much room in between. The chainsaw-toting Ashley “Ash” Williams is tossed back to medieval times where he must fight off a horde of undead monstrosities with only his ingenuity and his “boom stick.”

Even though it’s slapstick comedy with wonderfully B-movie action sequences, it remains an absolute joy to watch.

22. Doctor Strange

In this Marvel sleeper hit , Stephen Strange (played by Benedict Cumberbatch) becomes the Sorcerer Supreme, and in typical Marvel fashion, is tasked with saving the world. Although the visuals alone are worthing giving this movie a shot, its manipulation of time as a superpower rather than a world-altering plot device is what sets it apart from the rest.

21. Sleeper

Although not technically time travel (long stretches of cryo-sleep instead), Sleeper is Woody Allen’s sci-fi comedy that’s absurd, hilarious, and strangely poignant. Miles Monroe is a jazz musician and health-food-store owner who wakes up in the 22nd century after a botched gall bladder operation. The world is, as you’d expect, quite different, and Monroe is a hilarious character to explore it with.

Tenet is an “A for effort” addition to this list. The film has all the trappings of a Christopher Nolan flick—stunning cinematography, a star-studded cast, head-scratching plot points, etc., etc. And Tenet does take time travel movies one step further with the introduction of time inversion, the idea that objects and people can travel into the past at the same temporal pace that they can travel into the future. Although a fascinating concept, it’s also a confusing one, which is why Nolan spends much of the film’s 150-minute runtime explaining what’s going on. Tenet is a fascinating time travel story though ultimately one a bit lost in its own exposition.

19. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

This 2006 award-winning anime is a coming-of-age time travel story that even rivals Back to the Future . After schoolgirl Mokoto Konno discovers a time travel device that gives her the power to leap through time, she uses her new gifts for mundane high school stuff, passing tests, avoiding awkward conversations, and to address her chronic lateness.

When she learns what her time traveling does to others around her, and as the seriousness of her time jumping becomes more apparent, the film blossoms into an important story about loss and friendship.

Crime noir meets science fiction in Rian Johnson’s Looper , and the match is magical. In a future where time travel is invented and immediately made illegal, crime syndicates use the technology for time-hopping assassinations. But to tie off some temporal inconsistencies, the assassin must eventually become the target—and that’s where things get interesting. This isn’t flawless sci-fi, but it’s certainly inventive.

17. Run Lola Run

On its surface, the German film Run Lola Run is about a blazingly red-headed woman running through the streets of Berlin in an attempt to save her boyfriend’s life. However, the twist is that once Lola reaches a dead-end (sometimes literally) in one of her runs, the film starts over from the beginning and Lola runs through Berlin once again, only this time small changes in her path create largely divergent outcomes by the film’s end. Although time is more of a thematic device than a strictly plot-driven one in Run Lola Run, its ruminations on time and the exploration of the Butterfly Effect , the idea that small incidents can have lasting repercussions, makes Run Lola Run one of the most unique films on this list.

16. Avengers: Endgame

What happens when the big purple monster man annihilates half the population? Time travel, baby. Tony Stark and gang concoct a convoluted plan that’ll save the universe from being cleaved in two, including some very inventive scenes that play with time travel. Like most time travel plots, Endgame creates more questions than it answers, but it’s best to just sit back and enjoy.

Darren lives in Portland, has a cat, and writes/edits about sci-fi and how our world works. You can find his previous stuff at Gizmodo and Paste if you look hard enough. 

.css-cuqpxl:before{padding-right:0.3125rem;content:'//';display:inline;} Movie Reviews .css-xtujxj:before{padding-left:0.3125rem;content:'//';display:inline;}

The Best Documentaries to Stream on Netflix

The 25 Best Sci-Fi Movies on Netflix Right Now

All the Sci-Fi Movies You Need to See in 2019

The 40 Best Sci-Fi Scenes

'Annihilation' Is a Sci-Fi Slog That's Worth It

'Mute,' Netflix, and the Future of SciFi Streaming

'Black Panther' Is a Marvel Film Unlike Any Other

'Valerian' Stumbles Into an Amazing Sci-Fi World

'Mad Max: Fury Road' Is Pure, Ridiculous Mutant Car Fun

A 9-Year-Old Reviews 'Avengers: Age of Ultron'

The Fast and the Furious, Cuban Style

• Stranger Things Season 5
• Deadpool and Wolverine
• The Batman 2
• Spider-Man 4
• Yellowstone Season 6
• Fallout Season 2
• The Last of Us Season 2
• Entertainment
• Streaming Guides

10 best time travel movies of all time, ranked

Time travel movies may all share a core premise, but there’s a surprising variety of films that explore different ideas within the genre. Characters being transported through time can be caught in action-packed adventures, romantic entanglements, and even philosophical loops that can change the trajectories of their lives.

10. About Time (2013)

9. idiocracy (2006), 8. looper (2012), 7. your name (2016), 6. edge of tomorrow (2014).

• 5. Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989)

4. 12 Monkeys (1995)

3. terminator 2: judgment day (1991), 2. groundhog day (1993), 1. back to the future (1985).

From the underrated sci-fi romance flick About Time , to the beloved ’80s classic Back to the Future , the best time travel movies explore the countless possibilities that arise when characters are flung through the past, present, and future. The greatest entries in the genre range from silly mindless comedies to hard-hitting emotional movies, ensuring that there’s a perfect time travel film for every type of viewer.

About Time follows Tim Lake (Domhnall Gleeson), who, on his 21st birthday, learns a family secret from his father, James Lake ( Love Actually ‘s Bill Nighy). The men in the Lake family inherit the ability to time travel, which Tim immediately uses to improve his life in tiny, but crucial ways, particularly his romantic involvement with Mary (Rachel McAdams). He soon learns that time travel doesn’t make him immune to heartache and troubles, though.

Director Richard Curtis’ romantic sci-fi drama weaves a beautiful and surprisingly tearjerking tale that underscores the importance of the small details that make life worth living. The time travel element is used to highlight Tim’s evolving relationships with his partner, friends, and family, as well as what those connections teach him. About Time reminds viewers to embrace the fleeting and imperfect moments that often end up becoming the most cherished memories.

Director Mike Judge’s comedic sci-fi satire revolves around an average Joe serving as a U.S. Army librarian, who’s selected to participate in a top secret military experiment that goes wrong. Chosen for being the “most average individual” in the military, Joe Bauers (Luke Wilson) is put in hibernation alongside a woman, Rita (Maya Rudolph). They’re forgotten about and eventually wake up in the year 2505, where the intellectual bar has plummeted, making Joe the smartest person on earth.

Idiocracy is a hilarious, yet unsettling satire that shows the extreme consequences of consumerism and capitalism. The future it portrays is dominated by ads and low-brow pop culture consumed by an anti-intellectual population. Joe’s basic suggestions like not watering crops with a popular sports drink end up transforming the nation, making his unintentional trip through time a positive one. Although this film wasn’t received well when it first premiered, the box office bomb has become a cult classic with a dedicated fan base today.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as a hired gun in director Rian Johnson’s Looper , which is set in a future world where time travel technology exists. Only the wealthy criminal organizations from the future have access to it, though, and they use it to eliminate their targets by sending them to the past, where “loopers” like Joe kill them. When Joe’s boss “closes the loop” by sending the protagonist’s future self (played by Bruce Willis) back in time, his present version can’t bring himself to shoot him.

Although its logic is shaky at times, Looper mostly achieves what it set out to do, which is be an engrossing action-thriller that also touches on the cyclical nature of time. The film is bolstered by fantastic performances and the obvious chemistry between its leads, Gordon-Levitt and Willis, who masterfully play the roles of two different versions of the same man.

In director Makoto Shinkai’s visually stunning anime Your Name , two high school students form a mysterious cosmic connection despite having never met. Mitsuha Miyamizu (Mone Kamishiraishi) and Taki Tachibana (Ryunosuke Kamiki) wake up one day to find themselves in each other’s rooms, with the sudden body swap initially leading to chaos and then unexpected joyful moments in their lives. They eventually learn the true reason for their unique situation.

A gorgeous and moving combination of fantasy and romance, Your Name chronicles the unlikely relationship that forms between the two main characters as they fall in love with each other with every new day of body swapping. It would be impossible to discuss the movie’s time-bending twist without spoiling its well-written plot, but audiences who are fans of anime films should definitely consider the modern classic essential viewing.

Edge of Tomorrow sees a future version of Earth that’s overrun by seemingly invincible aliens. Tom Cruise stars as Major William Cage, an inexperienced soldier who’s assigned to a suicide mission that almost immediately kills him. Instead of actually dying, Cage ends up in a time loop where he uses what he learns about the aliens to plot against them, even if that means dying over and over again.

Alongside Emily Blunt, who plays the role of the equally determined Sergeant Rita Vrataski, Cage embarks on a relentless quest to find the aliens’ weakness. It becomes impossible not to root for the determined Cage, who endures one brutal death after another alongside his team of brave soldiers, especially as the action sequences and accompanying special effects escalate and build toward an explosive conclusion.

5. Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989)

Before Keanu Reeves was an action star , he starred in the movie Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure , a wacky time travel comedy and adventure flick. The film follows the two titular high school friends, Bill (Alex Winter) and Ted (Reeves), whose desperation to pass their history class leads to their encounter with a time traveler, Rufus (George Carlin). The duo uses Rufus’s time machine to travel to different points in history and meet significant figures who can help them with their crucial presentation for the class.

Director Stephen Herek’s Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure is silly in the best way, with the film never taking itself too seriously and piling on one absurd plot point after another. Its protagonists’ meetings with historical figures like Napoleon Bonaparte, Billy the Kid, and even Joan of Arc are often gut-busting, as Bill and Ted end up involved in those individuals’ most important actions.

Director Terry Gilliam’s 12 Monkeys portrays a postapocalyptic future where a plague has wiped out most of the population. The surviving humans are confined in bunkers and scientists decide to send the criminal James Cole (Bruce Willis) back to the 1990s to learn more about how the disease started. After an excruciating trip, James lands in a mental health facility for claiming to be from the future. There, he meets the paranoid Jeffrey (Brad Pitt), who’s about to play an important role in releasing the virus.

12 Monkeys is a gritty and chaotic film in the best way possible, with James and Jeffrey’s frenetic interactions effectively building dread as they slowly reveal more about humanity’s fate. Bruce Willis gives an amazing performance as the confused, tortured, and terrified protagonist, whose limited perspective defines what audiences know and don’t know about the origin of the man-made virus.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day is often used as an example of a sequel that’s better than the original , and for good reason. The stakes are higher than ever before in director James Cameron’s legendary sci-fi action classic, which has the original Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger) returning from the future, this time to protect Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton), as well as her son, John (Edward Furlong). The trio are pursued by another Skynet Terminator, whose task to kill the future leader of the human resistance endangers humanity’s fate.

The incredible sequel is considered not just the best from the franchise, but one of the greatest sci-fi and action movies ever made. Its groundbreaking use of special effects has helped it age well, not to mention its flawlessly choreographed action sequences and endlessly quotable lines like “Come with me if you want to live!” and “Hasta la vista, baby.”

Director Harold Ramis’s Groundhog Day is the quintessential time loop movie that everyone should see at least once. The comedy-fantasy film stars Bill Murray as the cynical and self-centered weatherman Phil Connors, who’s assigned to cover the Groundhog Day events in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. While there, Phil finds himself suddenly and inexplicably trapped in a time loop, forced to relive the same day over and over again.

Groundhog Day may be a comedy, but it won over audiences with its philosophical message, which reveals itself as Phil goes through various emotions in the process of repeating the same day. The ordinary is transformed into the extraordinary as the protagonist finally stops to notice the small things that make life beautiful. Murray is perfectly cast as the weatherman whose predicament soon teaches him more than a few valuable lessons, and his excellent performance also proved that the comedy star could take on more serious roles, too.

One of the best sci-fi movies of the ’80s , Back to the Future is a nostalgic classic that needs no introduction. Director Robert Zemeckis’ enduring time travel adventure is centered on California teen Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox), who accidentally ends up in 1955 after testing out Doc Brown’s (Christopher Lloyd) time-traveling DeLorean. While there, he runs into young versions of his parents and mistakenly prevents them from falling for each other, which threatens Marty’s existence.

The influential flick is likely the first film many think of when considering the greatest time travel movies ever. It’s just an entertaining film with a well-executed story that relies heavily on the performances and chemistry of Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd, whose characters would become pop culture icons. The original Back to the Future would also go on to spawn a successful franchise that continues Marty and Doc Brown’s story in exciting ways.

Editors’ Recommendations

• 10 best movie heroes of all time, ranked
• 10 best PG-rated movies streaming right now

Labor Day typically signals the end of summer. It's our last chance to take that weekend road trip, lounge at the beach, or spend a leisurely evening watching a great movie. Considering how hot it's been for much of the continent this summer, lots of people are probably eagerly awaiting the cooler weather, but there's always a bit of summer magic that seems to flutter away once Labor Day comes to a close.

So, why not celebrate the last glimpse of summer with some great comedies? Whether you want a movie about slacking off at work (it is Labor Day after all), some family vacationing gone wrong, or one of the funniest shark movies ever made, be sure to check out these five great comedy movies over the holiday weekend.

The last weekend of the month is always an awkward time for Amazon Prime Video, especially since September's new movies won't be arriving until Sunday, September 1. But in the meantime, Prime Video subscribers can close out the month with The Hobbit trilogy just in time for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season 2.

Additionally, Prime Video has the original adaptation of The Crow, as well as recent arrivals Drive-Away Dolls, 10 Cloverfield Lane, Jackpot! and Paddington. That's a good lineup that should get you through the holiday weekend. And you can find more of the best movies on Amazon Prime Video below.

Though some might dread the beginning of the fall this September, many can look forward to a relaxing three-day weekend thanks to Labor Day. This break should give people the chance to enjoy themselves with a movie at home.

Fortunately, there are many great films that will be available to stream at the start of September. While everyone's still making plans for the holiday, here are 10 great movies to stream this Labor Day weekend.

The 15 Most Creative, Mind-Bending Time Travel Movies Ever Made

With Safety Not Guaranteed and About Time , these are the best movies about time travel you haven't seen yet.

We've been independently researching and testing products for over 120 years. If you buy through our links, we may earn a commission. Learn more about our review process.

Ever wish you could go back in time and handle a situation differently — or live through a historic event before your time? You're not the only one. Time travel has captured the imagination of countless creatives over the years, giving us some fascinating, morally challenging and even hilarious movies. We may not be able to talk a walk into the past — but as some of these films prove, that may be a good thing.

Whether you're in the mood for an adorable romantic comedy, a nail-biting action movie , or a haunting sci-fi movie , these time-traveling movies cross every genre. So once you exhaust everything on your Netflix list, these are the best time travel movies to watch. Don't forget the popcorn (ahem, we recommend these popcorn makers ).

About Time (2013)

Instead of altering history and life as we know it, the protagonist in this charming British film uses his time-traveling abilities for something a little more relatable: finding love. The result is a surprisingly sweet and criminally underrated romantic comedy.

RELATED: The 60 Best Romantic Comedies of All Time to Stream Right Now

Predestination (2015)

Based on Robert Heinlein’s short story All You Zombies , this Ethan Hawke movie will leave you guessing (and second-guessing) the whole time. Without spoiling the ending, it's definitely worth watching again.

The Time Traveler's Wife (2009)

Of the three movies where Rachel McAdams dates a time traveling man (girlfriend's got a type), the drama is definitely the most serious. Based on Audrey Niffenegger's 2003 novel of the same name, Clare tries to build a life with the man she loves — while dealing with the fact he has no control over where and when he will travel through time.

Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)

Excellent! You're going to want to revisit this goofy, fun time travel flick before Keanu Reeves returns for the upcoming sequel.

Groundhog Day (1993)

Does living the same day over-and-over again count as time travel? This Bill Murray film about a weather man trapped in the worst day of his life is a classic, so we're going to count it.

Doctor Strange (2016)

Marvel fans are probably already familiar with Benedict Cumberbatch's role as a neurosurgeon with the powers to access alternate dimensions, but even if you're not familiar with the Marvel Universe, you can still enjoy this superhero romp.

RELATED: How to Watch All 24 Marvel Movies in the Correct Order

Back to the Future (1985)

If you're looking for some good, old-fashioned nostalgia, this 80s classic holds up! Michael J. Fox stars as Marty McFly, a teen who accidentally who accidentally gets stuck in the 1950s thanks to his mad scientist friend — and must make sure his parents fall in love with each other so he can still exist!

Interstellar (2014)

Trippy, mind-bending, and everything you want out of a time-travel movie, Christopher Nolan's time-traveling space epic will stay with you long after you finish watching,

Donnie Darko (2001)

Though it initially flopped at the box office, this film gathered a cult-following when it was released on DVD, thanks to Jake Gyllenhaal's intense performance and the surrealist images and themes just waiting to be dissected and discussed. See if you can untangle this famously dense plot for yourself.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)

One of the best Harry Potter films happens to also be a time-traveling tale. Hermione uses a "Time Turner" to take more classes at Hogwarts, but that's not all Harry and his friends use the device for.

Time Bandits (1981)

Terry Gilliam's endlessly imaginative film follows an 11-year-old boy who teams up with 6 dwarves for an adventure through time.

Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

A classified ad from a mysterious man looking for a time-traveling companion intrigues three cynical Seattle journalists. An unexpected connection forms between the would-be scientist and one of the reporters in this low-key indie.

Primer (2004)

Two engineers create an invention that can alter time — and butt heads over how to handle the magnitude of their creation.

Time After Time (1971)

H.G. Wells pursues Jack the Ripper in 1970's San Fransisco — as outlandish as the premise is, it's a fascinating movie once you get on board with it.

The Terminator (1984)

Two time travelers from the future, an evil cyborg and a resistance fighter, fight over the life of modern woman Sarah Connor, after it's revealed her fate can save humanity.

As an Editorial Fellow for Good Housekeeping, Katie covers health, beauty, home, and pop culture. Outside of the office, you can find her killing it on the karaoke machine or listening to true crime podcasts.

Entertainment

See How Simone Biles Commemorated Her Olympics Win

Why 'The View' Will Look Different in Season 28

Luke Grimes and Wife Bianca Expecting First Child

Where to Stream 'Beetlejuice' Before the Sequel

Jennifer Love Hewitt Has a "Lit" Family Update

'SVU' Fans Rejoice Over New 'Law & Order' Series

How Catherine O' Hara Met Her Husband, Bo Welch

Jimmy Fallon Opens Up About His Latest Career Move

35 Latina Actresses Embracing Their Roots

Where Is the Cast of 'Beetlejuice' Now?

How to Watch the 2024 Paralympics Live and Online

Guy Fieri Sends Son Ryder Off to College

• Mobile Site
• Staff Directory
• Advertise with Ars

Filter by topic

• Biz & IT
• Gaming & Culture

Front page layout

Join us for some temporal shenanigans —

The ars guide to time travel in the movies, we picked 20 time-travel movies and rated them by scientific logic and entertainment value..

Jennifer Ouellette and Sean M. Carroll - Nov 24, 2023 12:30 pm UTC

Since antiquity, humans have envisioned various means of time travel into the future or the past. The concept has since become a staple of modern science fiction. In particular, the number of films that make use of time travel has increased significantly over the decades, while the real-world science has evolved right alongside them, moving from simple Newtonian mechanics and general relativity to quantum mechanics and the notion of a multiverse or more exotic alternatives like string theory.

But not all time-travel movies are created equal. Some make for fantastic entertainment but the time travel makes no scientific or logical sense, while others might err in the opposite direction, sacrificing good storytelling in the interests of technical accuracy. What we really need is a handy guide to help us navigate this increasingly crowded field to ensure we get the best of both worlds, so to speak. The Ars Guide to Time Travel in the Movies is here to help us all make better, more informed decisions when it comes to choosing our time travel movie fare.

This is not meant to be an exhaustive list; rather, we selected films that represented many diverse approaches to time travel across multiple subgenres and decades. We then evaluated each one—grading on a curve—with regard to its overall entertainment value and scientific logic, with the final combined score determining a film's spot on the overall ranking. For the “science” part of our scoring system, we specifically took three factors into account. First and foremost, does the time travel make logical sense? Second, is the physical mechanism of time travel somewhat realistic? And third, does the film use time travel in narratively interesting ways? So a movie like Looper , which makes absolutely no sense if you think about it too hard, gets points for weaving time paradoxes thoroughly into the fabric of the story.

(Many spoilers below in the interest of meaningful analysis.)

What modern science has to say about time travel can be summed up thusly: You can travel to the future, but you probably can’t travel to the past, although to be honest, we’re not really sure. Einstein’s theory of general relativity—which says that space and time are unified into “spacetime” and the curvature of spacetime gives rise to gravity—at least lets us contemplate the possibility of time travel in a scientifically plausible context. A “ closed timelike curve ” is a path through spacetime on which someone can move forward in time as far as their local perspective is concerned and nevertheless end up visiting their own past. Such a context, however, would involve astrophysically massive gravitational fields, possibly wormholes, and negative energies or something equally exotic. Essentially none of the films we will discuss even attempt to portray physically realistic time travel (with one exception, Interstellar , which is only a partial exception).

Even without scientific accuracy, we can still ask for logical consistency. Alas, that is also pretty thin on the ground, although in this case, there are true exceptions. The most straightforward way for travel to the past to make sense is if you can visit but you can’t actually change anything—“ Whatever happened happened ,” in the memorable formulation of fictional physicist Daniel Faraday in the TV show Lost . Physicists have dubbed this the “ Novikov self-consistency principle ,” but it can really just be summed up as “making sense." Somewhat more ambitiously, we can imagine one or more alternative parallel timelines that are created by a sojourn into history. For the most part, however, our cinematic heroes make a cheerful hash of logic and narrative sense as they traipse through their pasts.

Here are our 20 representative picks, discussed in chronological order of their release to highlight how the understanding and treatment of time travel in Hollywood has evolved over the decades. There are some truly delightful entries here (plus a few stinkers for balance), but our deep dive into the topic has convinced us that the perfect time travel movie has yet to be made. That's a worthy goal for future filmmakers to strive for.

reader comments

Channel ars technica.

Genius tips, tricks & beautiful things, straight to your inbox every day.

© 2010-2021 Wow Media Products, Inc doing business as PureWow. All rights reserved.

The 30 Best Time Travel Movies to Stream Right Now (That Aren’t ‘Back to the Future’)

Whenever there's a debate about the best time travel family movies or television shows of all time, nine times out of ten, the person you're debating will mention the 1985 classic,  Back the Future . And for good reason. Considered one of the best films ever made, the sci-fi flick paved the way for countless other time travel and  adventure films  that followed. But as much as I enjoy following Marty McFly’s adventures with Doc, there are other great time travel flicks that deserve your attention, too, from Somewhere in Time to The Butterfly Effect.

Whether you’re looking for new titles that explore different time travel theories or you’re just in the mood for a good fantasy, here are 30 stellar time travel films you can stream right now.

These 20 Must-Watch Action Movies on Prime Video Will Have Your Heart Racing

1. ‘Tenet’ (2020)

• Who's in it?  John David Washington, Elizabeth Debicki, Robert Pattinson, Kenneth Branagh
• Run time:  150 minutes

John David Washington stars as a skilled CIA agent who can manipulate time in this fast-paced sci-fi thriller. Throughout the film, we follow the agent as he attempts to protect the world from future threats that want to destroy it. The film was directed by Christopher Nolan, best known for Memento and Inception , so prepare to be as wowed as I was when watched this movie for the first time. I don't believe Tenet got the credit it truly deserved for being such a complex film loaded with twists and turns. But you know, sometimes movies are appreciated years after they come out, and I think that will be the case with this one.

2. ‘Déjà Vu’ (2006)

• Who's in it?  Denzel Washington, Val Kimmer, Paula Patton, Jim Caviezel, Adam Goldberg, Bruce Greenwood
• Run time:  126 minutes

As if we needed any more proof that talent runs in the Washington family, Denzel Washington gives a noteworthy performance in this action film, which follows an ATF agent who travels back in time to stop a domestic terrorist attack and save the woman he loves. Sit back and prepare to be amazed, thanks in no small part to other stellar performances from Paula Patton, Val Kilmer, Erika Alexander and Elle Fanning. Also, this is hands down my favorite Denzel Washington movie of all-time, which is saying something since his catalog is so robust, but the flashback scenes and the piecing together you have to do to keep up is insane. It's also an underrated performance from Washington in my opinion.

3. ‘Will You Be There?’ (2016)

• Who's in it?  Kim Yoon-seok, Byun Yo-han, Kim Sang-ho, Chae Seo-jin
• Run time:  111 minutes

This South Korean fantasy revolves around a surgeon who doesn't have much time left to live because of his deteriorating health. His dying wish? To be able to see his true love, who passed away 30 years ago. Fortunately for him, he receives 10 pills that allow him to travel back in time.

4. ‘24’ (2016)

• Who's in it?  Suriya, Nithya Menen, Samantha Ruth Prabhu, Saranya Ponvannan
• Run time:  164 minutes

When Sethuraman (Suriya), a brilliant scientist, invents a watch that allows people to time travel, his evil twin brother wastes no time in trying to get his hands on it. When it falls into the hands of Sethuraman’s son, Mani (Suriya), he has no choice but to go up against his devious uncle. Expect a whole lot of action sequences (and a few musical numbers too!).

5. ‘Interstellar’ (2014)

• Who's in it?  Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Matt Damon
• Run time:  167 minutes

To be fair, this one feels more like a sci-fi space movie, but it does have some time travel elements and viewers will be blown away by the thrilling scenes and thought-provoking plot. Set in the year 2067, where humanity is struggling to survive, Interstellar tells the story of a group of volunteers who travel through a wormhole near Saturn, hoping to find a safer world in a distant galaxy. The star-studded cast includes Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain and Matt Damon, and its 167 minute runtime made it the longest IMAX presentation ever at the time of its release.

6. ‘12 Monkeys’ (1995)

• Who's in it?  Madeleine Stowe, Brad Pitt, Christopher Plummer
• Run time: 129 minutes

Nearly four decades after a deadly virus gets released, destroying nearly all of humankind, James Cole (Bruce Willis), a criminal from the future, is chosen to travel back in time and help scientists create a cure. Inspired by Chris Marker's 1962 short film, La Jetée , the movie also stars Madeleine Stowe, Brad Pitt and Christopher Plummer.

7. ‘Your Name.’ (2016)

• Who's in it?  Ryunosuke Kamiki, Mone Kamishiraishi, Ryo Narita, Aoi Yûki, Nobunaga Shimazaki
• Run time: 112 minutes

Yes, anime time travel films are definitely worth your while if you're really into this concept. Your Name (also called Kimi no na wa ) is about two teenagers in Japan who discover that they're connected to one another in the most bizarre way. We won’t spoil it by giving too many details away, but if you need more reason to watch: It currently holds a perfect five-star rating from more that 15,000 viewers on Amazon Prime.

8. 'Donnie Darko’ (2001)

• Who's in it?  Jake Gyllenhaal, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Drew Barrymore, Seth Rogan, Patrick Swayze
• Run time: 113 minutes

Fair warning, you'll probably never look at rabbits the same way after you see this. The cult classic follows a troubled, sleepwalking teenager who barely escapes a jet engine crashing into his room. But after the accident, he has several visions of a creepy, giant rabbit who claims to be from the future and reveals that the world will end soon. " Donnie Darko is such an intriguing watch," says PureWow Senior Editor Dana Dickey . "I really appreciate the big swing the director took with his first feature. It's a little scary, a little confusing and ultimately very touching."

9. ‘The Call’ (2020)

• Who's in it?  Park Shin-hye, Jeon Jong-seo, Lee El, Kim Min-ha

Not to be confused with Halle Berry's 2013 film of the same name, this South Korean psychological thriller is a haunting one that blends together time travel elements, and centers on two women from completely different time periods who connect through a single phone call. The kicker? There's also a serial killer in the mix who's threatening one of their lives, which adds to the suspense.

10. ‘41’ (2012)

• Who's in it?  Keith Gordon, Menik Gooneratne, Don Bridges, Dafna Kronental, Gordon Boyd
• Run time: 80 minutes

In this remixed version of The Butterfly Effect , a man stumbles upon a hole in the ground that takes him back to the previous day. Not many are familiar with this low-budget indie film, but it’s a fun watch for anyone who genuinely enjoys exploring time travel theories.

11. ‘Mirage’ (2018)

• Who's in it?  Adriana Ugarte, Chino Darín, Álvaro Morte, Javier Gutiérrez, Nora Navas
• Run time: 128 minutes

In this two-hour feature, Vera Roy (Adriana Ugarte) manages to save the life of a boy 25 years in the past, but in a sudden turn of events, she winds up losing her daughter in the process. Can she get her child back or is her daughter lost forever? You'll have to watch the movie for those answers.

12. ‘Somewhere In Time’ (1980)

• Who's in it?  Christopher Reeve, Jane Seymour, Elise McKenna, Bill Erwin, Richard Matheson
• Run time: 103 minutes

It's smart, it's charming and it's required viewing for literally anyone who enjoys a passionate romance. Christopher Reeve plays Richard Collier, a writer who’s so smitten by a vintage photo that he travels back in time (through self-hypnosis!) to meet the woman in it. Unfortunately for him, striking up a romance isn’t as easy with her manager around.

13. ‘Don't Let Go’ (2019)

• Who's in it?  David Oyelowo, Storm Reid, Mykelti Williamson, Brian Tyree Henry
• Run time: 107 minutes

OK, so this is technically more of a murder mystery, but it weaves in the time travel concept so well. Selma star David Oyelowo plays Detective Jack Radcliff, who's stunned to receive a call from his murdered niece, Ashley (Storm Reid). Will this mysterious new connection help him figure out who murdered her?

14. ‘Timecrimes’ (2007)

• Who's in it?  Nacho Vigalondo, Candela Fernández, Juan Inciarte, Bárbara Goenaga
• Run time: 92 minutes

A testament to how messy and complicated time travel can be, Timecrimes follows a middle-aged man named Héctor (Karra Elejalde), who accidentally travels back an hour in time while trying to escape an attacker.

15. ‘About Time’ (2013)

• Who's in it?  Rachel McAdams, Domhnall Gleeson, Bill Nighy, Vanessa Kirby, Tom Hollander
• Run time: 123 minutes

When Tim discovers that the men in his family share a special gift—the ability to time travel— he decides to use it to his advantage by going back in time and getting the girl of his dreams. This comedy will have you cackling all the way through according to Dickey. "Think you've seen every rom-com ever? You haven't watched About Time, the Rachel MacAdams/Domhnall Gleeson vehicle that's way more about the heart of a romantic underdog than it is any sci-fi trappings. Although, yes there's time travel. There's also Bill Nighy as the most charming dad, ever."

16. ‘The Infinite Man’ (2014)

• Who's in it?  Josh McConville, Hannah Marshall, Alex Dimitriades
• Run time: 85 minutes

Josh McConville is Dean, a clever scientist who tries to relive a romantic weekend with his girlfriend, Lana (Hannah Marshall). When Lana's ex-boyfriend shows up and ruins the mood, Dean attempts to fix this by going back in time, but things don’t go according to plan...

17. ‘The Butterfly Effect’ (2004)

• Who's in it?  Ashton Kutcher, Amy Smart, Logan Lerman, Ethan Suplee

The Butterfly Effect brilliantly explores the concept where the smallest change can trigger a series of events and lead to much bigger consequences. Evan Treborn (Ashton Kutcher), who experienced a number of blackouts throughout his childhood, realizes that he can travel back in time by revisiting those same moments. Naturally, he tries to fix everything that went wrong, but this plan backfires.

"The Butterfly Effect was an obsession between my friends and I when it came out," says PureWow's VP of Editorial Candace Davison . " Just thinking about the small ways you can impact another life—or change the course of your own—had us questioning every little thing we did for days afterward. It's dark and twisted—and years later, I'm looking forward to rewatching it."

18. ‘The Girl Who Leapt Through Time’ (2006)

• Who's in it?  Riisa Naka, Takuya Ishida, Yuki Sekido, Ayami Kakiuchi
• Run time: 98 minutes

Inspired by Yasutaka Tsutsui's novel of the same name, the film follows a high school girl who uses her newfound ability to time travel for her own gain. But when she sees the negative impact that this has on those around her, she's determined to make things right. Not only is it filled with lovable characters, but it also tackles themes like bullying, friendship and self-awareness.

19. ‘Primer’ (2004)

• Who's in it?  David Sullivan, Shane Carruth
• Run time: 77 minutes

Although this film was made on a small budget (just $7,000), Primer is one of the smartest and most thought-provoking time travel films you’ll ever see. Two engineers, Aaron (Shane Carruth) and Abe (David Sullivan), accidentally invent a time machine, causing them to experiment with a technology that allows humans to time travel. However, they soon realize the consequences of their actions.

20. ‘The Time Machine’ (1960)

• Who's in it?  Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux, H. G. Wells, Alan Young

Based on H. G. Wells's novella of the same title, this Oscar-winning film follows George Wells (Rod Taylor), an inventor who builds a time machine and journeys hundreds of years into the future. Definitely a must-watch for any time-travel fanatic.

21. Palm Springs (2020)

• Who's in it?  Andy Samberg, Cristin Milioti, Camila Mendes, J.K. Simmons, Peter Gallager
• Run time: 90 minutes

Following two wedding guests who are stuck in a time loop and forced to keep reliving the same day over and over again, Palm Springs is a must-watch according to PureWow Senior Editor  Abby Hepworth.  "Andy Samberg and Cristin Millioti are both so phenomenal in this and make an unlikely but hilarious duo. The visuals are great, too, and it somehow manages to make the idea of a Groundhog's Day/time travel situation feel fresh and novel."

22. 57 Seconds (2023)

• Who's in it?  Morgan Freeman, Josh Hutcherson, Lovie Simone, Brevin Bru, Greg Germann, Kenneth Kynt Bryan
• Run time: 99 minutes

Follow the adventures of a tech blogger who seeks to rewrite the past through a time-altering device. A tale focused on seeking revenge against a corporate empire that destroyed a family, this film is full of heart-pounding loop holes where survival matters every second.

23. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023)

• Who's in it?  Harrison Ford, Mads Mikkelsen, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Antonio Banderas
• Run time: 154 minutes

Harrison Ford has been gracing the big screen as Indiana Jones since the early 1980s, and this final installment was a nice way to tie the series together. This fifth and final installment focuses on Indiana Jones embarking on a race against time to retrieve the legendary dial that can alter the course of history, and it takes you through an adventure to say the least.

24. Aporia (2023)

• Who's in it?  Edi Gathegi, Peyman Moaadi, Faithe Herman, Whitney Morgan Cox
• Run time: 104 minutes

In this film, a grief-stricken widow struggling to find a full-time job while raising her devastated teenage daughter, is sold on the dream of being able to return to her past life through a time machine. This, of course comes with unforeseen implications, and now the woman is forced to deal with terrible consequences as a result.

25. The Shift (2023)

• Who's in it?  Neal McDonough, Kristoffer Polaha, Elizabeth Tabish, Sean Austin
• Run time: 115 minutes

After encountering a man who seems to have otherworldly powers, Kevin Garner faces new challenges, as he suddenly finds himself banished to another dimension best described as a "parallel Earth." On top of that, he's also fighting to win the love of his life back at the same time. Needless to say, Kevin has a lot on his plate.

26. Totally Killer (2023)

• Who's in it?  Kiernan Shipka, Olivia Holt, Charlie Gillespie, Julie Bowen
• Run time: 106 minutes

Shipka stars as 17-year-old Jamie, a frightened teen who accidentally travels back to the year 1987 as a result of her encounter with a masked maniac. As it turns out, it's been 35 years since the brutal murders of three teenagers, and in a rather uncanny turn of events, Jamie teams up with the teenage version of her mother to take down the masked killer.

• Who's in it?  Ariana Greenblatt, Adam Driver, Chloe Coleman, Alexandra Shipp
• Run time: 93 minutes

After suffering a catastrophic crash on a unknown planet, Pilot Mills finds himself transported back 65 million years. With only one other survivor accompanying him, he now must learn how to adjust to a pre-historic lifestyle. This fun storyline has all the makings of an interesting time travel movie with a mixture of both comedy and thrilling moments.

28. The Tomorrow Job (2023)

• Who's in it?  Grant Schumacher, Caitlin Duffy, Ariella Mastroianni, Ariella Mastroianni
• Run time: 105 minutes

Directed by Bruce Wemple, The Tomorrow Job is action-packed and intense. The film follows a group of thieves who use a drug that allows them to trade consciousnesses with their future-selves in order to steal secrets that they can profit from. Viewers will appreciate the storytelling, cinematography and the captivating fight scenes.

29. Rewind (2023)

• Who's in it?  Dingdong Dantes, Marian Rivera, Coney Reyes

A grieving widower makes a deal to go back in time to change some elements of his past—primarily his wife dying during their marital troubles. There's just one problem. This deal comes with an exchange for his life instead. Aside from the time travel component, this film explores themes of love and forgiveness.

30. Babylon 5: The Road Home

• Who's in it?  Bruce Boxleitner, Claudia Christian, Rebecca Riedy
• Run time: 79 minutes

Return to the city of Babylon as John Sheridan unexpectedly finds himself traveling through different dimensions, timelines and alternate realities. Sheridan is constantly facing chaos and exploration, as he encounters familiar faces, and uncovers new revelations about the cosmic universe.

11 Shows and Movies to Watch This Weekend, Recommended by Our Editors

Associate Editor, News and Entertainment

• Writes celebrity news, TV/movie reviews and SEO-focused entertainment articles
• Interviews celebrities and covers red carpet events
• Has 8+ years of experience covering entertainment topics

Associate Commerce Strategist

• Covers all things commerce and entertainment
• Has over a decade of editorial experience in both fashion and entertainment, and was previously with ONE37pm before joining the PureWow team in March 2024
• Studied journalism and marketing at Columbus State University in Georgia

10 Best Time Travel Movies: A Mind-Bending Collection of Temporal Adventures

Time travel has been a popular subject in movies for decades, allowing filmmakers to explore the possibilities and consequences of altering the past or future.

Whether it’s through a time machine, a wormhole, or some other means, time travel movies have captured the imagination of audiences and inspired countless theories and debates.

Some of the best time travel movies have used the concept to tell stories that are thrilling, thought-provoking, and emotionally resonant.

From science fiction classics to mind-bending thrillers, these films have entertained and challenged audiences while exploring the mysteries of time and space.

Best Time Travel Movies

Whether you’re a fan of action-packed adventures or more introspective dramas, there’s a time travel movie out there for everyone. So sit back, buckle up, and get ready for a journey through some of the best time travel movies ever made.

1. The Time Machine (1960)

“The Time Machine” is a 1960 American science fiction film directed by George Pal and starring Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux, and Alan Young. The film is based on the 1895 novel of the same name by H.G. Wells.

The film follows a time traveler named George, played by Rod Taylor, who builds a machine that can transport him through time.

He travels to the year 802,701 AD and discovers a future world where humanity has split into two separate species: the childlike Eloi and the subterranean Morlocks, who prey upon the Eloi.

“The Time Machine” is known for its groundbreaking special effects, which won an Academy Award, as well as for its themes of evolution, class struggle, and the dangers of technological progress.

It has been cited as an important work in the science fiction genre and has inspired numerous adaptations and homages in popular culture.

“The Time Machine” was a critical and commercial success, grossing over $1 million at the box office and earning positive reviews for its performances, visuals, and social commentary. It has since become a cult classic and remains a beloved science fiction film.

• Amazon Prime Video (Video on Demand)
• Rod Taylor, Alan Young, Yvette Mimieux (Actors)
• George Pal (Director) - David Duncan (Writer) - George Pal (Producer)
• English (Playback Language)
• English (Subtitle)

2. Back to the Future (1985)

“Back to the Future” is a science fiction adventure film directed by Robert Zemeckis and released in 1985.

The movie stars Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd, among others, and follows the story of a high school student who travels back in time to the 1950s in a time machine built by his eccentric scientist friend.

The film is known for its creative storyline, inventive special effects, and memorable characters, as well as its iconic soundtrack and catchphrases.

It explores themes of time travel, the consequences of changing the past, and the importance of family and friendship, as the characters navigate their way through a series of adventures and obstacles in both the present and the past.

“Back to the Future” was a critical and commercial success upon its release, and has since become a beloved classic of the sci-fi genre. It has been praised for its engaging storyline, entertaining characters, and expertly crafted mix of comedy, action, and drama.

The film spawned two sequels, as well as numerous spinoffs, adaptations, and merchandise.

• Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson (Actors)
• Robert Zemeckis (Director) - Robert Zemeckis (Writer) - Bob Gale (Producer)

3. The Terminator (1984)

“The Terminator” is a science fiction film that was released in 1984. It was directed by James Cameron and written by Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd.

The film stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as the titular character, a cyborg assassin sent back in time from the future to kill Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton), the mother of the future leader of the human resistance against the machines.

Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), a soldier from the future, is also sent back in time to protect Sarah and stop the Terminator.

The film is known for its iconic action scenes, special effects, and memorable lines, such as “I’ll be back.” It was a critical and commercial success, and spawned a franchise that includes several sequels, spin-offs, and a television series.

The film has been praised for its innovative storytelling and its portrayal of technology and its potential dangers.

• Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen (Actors)
• James Cameron (Director) - Gail Ann Hurd (Writer) - Gale Anne Hurd (Producer)

4. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

“Terminator 2: Judgment Day” is a science fiction action film directed by James Cameron and released in 1991.

It is the sequel to the 1984 film “The Terminator” and stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, and Edward Furlong.

The film follows the story of Sarah Connor and her son John, who are being pursued by a new, advanced Terminator sent back in time to kill John and prevent him from leading the human resistance against the machines in the future.

However, they are also aided by a reprogrammed Terminator sent back to protect them.

“Terminator 2: Judgment Day” was a major critical and commercial success upon its release, and is widely regarded as one of the best action films ever made.

It was praised for its groundbreaking special effects, intense action sequences, and its strong performances, particularly by Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor.

The film has since become a cultural icon, with its iconic characters and memorable quotes ingrained in popular culture. It is also considered a landmark in the science fiction genre, and is often cited as a prime example of the use of time travel and artificial intelligence in film.

• Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong (Actors)
• James Cameron (Director) - James Cameron (Producer)
• English, Spanish, French (Subtitles)
• Audience Rating: R (Restricted)

5. Time After Time (1979)

“Time After Time” is a science fiction movie released in 1979, directed by Nicholas Meyer and starring Malcolm McDowell and David Warner.

The film follows the story of H.G. Wells (McDowell) as he uses his time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper (Warner) into the future, ending up in San Francisco in the 1970s.

The film explores a number of themes, including the nature of good and evil, the consequences of time travel, and the idea of progress. The movie also features a number of suspenseful and action-packed scenes, as well as a romantic subplot between Wells and a modern-day woman.

“Time After Time” received generally positive reviews upon its release, with critics praising its innovative concept, strong performances, and clever script.

The film has since become a cult classic and is considered one of the best time travel movies of all time, known for its imaginative storytelling and thrilling action sequences.

• Malcolm McDowell, David Warner, Mary Steenburgen (Actors)
• Nicholas Meyer (Director) - Nicholas Meyer (Writer) - Herb Jaffe (Producer)

6. Donnie Darko (2001)

Donnie Darko is a science fiction psychological thriller movie released in 2001, written and directed by Richard Kelly and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, and Drew Barrymore.

The plot of the movie revolves around a troubled teenager named Donnie Darko (Jake Gyllenhaal) who has visions of a giant rabbit named Frank, who tells him that the world will end in 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, and 12 seconds.

As the days pass, Donnie’s life becomes increasingly surreal and unpredictable, as he grapples with his own mental illness, strange occurrences in his small town, and the possibility that his visions may be real.

Donnie Darko was a critical and commercial success upon its release, with many critics praising its complex storyline, inventive visuals, and powerful performances from the cast. The movie has since become a cult classic, with many fans dissecting its intricate plot and themes of time travel, fate, and mental illness.

If you’re in the mood for a mind-bending thriller that will keep you guessing until the very end, Donnie Darko is definitely worth checking out. Just be prepared for a movie that will challenge your perceptions of reality and leave you thinking long after the credits roll.

No products found.

7. Planet of the Apes (1968)

“Planet of the Apes” is a science fiction movie released in 1968, directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and starring Charlton Heston. The film is based on the 1963 novel “La Planète des Singes” by Pierre Boulle.

The story follows a group of astronauts who crash-land on a planet ruled by intelligent apes, with humans serving as a subservient and primitive species.

The film explores themes of science, society, and evolution as the main character, George Taylor (Charlton Heston), tries to survive and unravel the mysteries of this strange new world.

“Planet of the Apes” was a critical and commercial success, and is now considered a science fiction classic. The film’s exploration of social and political issues through the lens of science fiction has been praised by critics and fans alike.

The film also spawned a successful franchise, including several sequels, a television series, and a modern film reboot series.

• Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter (Actors)
• Franklin J. Schaffner (Director) - Michael Wilson (Writer) - Arthur P. Jacobs (Producer)

8. Groundhog Day (1993)

“Groundhog Day” is a 1993 American comedy film directed by Harold Ramis and starring Bill Murray, Andie MacDowell, and Chris Elliott.

The film follows the story of Phil Connors, a cynical TV weatherman who is sent to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, to cover the annual Groundhog Day celebrations. However, he finds himself trapped in a time loop, reliving the same day over and over again.

As Phil continues to relive the same day, he begins to reevaluate his life choices and ultimately seeks redemption by using his newfound knowledge and time to help others.

The film is known for its creative premise, witty writing, and memorable performances, particularly by Murray, who delivers a career-defining performance.

“Groundhog Day” was a critical and commercial success, grossing over $70 million at the box office and earning widespread acclaim for its blend of comedy, romance, and philosophical themes.

It has since become a cultural phenomenon, inspiring numerous references and homages in popular culture, as well as scholarly analysis and interpretation for its exploration of existentialism, Buddhism, and the nature of time.

• Bill Murray, Richard Henzel, Andie MacDowell (Actors)
• Harold Ramis (Director) - Danny Rubin (Writer) - Harold Ramis (Producer)

9. Run Lola Run (1998)

“Run Lola Run” is a German thriller film directed by Tom Tykwer and released in 1998. The movie stars Franka Potente as Lola, a young woman who has 20 minutes to come up with 100,000 deutsche marks in order to save her boyfriend Manni, who is a small-time criminal.

The film is known for its creative storytelling, frenetic pacing, and innovative use of editing and visual effects. It explores themes of fate, chance, and free will, as the story unfolds in three different versions, each with small changes that have a significant impact on the outcome.

“Run Lola Run” was a critical and commercial success upon its release, and has since become a cult classic of the thriller genre.

It has been praised for its innovative use of cinematic techniques, its high-energy soundtrack, and the dynamic performance by Franka Potente. The film has influenced numerous other movies and directors, and is considered a landmark of German cinema.

• Franka Potente, Herbert Knaup, Joachim Krol (Actors)
• Tom Tykwer (Director) - Stefan Arndt (Producer)
• English, French (Subtitles)
• English (Publication Language)

10. Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

“Safety Not Guaranteed” is a science fiction comedy-drama film that was released in 2012. It was directed by Colin Trevorrow and written by Derek Connolly. The film stars Aubrey Plaza, Mark Duplass, and Jake Johnson.

The plot of the film revolves around a magazine journalist named Jeff (Jake Johnson) and his two interns, Darius (Aubrey Plaza) and Arnau (Karan Soni), who investigate a classified ad seeking a time-traveling companion.

They meet the ad’s author, Kenneth (Mark Duplass), who claims to have built a time machine and is seeking a partner to travel back in time with him.

As Darius begins to bond with Kenneth and becomes increasingly invested in his mission, Jeff becomes more skeptical and begins to investigate Kenneth’s past.

The film explores themes of regret, nostalgia, and the search for meaning in life. It received positive reviews for its performances, humor, and emotional depth.

• Alice Hung, Aubrey Plaza, Basil Harris (Actors)
• Colin Trevorrow (Director) - Derek Connolly (Writer) - Marc Turtletaub (Producer)

3 Characteristics of Time Travel Movies

The Butterfly Effect: Many time travel movies explore the idea of the “butterfly effect,” which refers to the idea that even small changes in the past can have significant consequences in the future.

This concept is often used to create tension and suspense in the plot, as characters must grapple with the potential consequences of their actions.

Paradoxes: Time travel movies often play with the idea of paradoxes, such as the grandfather paradox (where someone goes back in time and accidentally kills their own grandfather, thus preventing their own birth) or the bootstrap paradox (where an object or piece of information is sent back in time and becomes its own cause).

These paradoxes can be used to create mind-bending plot twists and explore complex philosophical ideas.

Consequences: Time travel movies often explore the consequences of time travel, both on an individual level (such as the psychological toll of reliving traumatic events) and on a larger scale (such as the potential for altering history and changing the course of human events).

These consequences can be used to create drama, suspense, and emotional resonance in the story.

3 Reasons To Watch Time Travel Movies

They offer a unique perspective on time and history: Time travel movies allow us to imagine what it would be like to travel back or forward in time, and see how the world and its people might have been different in the past or future.

They offer a unique way to explore history, culture, and the human condition from a different angle, and can spark our imagination and curiosity.

They challenge our understanding of cause and effect: Time travel movies often play with the concept of cause and effect, showing how small changes in the past can have major consequences in the present or future.

They can challenge our assumptions about the nature of time, free will, and fate, and force us to think about the ethical implications of our actions.

They can be thrilling and entertaining: Time travel movies often combine elements of science fiction, action, and drama, making them exciting and entertaining to watch. They can take us on a thrilling adventure through time and space, filled with suspense, humor, and memorable characters. Whether you’re a fan of mind-bending puzzles or action-packed adventures, time travel movies offer something for everyone.

Best Time Travel Movies – Wrap Up

In conclusion, time travel movies have provided audiences with a fascinating and thought-provoking cinematic experience for many years. From exploring the mysteries of the universe to examining the consequences of altering the past, these films have challenged viewers to consider the possibilities and implications of time travel.

Some of the best time travel movies have become cultural touchstones, inspiring discussions and debates among fans and scholars alike. They have featured complex characters, engaging storylines, and stunning visual effects that have captured the imagination of audiences around the world.

Whether you’re a fan of science fiction, action, or drama, there’s a time travel movie out there for you. So whether you’re re-watching a classic or discovering a new favorite, buckle up and get ready for a journey through time and space.

20 Best Martial Arts Movies: A High-Flying Collection of Action-Packed Films

20 Best Stoner Movies: A High-Spirited Collection of Cannabis-Fueled Comedies

Matt Crawford

Related posts, 5 best maggie gyllenhaal movies: the intriguing and daring roles of a fearless actress, highest grossing movies of all time: the essential guide, best david lynch movies: 12 top david lynch films you don’t want to miss, 6 best giuseppe tornatore films: the nostalgic storyteller of italian cinema, 10 best gregg toland films: depth and perspective reimagined, 7 best swedish movies of all time: a tribute to the cinema of sweden, leave a reply cancel reply.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed .

Username or Email Address

Remember Me

Registration is closed.

Pin It on Pinterest

WANT GET MORE CLIENTS & GROW YOUR VIDEO COMPANY TO 7-FIGURES PER YEAR?

Enter Your Details Below!

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Trouble logging in?

By continuing, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes.

Email not verified

Let's keep in touch.

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

• Upcoming Movies and TV shows
• Rotten Tomatoes Podcast
• Media News + More

By clicking "Sign Me Up," you are agreeing to receive occasional emails and communications from Fandango Media (Fandango, Vudu, and Rotten Tomatoes) and consenting to Fandango's Privacy Policy and Terms and Policies . Please allow 10 business days for your account to reflect your preferences.

OK, got it!

• About Rotten Tomatoes®
• Login/signup

Movies in theaters

• Opening This Week
• Top Box Office
• Coming Soon to Theaters
• Certified Fresh Movies

Movies at Home

• Fandango at Home
• Prime Video
• Most Popular Streaming Movies
• What to Watch New

Certified fresh picks

• 73% Blink Twice Link to Blink Twice
• 96% Strange Darling Link to Strange Darling
• 86% Between the Temples Link to Between the Temples

New TV Tonight

• 96% Only Murders in the Building: Season 4
• 92% The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Season 2
• 95% Terminator Zero: Season 1
• 68% Kaos: Season 1
• 83% City of God: The Fight Rages On: Season 1
• -- Here Come the Irish: Season 1
• -- K-Pop Idols: Season 1
• -- Horror's Greatest: Season 1
• -- After Baywatch: Moment in the Sun: Season 1

Most Popular TV on RT

• 100% Dark Winds: Season 2
• 92% Bad Monkey: Season 1
• 78% Star Wars: The Acolyte: Season 1
• 100% Pachinko: Season 2
• Best TV Shows
• Most Popular TV

Certified fresh pick

• 92% The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Season 2 Link to The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Season 2
• All-Time Lists
• Binge Guide
• Comics on TV
• Five Favorite Films
• Video Interviews
• Weekend Box Office
• Weekly Ketchup
• What to Watch

The Best Shows on Amazon Prime Video to Watch Right Now (August 2024)

100 Best Netflix Series To Watch Right Now (August 2024)

What to Watch: In Theaters and On Streaming

Awards Tour

TV Premiere Dates 2024

Your Full List of All Upcoming Marvel Movies — With Key Details!

• Trending on RT
• Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
• Rings of Power S2 First Reviews
• Venice Film Festival
• Fall Horror Movie Preview

Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel

Where to watch.

Watch Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel with a subscription on Max, rent on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV, or buy on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV.

Critics Reviews

Audience reviews, cast & crew.

Gareth Carrivick

Dean Lennox Kelly

Marc Wootton

Dario Attanasio

Monkey Mayhem Promoter

Chris O'Dowd

More Like This

30 Movies About Time Travel Ranked Worst To Best

The notion of time travel is both inherently human (who wouldn't want the opportunity to see what the world will be like after they're gone, or to revisit the cherished memories of the past?) and intensely cinematic. So, it makes sense that it's a theme we see revisited in film time and time again. 

However, while time travel is rooted in science fiction, time travel movies embrace a variety of different genres. We're not limited to just sci-fi action-adventures (there are plenty of those, though, if that's your cup of tea.) Filmmakers have used time travel for romances, family dramas, stoner comedies, and even serial-killer thrillers. By using time travel, we can reckon with both our fixation on the past and our constant anxieties about the future. Besides, time travel is a whole lot of fun. If you're looking for a new time travel movie to watch, these are some of the best.

30. Army of Darkness

After making two gruesome cult horror movies about the undead rising to do unspeakable things to your beloved protagonist, your first instinct might not be to hurl him backward in time to medieval Europe — but that's exactly what Sam Raimi did with "Army of Darkness." By transporting Ash (Bruce Campbell) to the 1300s on a mission to recover the mysterious Book of the Dead, Raimi was effectively able to keep his burgeoning franchise fresh, while still delivering on the ghoulish horror that his devoted fans had come to anticipate. 

A knowing play on "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court," which also sees its modern-day hero set back to the Middle Ages, Raimi brings his trademark sense of humor to the proceedings. Although we've seen a continuation of the "Evil Dead" franchise in recent years, this outing served as a perfect finale to the original trilogy, giving Campbell's chainsaw-wielding Ash an appropriate send-off.

29. Brigadoon

Although time travel usually belongs to the science fiction genre, "Brigadoon" offers up a musical fantasy interpretation of the trope. Two modern-day Americans (Gene Kelly and Van Johnson) go wandering through the Scottish highlands when they happen upon a strange little town, one that is cursed to awaken from its slumber for just one day every 100 years. As such, it's effectively stuck in the 1700s, protected from the changing world around it. 

The legend goes that if any of the villagers leave, the town will disappear forever, and anyone who wants to stay must be willing to completely abandon their former life in the outside world. When one of the Americans falls in love with a girl in this folksy Scottish utopia, he will have to choose a life for himself that involves being a man out of time — if he loves her enough to make that sacrifice, that is. With light, airy musical numbers and winning performances from Cyd Charisse and Gene Kelly, "Brigadoon" is entirely charming (even if its faux Scottish whimsy can wear thin at times).

28. Flight of the Navigator

Although "Flight of the Navigator" is aimed squarely at kids, it features some pretty complex science (and science fiction) principles, namely the time travel that could occur as a byproduct of advanced space flight. David is an ordinary 12-year-old growing up in the 1970s when he suffers a blow to the head that momentarily knocks him unconscious. But when he wakes up, he discovers to his considerable surprise that eight years have passed, everyone has grown older except for him, and no one can explain what happened to him. 

"Flight of the Navigator" is at its best when it explores the ramifications of this time travel, especially as David struggles with the fact that all of his friends are full-grown adults now, and his little brother is now several years older than him. A rollicking family adventure through time and space, "Flight of the Navigator" may not hold a candle to its similarly alien-themed predecessor "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," but it has amassed a loyal fanbase all the same.

27. Last Night in Soho

A young aspiring fashion designer, Eloise (Thomasin McKenzie), travels to London to attend fashion school, determined to leave a mysterious and unwelcome gift behind her. But it follows her all the same in "Last Night in Soho." Each night, she travels in her dreams to the London of the swinging '60s, becoming obsessed with a beautiful woman she sees there, Sandie (Anya Taylor-Joy). Slowly over the course of the film, the lines between Eloise and Sandie become blurred, until she can barely tell where one ends and the other begins. 

Hyper-stylized and dressed to the nines, "Last Night in Soho" luxuriates in the scenes set in the past, gleefully watching Eloise and Sandie ebb and flow into one another. But it isn't long before Eloise's dreams grow more malevolent and threatening, putting her very survival at risk. Although "Last Night in Soho" arguably has a slightly wobbly third act, the visual lyricism of the film more than makes up for any weaknesses that pop up later on.

26. Interstellar

If the Earth was dying, and you had a chance to save it, would you be willing to give up your entire world to do so? In "Interstellar," a team of astronauts is sent on a Hail Mary mission to find a new planet compatible with human life. But in order to do so, they'll have to travel in deep space through a wormhole, going so far away from home that they'll age at just a fraction of the speed of those left on Earth. For Cooper (Matthew McConaughey), that means leaving his two children to effectively grow up without him — their entire lives will go by in what feels like mere months for him. 

Blending philosophical quandaries with the type of stunning visual work that director Christopher Nolan is known for, "Interstellar" is a top-tier space drama that addresses the ramifications of time dilation, causal loops, and black holes in a way that somehow manages to be both exciting and emotionally evocative.

25. Happy Death Day

What if every day in "Groundhog Day" ended in a serial murder? That's basically the plot of "Happy Death Day," a time loop movie that sees sorority girl Tree (Jessica Rothe) forced to repeat the same day over and over again. But not just any ordinary day — this is the day that she is murdered. Tree discovers new and inventive ways to be killed, as she is repeatedly hunted down by an extremely unsettling, baby-faced murderer. If she can figure out a way to survive and unmask the killer, she might just be able to break the loop and finally see what comes next. 

Rothe owns every inch of the film, bringing charm and savvy to the lead role of Tree in what is an undeniable breakout performance. "Happy Death Day" has a mischievous sense of humor that allows it to join the top echelon of self-aware slashers, mixing comedy with inventive death sequences and a genuinely disturbing villain.

24. Edge of Tomorrow

If "die, rinse, repeat" is your kind of time loop, "Edge of Tomorrow" offers one of the finest examples in the genre. In a futuristic landscape of an Earth that has been beset by alien invaders, Tom Cruise stars as a soldier who is doomed to live out the same ultimately fatal battle ad nauseam. But just as Tree from "Happy Death Day" and Phil from "Groundhog Day" acquire new skills and perspectives with each new cycle, so too does Cruise's Bill Cage level up in his fighting abilities. 

In many ways, "Edge of Tomorrow" mimics a roguelike video game as much as it functions as a traditional feature film. With impressive special effects and an unexpectedly compelling dynamic between Cruise and co-star Emily Blunt, "Edge of Tomorrow" rises above many other similar science fiction blockbusters.  Variety praised both the writing and editing teams, emphasizing that they "tell their story in a breezy narrative shorthand (and at times, sleight-of-hand), transforming what must surely be an unbelievably tedious gauntlet for our hero into a deft, playful and continually involving viewing experience."

23. Frequency

To be fair, no one technically travels through time in "Frequency" — not physically, anyway. In the late 1990s, a grumpy, cynical NYC cop named John (Jim Caviezel) plays with a ham radio that once belonged to his father Frank, a firefighter who died on the job when John was a child. Imagine his amazement when a familiar voice begins speaking back to him — the voice of his long-dead father, traveling through space and time from the late 1960s. 

Of course, the impulse to save him from the fire that claimed his life proves difficult to resist, a decision that sets in motion an unexpectedly dangerous chain of events. Clever and inventive, "Frequency" delivers on the touching father-son relationship between John and Frank, and its use of the ham radio as a vessel for time travel makes it stand out within the genre. With a narrative that is perpetually evolving with the ripples of time manipulation, it's full of surprises.

22. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

When characters are given the ability to travel through time, sometimes they grasp the gravity of their situation immediately — and other times they use their gift carelessly, hopping casually back a few days or even hours to fix minor life problems. Makoto Konno in "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" falls decidedly into the latter category. After being thrown from her bike and nearly killed by an oncoming train, Konno discovers her ability to "time-leap," as she finds herself flung back to the moments before the accident. She quickly uses this ability to her advantage, without realizing the impact these leaps have on the people around her. 

Although there's a lightness to the storytelling (its far less apocalyptic than many other time travel films), "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" displays legitimate artistry, with  Village Voice  stating, "There's real craftsmanship for how [the film] sustains its sense of summer quietude and sun-soaked haziness through a few carefully reprised motifs: three-cornered games of catch, mountainous cloud formations, classroom still-lifes."

When we think of time travel movies, we generally think of science fiction, sprawling epics that by the nature of their genre tend to cost a lot of money to make. It's rare when we're treated to an indie time travel movie, especially one as well-made as "Primer." This low-budget psychological thriller is the brainchild of Shane Carruth, who is credited as its director, screenwriter, producer, editor, composer, and star. With a technical background in engineering and mathematics, Carruth looked to make something different from the typical Hollywood time travel film. As he said in the film's press notes , watching "All the President's Men" taught him it would be possible for "Primer" to be "a compelling narrative without neon or special effects or smoke screens."

Instead, "Primer," which tells the story of a group of engineers who accidentally discover time travel while working on a project in their garage, deals with the logistical and philosophical implications of this discovery and wastes no time worrying if the audience will be able to follow along. The result is a bare-bones, but ultimately compelling, take on the genre.

20. When We First Met

Throughout movie and TV history, we've seen DeLoreans, phone booths, and police boxes turned into time machines, but "When We First Met" may be the very first time we've gotten a time-traveling photo booth. When Noah (Adam DeVine) goes into the photo booth at his favorite piano bar, he gets the opportunity to go back to the night when he first met Avery (Alexandra Daddario), the "girl of his dreams" who is engaged to another man. Whatever Noah does on that fateful day causes ripples, and when he wakes up, it's in a slightly different version of the present. 

So, naturally, Noah takes as many chances as he can to engineer a happily ever after between himself and Avery. But "When We First Met" challenges the notion of the "perfect" girl who's just out of reach, and offers a parable about the dangers of letting an idealized version of someone take root in your brain, no longer letting you see them for who they really are. If nothing else, "When We First Met" deserves heaps of credits for featuring Adam DeVine at his most endearing.

19. Your Name

In Makoto Shinkai's "Your Name," Mitsuha and Taki are two ordinary high school students who live separate lives in different parts of Japan. Then, one day, the two strangers begin to switch bodies. "Your Name" begins as a classic gender-bending comedy, where Mtsusha and Taki are forced to live through each others' daily lives, fumbling through classes, interpersonal relationships, and unfamiliar gender expectations. This body swapping happens intermittently, without warning, and over time the two learn how to communicate with each other by leaving messages on paper, their phones, even their skin. 

Then, "Your Name" raises the stakes by revealing that the teens aren't just from different towns — they're from entirely different time periods. Taki is living in a world three years older than Mitsuha's, and learns about a freak accident that caused untold devastation in her hometown. But can he warn everyone in time? "Your Name" is a gorgeously animated time-traveling romance that creates a genuine bond between its two central figures, who are bound together by a unique ability that ends up being their salvation.

18. Kate & Leopold

What happens when a hunky man from the 19th century ends up in modern-day New York? This is the important question that "Kate & Leopold" dares to ask. When Stuart (Liev Schreiber) discovers a time portal above the Brooklyn Bridge, he is eager to go back in time and explore. What he does not count on is Leopold, the 3rd Duke of Albany (played by an especially dreamy Hugh Jackman), following him back through the portal. 

After Stuart gets severely injured falling down an elevator shaft (if Leopold isn't around to invent elevators in the 1800s, they can hardly be expected to exist in the 2000s), his ex-girlfriend Kate (Meg Ryan) is stuck taking care of the anachronistic duke. Obviously, they fall in love — look, it's Hugh Jackman and Meg Ryan. Why would you even bother putting them in a movie together if they weren't going to become romantically involved? 

Anyway, "Kate & Leopold" is a very sweet rom-com, even if it is sort of depressing that Meg Ryan ends up going to live in a past where she has no rights. Oh well. Love conquers all, right?

17. Palm Springs

"Palm Springs" follows in the footsteps of "Groundhog Day," with Andy Samberg serving as a natural successor to fellow "Saturday Night Live" alum Bill Murray. Trapped in a never-ending time loop and forced to relive his friend's wedding day over and over, Nyles has long since given up any hope of escaping his own personal prison. But unlike Phil in "Groundhog Day," who suffers in isolation, Nyles is joined by Sarah (Cristin Milioti), who follows him into the mysterious cave at the heart of the time loop and gets herself stuck as well. 

"Palm Springs" offers us two perspectives: one from a veteran time-looper who has lived the same day for potentially hundreds of years, and the other from a fresh-faced newbie experiencing it all for the first time. What's interesting about "Palm Springs" is that it fully leans into the devastating ennui that's the natural result of this sort of situation. The time loop isn't just a set-up for a bunch of jokes, it's a reality where hopelessness is only briefly staved off by mindless distractions. That this movie would come out in 2020, a year when most of us were facing the monotony of life in quasi-quarantine, only adds to its emotional resonance.

16. Back to the Future Part III

Ah yes, the much maligned final chapter in the "Back to the Future" series. But you know what? This movie gets so much more hate than it deserves. No, it doesn't reach the dizzying heights of the first and second Back to the Future movies, but that doesn't mean it isn't a good film. 

After Doc Brown's DeLorean is struck by lightning and he ends up back in the old West of 1885, Marty discovers Doc's tombstone, which shows that he died just a few days after writing a letter to Marty asking not to be rescued. Obviously, Marty does just that. The romance between Doc and Miss Clara Clayton (Mary Steenburgen) is absolutely adorable, allowing the Back to the Future crew to explore a different side of Doc's character. And this outing is just as clever with its callbacks to jokes from the other two films, especially when Marty gets to have his classic Clint Eastwood moment. Plus, Michael J. Fox doing an Irish accent to play a McFly ancestor? Totally worth the price of admission.

15. The Map of Tiny Perfect Things

Structured much like "Groundhog Day," "The Map of Tiny Perfect Things" revolves around Mark (Kyle Allen), who has been living in a time loop for ages. He knows every single thing that's going to happen — that is, until he meets Margaret (Kathryn Newton), who has been stuck in the same time loop. Together, they set out to build a map of all the strange, beautiful moments that occur in their town, the kinds of things that you'd only notice if you had several lifetimes to catalog them all. 

"The Map of Tiny Perfect Things" is unique in its subtlety, and the way it brings out a time loop's smaller implications. For example, on this particular day, Mark's mother went into work early and did a double shift, which means that he hasn't seen more than a glimpse of her in years. Margaret's own relationship with her terminally ill mother means that she's hesitant to get out of the time loop and sever that connection. These tiny moments help "The Map of Tiny Perfect Things" stand out in the increasingly crowded time-loop genre.

14. 12 Monkeys

"12 Monkeys" is part traditional time travel story, part post-apocalyptic action thriller. Set initially in the 2030s, after a deadly plague has ravaged the planet, James Cole (Bruce Willis) is sent back in time to the '90s in order to prevent the devastating epidemic before it starts. 

Creatively directed by Terry Gilliam, the master of eccentric science fiction, "12 Monkeys" also has the honor of being one of the first films that would make people begin to take then-young heartthrob Brad Pitt seriously as an actor. His manic performance as Jeffrey Goines, the unstable leader of the eco-terrorist organization called the Army of the Twelve Monkeys, is one of the most memorable elements of the entire film. Performances aside, "12 Monkeys" also lays claim to a unique visual style that would influence several other science fiction films of the late '90s, and occupies a darker space than many other time travel films dare to enter.

13. Meet the Robinsons

Here, we take the opportunity to shout from the rooftops that "Meet the Robinsons" is perhaps the single most underrated Disney film of all time. Much like its lead character Lewis, a brilliant orphan whose inventions have a knack for getting him into trouble, "Meet the Robinsons" is tragically misunderstood. Lewis struggles to find an adoptive family, partially because his inventions often go haywire at the most inopportune times, but also because he's entirely focused on the past and, in particular, finding out the identity of his biological mother. 

When a kid named Wilbur Robinson turns up and takes Lewis 30 years or so into the future, not only does Lewis get to see how far humanity progresses, but he is exposed to an eccentric family that is loving, empathetic, and entirely devoted to one another. "Meet the Robinsons" is genuinely hilarious; more importantly, it's also a heart-warming tale about building a family of your own.

12. Peggy Sue Got Married

Probably the most common question asked of any adult staring down middle-age is, "If you could go back in time to relive your high school years, would you?" This hypothetical becomes a reality in "Peggy Sue Got Married," when Peggy Sue (Kathleen Turner), recently divorced and looking back on a life she thinks she's wasted, attends her 25th high school reunion. Her morose contemplation is interrupted, however, when she is suddenly thrust back in time to her senior year of high school in 1960. 

There, Peggy Sue faces certain choices. Given the opportunity to do it all over again, will she make the same decisions? Most notably, will she stick with Charlie (Nicolas Cage), her high-school sweetheart, even though she knows that their relationship is ultimately doomed? "Peggy Sue Got Married" is a bittersweet exploration of nostalgia, of growing older, and of looking back on your misspent youth with equal parts dissatisfaction and longing.

11. Somewhere in Time

Before we even get into the time travel elements of "Somewhere in Time," it's important to address the elephant in the room: Have there ever been two people on earth more preternaturally beautiful than Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve? Together, they star in this time travel romance, in which Reeve's playwright, Richard Collier, falls in love with a portrait of an actress (Seymour) nearly a century older, and learns how to use self-hypnosis to send himself back in time to 1912 so that they can be together. 

"Somewhere in Time" is a dreamy, fanciful production, with a gorgeously winsome score from John Barry. Reeve and Seymour have tremendous chemistry together, which makes their beautiful but ultimately doomed romance all the more compelling. Set against the backdrop of the historic Grand Hotel in Mackinac Island, Michigan, "Somewhere in Time" is a charming, whimsical, and heartbreaking tale of love across the ages.

10. Time After Time

It's surprising, really, that HG Wells, the enormously imaginative science fiction writer who dreamt up "The Time Machine" (along with dozens of other sci-fi classics) has rarely featured in time travel stories himself. But he does star in "Time After Time," a pulpy thriller in which Wells (Malcolm McDowell) has his time machine stolen by Jack the Ripper (David Warner), who uses it to evade the police and travel to '70s San Francisco. 

Wells gives chase, and must track Jack down before he murders again (in the meantime, he falls in love with a bank teller played by Mary Steenburgen, as one does). This was remade recently as a fairly lackluster network drama that got pulled from the airwaves before it was halfway through its first season, but the original film is a lot of fun, featuring a battle of wits between these two famous historical figures.

9. La Jetée

"La Jetée" is a French short film directed by Chris Marker. It's approximately 28 minutes long, consisting mostly of still photography with voiceover narration. It is magnificent. 

"La Jetée" tells the story of a man imprisoned in the post-apocalyptic future, where scientists are working on devising methods of time travel to avert the calamity that has befallen humanity. He has a particularly strong memory from childhood of himself standing on a pier, witnessing a man being killed. This window to the past allows him to withstand the mental shock of time travel. 

Once safely in the past, the man meets a woman, whom he falls in love. But in the end, when he has finished his mission and is allowed to live out his days in the past, he realizes that the man he saw murdered was the adult version of himself. By utilizing still photography, Marker places tremendous importance on the power of images — in this case, visuals are so strong that they literally allow one to travel through time. But Marker also sends an unmistakably clear message: you cannot escape your destiny, and despite our fixations on the past and the future, you can only ever live in the present.

8. Groundhog Day

Groundhog Day is not our most beloved national holiday, but it is the backdrop of a time-travel comedy classic. Acerbic weatherman Phil (Bill Murray) reluctantly travels to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania to cover a local ceremony in which a groundhog decides whether we'll end up having a longer winter or not. He is not happy about this assignment (to be fair, he's not happy about much of anything). But it gets even worse when Phil is forced to relive the same day over and over and over again. 

"Groundhog Day" does an amazing job of showing how Phil's emotions progress as he adapts to his situation: first, he's bemusemed, then angry, then depressed, and then finally comes to accept it. Once his new reality sets in, and all the fun of being able to do whatever you want with absolutely zero repercussions fades away, Phil lives a terribly isolating experience. No one he knows grows or changes; he can't have a single conversation with someone that they'll remember in the morning. It's to the credit of "Groundhog Day" that the horror of Phil's life is apparent even as it's mined for humor, giving Phil a genuinely hilarious existential crisis.

7. The Terminator

In terms of awkward conversations with your buddies, telling your best friend that he needs to go back in time to seduce your mother so that she'll get pregnant and give birth to you has to be right up there. But that's pretty much the central conceit behind "The Terminator." The future is an apocalyptic hellscape controlled by sentient machines, and the Terminator (a super-buff Arnold Schwarzenegger) is sent back in time to kill Sarah Connor before she can have her son John, who will grow up to become the leader in the fight against the machines. 

Although it's set almost exclusively in the '80s, the time travel element is baked into "The Terminator" from the very beginning. It's also an unusually intelligent science fiction action film. It has plenty of violence, fight scenes, and gore to keep adrenaline junkies happy, but some thoughtful subtext lurks just beneath the surface. Also, Linda Hamilton is note-perfect as Sarah Connor, going from a perfectly ordinary waitress to a warrior who battles killer robots in a matter of minutes.

When Kun, a spoiled young boy used to being the center of attention, suddenly has to share his parents with his new baby sister Mirai, he's not a happy camper. But one day, Kun goes into his family's garden, and he is given the opportunity to meet not just the older version of his sister, but also his mother as a child, and his great-grandfather as a young man. 

This is the magic of "Mirai": It creates a separate metaphysical plane where Kun, a child whose worldview is entirely self-centered, is given access to all of the different branches of his family tree, giving him a greater understanding of the people he loves most by showing them at different points in their lives. It also teaches Kun that he's one small component of a much larger whole, a legacy that goes on unending forever. But although "Mirai" touches on philosophical themes, it is presented with a great sense of fun and whimsy; Kun's travels are adventures, not dry family history lessons.

5. Back to the Future Part II

"Back to the Future Part II" picks up right where the first film left off. Marty reunites with Jennifer (whose actress has mysteriously changed between films), then Doc Brown bursts on the scene, frantically warning them that they need to travel to the future to fix the lives of their children. 

A huge selling point of "Back to the Future Part II" are the scenes set in the future world of 2015, which are so detailed and imaginative that they still feel futuristic, even though the real 2015 passed us by long ago. The way Hill Valley changes from 1955 to 1985 to 2015 is beautiful, showing the transformation of the California suburb over the decades. But "Back to the Future II" also revisits all of the original film's greatest hits, especially when Marty ends up having to travel to the '50s again to avoid Biff's incredibly Trump-esque rise to power . Some may claim that a large portion of the film is just a rehash of the first, but hey, why mess with what isn't broken?

4. The Time Machine

The classic HG Wells science fiction novel "The Time Machine" has had a few live-action adaptations , the best of which is directed by George Pal and stars Rod Taylor. George, an inventor at the turn of the century, is feverishly working to complete his time machine, a steampunk contraption that will allow him to see the future. He makes a few stops in the 20th century, where he sees the devastation of the first and second World Wars as well as the ever-present fears of nuclear attacks that would destroy humanity as we know it, before being knocked unconscious and travelling many thousands of years into the future. 

By then, humanity has recovered from nuclear blasts, but has split into two subspecies: the gentle surface-dwelling Eloi, and their subterranean predators, the Morlocks. "The Time Machine" is a clever, thought-provoking adventure that highlights many of the anxieties of both 1960, the year that this film was made, and the 1890s, when HG Wells wrote the original book. What will become of humanity in the long-term? Will we ever be able to curb the violent instincts that will likely lead to our downfall? "The Time Machine" provides answers to both.

3. About Time

Time travel movies can make you feel a lot of things, but they don't usually make you cry ugly tears. Apparently "About Time" didn't get the memo. When Tim (Domhnall Gleeson) turns 21, his father (Bill Nighy) sits him down and tells him the family secret: all of the men in their family have the ability to travel back to any point in their own timeline. 

Initially, Tim uses this as an opportunity to have a second chance with a girl (Rachel McAdams) he struck out with. However, Tim's story takes on a much more poignant tone after his father unexpectedly dies. Suddenly, the moments they shared become unbelievably precious, especially when Tim realizes that there will come a point when he can't see his father without causing serious, permanent changes to the people he loves (after Tim's daughter is born, for example, any trip to the past could threaten her existence). "About Time" is billed as a romantic comedy, but it's so much more than that. It's a wonderful story about the love between a father and son, and a reminder to the viewer to embrace the beauty of every single day.

2. Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure

It's hard to think of two more lovable airheads than Bill S. Preston, Esq. (Alex Winter) and Ted "Theodore" Logan, the stars of "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure." They're on the verge of failing their high school history class, which is majorly bad news for the future, given that Bill and Ted need to stick together long enough to write the song that will lead humanity to a peaceful utopian society. So, Rufus (George Carlin) springs into action, bringing the kids a time machine in the form of a phone booth that they can use to travel to the past and complete their history presentation. 

What follows is a madcap adventure through time. Bill and Ted end up packing their phone booth full of historical figures like Billy the Kid, Socrates, Joan of Arc, and Genghis Khan. "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure" is tremendously creative in its use of these famous people: having Napoleon get way too invested in an ice cream eating challenge, for example, might not be an obvious choice, but it makes perfect sense.

1. Back to the Future

"Back to the Future" is the gold standard when it comes to time travel films. When Marty ends up stuck in 1955 using his best friend Doc Brown's time machine, he has to fight to get back to his original time without causing too much disruption, an endeavor that is significantly complicated when Marty's mother starts to fall in love with him, jeopardizing his entire existence (also, he invents rock music? Marty is a busy kid). 

The dynamic between Marty and Doc Brown is probably the most endearing aspect of the film in both the 1985 and 1955 segments. But it's also incredibly fascinating to watch Marty see his own parents when they're teenagers themselves. Crispin Glover and Lea Thompson are perfectly cast as Marty's father and mother, somehow able to play the younger and older versions of their characters with equal dexterity. Also, the entire movie is so tightly written and expertly crafted that it's hard to think of a single thing to say against it. Is "Back to the Future" a perfect movie? It's certainly possible!

The Greatest Hits Is a High-Concept Remix of Romantic Clichés

Time travel is metaphor for grief — and music is the key to unlocking it — in this lo-fi romantic drama.

Grief is never convenient . It can manifest at the least opportune moments, and can be triggered by the most innocuous things. Whether it be a scent or a song, memory has a way of latching on, bringing up moments that we’d rather suppress.

Harriet (Lucy Boynton) understands that plight better than anyone. It’s been two years since her boyfriend Max ( David Corenswet ) had a fatal car accident — and thanks to some head trauma she sustained in the crash, she often finds herself reliving moments of their relationship, over and over, incapable of moving on.

Unfortunately, that’s not a metaphor: these flashbacks are visceral and real, each triggered by a song she experienced with Max. One takes her back to their meet-cute at a music festival; another transports her to a blissful beach day. On paper, it’s kind of romantic. But in Harriet’s story, orchestrated by writer-director Ned Benson, it’s painfully inconvenient.

The Greatest Hits is not afraid to indulge in some soul-stirring melodrama. It coasts the highs and lows of lost love with its heart on its sleeve, making for a story with an intimate scope. But believe it or not, it’s the sci-fi elements that give this story the grounding realism that it needs. As in a handful of cerebral sci-fi dramas , time travel is a fitting metaphor for grief. It’s also the very thing that keeps his sophomore effort from sinking beneath the weight of its played-out romantic clichés.

Harriet has traced the breadth of her life with Max by the songs they first listened to together, but there’s one moment in her life, one song, that remains unaccounted for. Harriet is still searching for the tune that will help her change the past, potentially saving Max’s life. But she can’t spend all her time combing through their record collection. Sooner or later, she has to rejoin the real world — and with the help of ever-present noise-canceling headphones, she can commute to her job at the library (because it’s quiet, of course) or her group therapy sessions without triggering another flashback.

From the outset, it’s very clear that Harriet is not living. Her condition has turned her from a promising music producer to a hermit, and the apartment she once shared with Max has become a shrine fit for a stalker. Among a careful catalog of songs she’s marked “safe” — from crates upon crates of her record collection — hangs a relationship timeline defined by music. She’s pushed everyone out of her life, her own mother included. The only one that’s stuck around is her gay best friend Morris (Austin Crute), who conveniently pops up whenever Harriet needs a confidence boost.

Boynton delivers an understated, aching performance as Harriet.

Crute’s performance is a definitive highlight, especially when paired with Boynton’s sullen, skittish lead. His effortless charm serves as an indicator of the kind of person Harriet used to be, and the film gains some much-needed levity whenever he’s around. Still, his limited role is one of many frustrating examples of an underbaked plot.

The Greatest Hits might be more enamored with its time-trekking premise than it is with the characters affected by it. That’s especially evident in the bond between Harriet and Max — or more appropriately, Max’s memory. Each flash back to a moment in their relationship is tinged with dread, which definitely works, given the circumstances. But we don’t learn much about Max during these brief exchanges; that’s partially because Harriet is so determined to change his fate. Otherwise, it’s conversations between Harriet and Morris that explain just who Max was when he was alive.

That instinct pushes the character into another vexing sci-fi trope: that of the Dead Wife in a Flashback. It’s interesting to see the gender roles reversed here, especially given Corenswet’s shifting role in the zeitgeist. ( He’s about to be Superman! ) Still, it would have been nice to see him get the chance to embody an actual character, rather than a ghost holding Harriet back.

Harriet’s quest to save her late boyfriend is the crux of the conflict here, but it never gets the substance it deserves.

Things get more interesting with the introduction of David (Justin H. Min), the latest member of Harriet’s support group. He’s grieving the loss of parents, but he clicks with Harriet instantly. With him, our heroine forges new memories attached to familiar tunes (the most endearing being an impromptu jam session to Nelly Furtado’s “I’m Like a Bird”), and slowly opens herself up to the idea of love. But intimacy is hard when you can’t leave the house without covering your ears. The closer Harriet gets to David, the more the lines between past and future blur. It’s here that The Greatest Hits shifts into a more urgent clip, settling finally into a story you don’t want to look away from.

Min’s chemistry with Boynton carries The Greatest Hits through some of its sillier sci-fi beats, including a confrontation that forces Harriet to prove that she can, in fact, meddle with time. The promise of new love — and the threat of more loss — injects their relationship with real, aching stakes. Any student of romance and sci-fi will likely know how this could end. Benson’s high-concept love story might be unique, but it’s not reinventing the wheel. That’s as much a virtue as it can be a vice, as The Greatest Hits is sampling the classics whenever it can. Nostalgia and novelty live side-by-side here, and it’s that fusion that ultimately delivers a solid exercise in rebirth.

The Greatest Hits is streaming now on Hulu.

• Science Fiction

Screen Rant

8 time travel movies that actually make sense.

Your changes have been saved

Email is sent

Email has already been sent

Please verify your email address.

You’ve reached your account maximum for followed topics.

Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare Trailer Reveals A Murderous & Child-Abducting Peter In New Poohniverse Movie

“no other gangster film ever did”: the godfather has 1 surprising secret to success, coppola says, harry potter star admits she briefly forgot she was in the magical franchise.

Time travel is one of the most used themes in science fiction, and it allows artists to make their own rules – however, this has led to many nonsensical stories about time travel, but there are also many others that actually make sense. Time travel in film can be traced all the way back to 1949 with the adaptation of Mark Twain’s 1889 novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court , starring Bing Crosby, and one of the earliest, most influential time-travel movies was George Pal’s 1960 adaptation of H.G. Well’s 1895 novella The Time Machine .

Since then, time travel has been a fascinating topic to cover in film, and it has made its way to various genres – from drama (such as About Time ) to horror (like Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness ) and even the world of superheroes ( Avengers: Endgame ). As time travel is a concept rather than a reality, it’s open to interpretation, allowing artists to make their own rules and come up with their own methods to take their characters on adventures across time and space. This has made way for confusing and nonsensical ways in which time travel works, but there are others that actually make sense, in both their methods and how time travel affects the story – and here are eight examples of these.

Related: 8 Sci-Fi Movies That Break Their Own Time Travel Rules

8 Primer (2004)

Primer is a psychological sci-fi movie directed by Shane Carruth. Primer follows Aaron (Carruth) and Abe (Dave Sullivan), two engineers who accidentally discover time travel. After a couple of careful experiments, Aaron and Abe start using their time-travel machine, called “the box”, to go back in time and make profitable same-day stock trades. However, time traveling soon begins to have physical and mental consequences on them, and their friendship is put to the test. Abe and Aaron are able to travel in time due to a loop, which creates doubles of themselves. Primer has been pointed out as the closest movie version of how time travel would actually work in real life.

7 Tenet (2020)

Tenet is a sci-fi action thriller movie directed by Christopher Nolan. Tenet follows the Protagonist (John David Washington), a former CIA agent who learns how to manipulate the flow of time to prevent an attack from the future that could annihilate the present world. Tenet is quite divisive due to its complex approach to time travel, as Nolan took real-life concepts and theories from physics to bring time travel to life, but as complex as it is, it makes sense. The characters in Tenet found a way of inverting the entropy of objects using nuclear fission and created a machine called a turnstile which inverts the entropy of anything or anyone placed inside it.

The object or person then begins to move backwards through time, but inverting a human has some side effects. As the person is moving backwards while everything else goes forwards, the world is disorienting and dangerous, the air is unbreathable, and the heat transfer of fire and ice are inverted, among other details. There’s a lot of physics involved in Tenet , and while it’s quite complex, it eventually makes sense.

6 Lightyear (2022)

Lightyear is an animated sci-fi adventure movie and a spinoff of the Toy Story film series . Directed by Angus MacLane, Lightyear follows Space Ranger Buzz Lightyear (voiced by Chris Evans) and his crew who, after becoming stranded on a hostile planet, have to find a way to repair their ship and return home. After a year of tests and research, Buzz volunteers as the test pilot for hyperspace fuel, and even though it’s only a four-minute test for him, four years had actually passed. Buzz continues testing the hyperspace fuel and ends up over sixty years into the future, where he meets Zurg, who turns out to be his older version. Older Buzz reveals that he fled into space to avoid arrest, and ended up hundreds of years into the far future.

Lightyear doesn’t complicate time travel and simply shows Buzz in his ship breaking the hyperspeed barrier and going through a series of rings that made him jump into the future thanks to time dilation. Buzz could have had a way to go back in time and avoid stranding his crew but chose not to alter the past after seeing what the future held.

5 X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)

X-Men: Days of Future Past is the fifth movie in the mainline of the X-Men saga, the sequel to X-Men: The Last Stand and X-Men: First Class , and a follow-up to The Wolverine . In a dystopian 2023, Sentinels are programmed to hunt down and kill mutants, so Kitty Pryde (Elliot Page) uses her powers to send Bishop a few days into the past to warn the rest of the mutants. They successfully avert the attack and the group retreats to a remote Chinese temple, where Professor X (Patrick Stewart) explains they have to go back in time to prevent Bolivar Trask’s assassination and thus the creation of the Sentinels. Wolverine volunteers to go as his regenerative abilities will allow him to survive the trip.

What makes time travel in X-Men: Days of Future Past comprehensible is that there are no machines involved and the subjects don’t physically travel in time. Instead, Kitty Pryde’s powers phases their consciousness through time and into the body of their past/younger selves, which is why both timelines co-exist until the consciousness of the subject returns to their present-day body.

4 Back to the Future (1985)

Back to the Future is a sci-fi movie directed by Robert Zemeckis. Set in 1985, Back to the Future follows teenager Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox), whose eccentric scientist friend, Emmett “Doc” Brown (Christopher Lloyd), builds a time-traveling DeLorean car. Marty ends up being sent back to 1955, where he not only has to make sure his parents fall in love (otherwise he won’t exist), but he also has to find Doc so he can help him return to the future.

Back to the Future’ s time travel rules are so simple, coherent, and effective that they have been taken as inspiration and basis for other time travel movies. The DeLorean was the conduit, but the rules were simple: you mess with the past, in any way, and your future will be altered, which is why it was a top priority for Marty to make his parents fall in love with each other.

3 Arrival (2016)

Arrival is a sci-fi drama movie directed by Denis Villeneuve and based on the 1998 short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang. Arrival follows linguist Louise Banks (Amy Adams), who is recruited by the US Army to decipher the language of extraterrestrials who have arrived at Earth. Arrival is not about time travel in the traditional way, and more like X-Men: Days of Future Past , it’s more about the mind. The aliens' language alters humans’ perception of time, allowing them to experience memories of future events, which is how Banks knew the tragedies that she and her family were going to go through years later.

2 Interstellar (2014)

Another Christopher Nolan movie addressing time travel is Interstellar . Set in 2067, in a future where humanity is facing global extinction after a global famine, ex-NASA pilot Joseph Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) is recruited for a mission to find an exoplanet capable of supporting life. Just like in Lightyear , time travel in Interstellar is due to time dilation, as time passes differently on each planet Cooper and his crew land in. Near the end of his mission, Copper ends up inside a five-dimensional tesseract, in which he can see different moments in time from inside his daughter Murphy’s bedroom, allowing him to communicate with her in Morse code by manipulating items in the room. Thanks to this, he helps Murph solve the equation that saves Earth.

1 The Terminator (1984)

The Terminator is a sci-fi action movie directed by James Cameron. The Terminator follows Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), a soldier sent from 2029 to 1984 to stop a cybernetic assassin known as a Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger) who was also sent back in time. The Terminator’s mission in 1984 is to kill Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) so her son, John Connor, won’t be born. In the future, an AI defense network known as Skynet becomes self-aware and triggers a global nuclear war to exterminate the human species. John Connor rallies the survivors and leads a resistance movement against Skynet, which is why the Terminator was sent to 1984, while Reese was sent to save Sarah Connor.

Through its simple use of time travel, The Terminator covers topics like free will, destiny, causality loops, and more, as if the Terminator succeeds, a whole timeline would be erased. Meanwhile, John Connor has to send Kyle Reese back as he’s also his father, so it’s not just about saving his mother but ensuring that he’s conceived. The Terminator ’s time travel is so effective that it made way for a whole franchise.

• The Terminator
• Interstellar

The Best, Most Realistic Movie About Time Travel Cost $7,000

Your changes have been saved

Email is sent

Email has already been sent

Please verify your email address.

You’ve reached your account maximum for followed topics.

The Big Picture

• Primer , created on a budget of $7,000, became a cult classic and won multiple awards.
• The film's complex plot, lack of exposition, and fast-paced editing can make it difficult to follow and understand.
• Primer 's low budget contributes to its realistic feel, making it relatable and believable for viewers.

If ever a film were brought into existence through the sheer force of one man's will, 2004's Primer is it. Over the course of three years, creator Shane Carruth (who was in his late 20s at the inception) wrote, directed, produced, edited, starred in, and wrote the score for the incredibly innovative, super-grounded sci-fi, all on a budget of $7,000. Primer would go on to win the Sundance Grand Jury Prize and Alfred P. Sloan Prize and become a beloved sci-fi cult classic.

Primer is the story of Aaron (Carruth) and Abe ( David Sullivan ), two engineers who accidentally stumble onto time travel while working on other projects in Aaron's garage. The time machine itself is a simple, cramped box made mostly of PVC — no shiny DeLorean , no dimension-hopping T.A.R.D.I.S. — but what makes this version of time travel unique is that in order to travel back in time, the traveler must spend an equivalent amount of time inside the box. In other words, to travel six hours into the past, you must spend six hours in the box.

Immediately after their discovery, Aaron and Abe are ultra careful not to influence the past during their brief trips through time, fearing consequences they can't even guess at. But eventually, the temptation to change history becomes too great, and Aaron in particular becomes obsessed with his ability to dictate the outcomes of events. This creates multiple complex, interwoven timelines and ultimately leads to a rift between the two characters.

Four friends/fledgling entrepreneurs, knowing that there's something bigger and more innovative than the different error-checking devices they've built, wrestle over their new invention.

'Primer' Can Be Tough To Follow

Primer is famously cerebral , refusing to hold the audience's hand at any point. The two leads speak in arcane physics jargon throughout because Carruth was adamant that the dialogue should sound authentic. The tight (and, at times, perhaps over-tuned) editing keeps Primer fast-paced; no one will catch every detail of the complicated plot the first time through . Primer is also very light on exposition — the characters often have long conversations about topics that the audience, at least at first, has no context for. Only in the last third of the movie does the voiceover dip in more heavily and start explaining things, though often cryptically.

Between the complexity of the story, the jargon, and the pacing, Primer can be a challenge to follow ; some critics have even called it "antagonistic" toward the audience. But that wasn't Carruth's goal. Instead, as Carruth told IndieWire , "the information is in there" to create a coherent story; it just might take multiple viewings for you to get it all. But unlike some modern filmmakers who don't trust their audience to make inferences and instead prefer to spell everything out, Carruth trusts not only his audience's intelligence, but their fortitude — perhaps a bit too much at times.

The 21st Century’s Best Time Travel Movie So Far Is a Low-Budget Rom-Com

You're guaranteed to be chewing on this one for months, two minutes at a time.

If Primer was an unlikely hit, then its creator was an equally unlikely filmmaker. Carruth has a degree in math and started his career as an engineer before quitting to pursue writing. (This training would turn out to be useful in the course of writing the script, though Carruth had to learn physics jargon by reading graduate students' papers online .) With no formal background in filmmaking, he taught himself scriptwriting, cinematography, and storyboarding in the process of making Primer . Carruth said during his interview with IndieWire that he never planned on starring in the film; he cast himself as one of Primer 's leads only because he had difficulty finding an actor who played the part the way he wanted it , with subtlety rather than drama, and with his ultra-low budget , he worried that someone else might cut and run in the middle of shooting, leaving them stranded.

Perhaps surprisingly, the acting is one of Primer 's biggest strengths . Either Carruth or Sullivan (who's gone on to have a broad and successful TV career) is in every scene, so the film rests entirely on their shoulders. Both performances are subdued and understated, yet a great deal of subtext lies just beneath the surface.

How Was 'Primer' Made?

After months of rehearsals, shooting took place over five weeks around Dallas, where Carruth lived at the time. Primer was shot on super 16 film; Carruth said during his IndieWire interview that he had considered going digital, but in the early 2000s, the technology wasn't yet there to create the look he wanted. However, this meant there was no budget for multiple takes . Once shooting was complete, Carruth did the editing himself, again learning the process as he went along and often having to edit around lack of footage and continuity errors. He also composed the score, a task he said he'd enjoy handing off to someone else the next time around.

In some ways, the story of Primer mirrors the story of its creation. Before their break-through discovery, Aaron and Abe, like Shane Carruth, are cash-strapped; they even vandalize their own cars and refrigerators for parts in their quest to create something people will want to buy. Carruth, too, had to cut corners due to lack of funds , using friends' and family's houses and apartments for many of the locations, relying on ambient lighting and sunlight, filming only a single take for many scenes because he couldn't afford to waste film.

And like his character, Carruth claims to be a "control freak." Primer starts out following four engineers working on patents in Aaron's garage, but as soon as Aaron and Abe realize what they've stumbled onto, Aaron insists on cutting out their two unwitting colleagues rather than revealing the truth to them. He also doesn't let his wife in on the secret, to Abe's surprise. And Aaron is the first one tempted to use the time machine to change the past, leading to his falling out with Abe. Carruth performed every job in the course of making Primer partly because he couldn't afford to hire anyone else, but also because he couldn't stand to give up control , a quality that he doesn't apologize for, because, as he says during his IndieWire interview, "it’s important to feel strongly about the material you’re working on."

The Low Budget Gives 'Primer' a Documentary Feel

The result? Primer 's ultra-low budget contributes to its grounded realism — there are no Avengers: Endgame or even Back to the Future -style special effects, and the main characters never travel more than a few days into the past, so fancy set pieces are unnecessary. Instead, Primer feels incredibly real, even documentary-like (the fact that the actors clearly haven't had professional hairstyling or makeup and appear to be wearing their own clothes contributes to this). Watching Primer , you can actually believe that if two smart but ultimately ordinary guys happened upon time travel by accident, this is exactly how it would play out.

After Primer 's success at Sundance, it had a very limited theatrical release, playing in no more than 31 theaters at a time over the course of a few months yet still bringing in over $400,000 at the domestic box office . Primer 's DVD release the following year quickly vaulted it to cult classic status, particularly among science fiction aficionados. Its complexity contributes to its rewatchability : after your third, fourth, or tenth viewing, you'll still be catching details you haven't noticed before.

Primer isn't for the faint-of-heart film viewer; it asks more of its audience than most films, and gives less. But serious sci-fi lovers and fans of movies that make you think should consider it a must-watch — and don't feel bad if you have to Google "Primer ending explained" after the fact.

Primer is available to rent on Prime Video and Apple TV+ in the U.S.

Rent on Prime Video

• Movie Features
• Shane Carruth

This Time-Travel Hulu Movie Gave One Umbrella Academy Star Their Happy Ending

Your changes have been saved

Email is sent

Email has already been sent

Please verify your email address.

You’ve reached your account maximum for followed topics.

Quick Links

The greatest hits had a fairytale ending, the umbrella academy's ben finds love with jennifer, the umbrella academy's ben and jennifer get a cruel ending.

The following contains spoilers for The Umbrella Academy Season 4, now streaming on Netflix.

One of the things that has left The Umbrella Academy fans a bit jaded is the bittersweet ending. The Hargreeves siblings manage to reset the timeline to what it was meant to be. But it comes at a great cost, as there are key deaths that occur that many deem cold and heartless.

While this ending isn't happy at all, one of the Umbrellas did get an ending filled with hope and love after the warping of space and time. This was none other than Justin H. Min, the actor who plays Ben in The Umbrella Academy . It came in a Hulu romantic comedy that had sci-fi as its spine: The Greatest Hits . For those who like Min's acting, he's given a better fate in the Hulu movie than the Umbrella Academy's Crisis on Infinite Earths -style ending .

Justin H. Min Had a Happier, Romantic Ending Filled with Possibility

The Greatest Hits' Ending, Explained

Hulu's The Greatest Hits mixes time-travel and romance as Lucy Boynton's Harriet tries to prevent a heartbreaking tragedy in her love life.

Justin Lin's Actor Details

In The Greatest Hits , Min played David, a young man who owned an antiques store who spent time with Harriet . Initially, they forged a friendship as she was mourning the loss of her boyfriend, Max ( played by Superman's David Corenswet ) after a car accident. David, himself, still grieved the loss of his parents, so they had a commonality.

Music was a key connector as well. To David, it calmed his soul, but it triggered something supernatural inside Harriet that allowed her to go back in time. Unfortunately, she couldn't save Max, no matter how hard she tried. That's why she decided to explore the potential of a future with David in the present. In time, she felt guilty and went back, only to realize she had to let fate play out.

The past Max admitted he'd never let them meet if he knew it would kill her. Harriet realized she had to be selfless and stop their romance so he could get a new destiny. That way, Max and Harriet would never get into an accident. With the timeline changed and Harriet's memories blurred, she ended up at a concert where she meets David and his sister .

They weren't sure how they knew each other. But they could tell they weren't strangers. The Hulu movie concluded with them smiling, insinuating they were going to bond and forge something over music again. In short, it portended that they were taking the first steps towards rebuilding a romance. The timeline may have been destroyed to build a new one, but one thing persisted: their love was immortal.

Justin H. Min's Ben Hargreeves Is Set Up For an Existential Romance

'Makes the Most Sense': Umbrella Academy Stars Defend the Show's Ending

Emmy Raver-Lampman and Elliot Page defend the finale of Netflix's Umbrella Academy

Min's Ben has a romantic arc as well in The Umbrella Academy . For three seasons, fans were curious what the Jennifer Incident was . She's a young woman Ben has to rescue in the new timeline created at the end of Season 3. He has an intrinsic love for her. No matter what, he's pulled towards her like gravity. He frees her from a fake town that Reginald had set up.

His siblings help out, too, confused why Ben loves her. She gets kidnapped by the Umbrella Academy's Keepers , but Ben locates her once more. He uses his squid powers, kills the soldiers and then departs with her. Their love blossoms right as they go on the run. She also senses he means the world to her. She can't tell why. A lot has to do with the past that Reginald tried to hide. He killed Ben and Jennifer as children in the first season timeline.

He didn't want them bonding because the marigold in Ben and Durango in Jennifer would cause an apocalypse. Reginald mind-wiped both children and let them think an accident occurred. In the new timeline, Ben and Jennifer's bond is explained by them meeting as children, touching and activating their particles before Reginald shot them dead . It was darkly poetic seeing them bleeding out next to each other, but that was a sign, once they existed on the same mortal plane, they'd try to find each other.

It's a Romeo and Juliet story, as Reginald keeps warning that they cannot be together. Even when the siblings contact Ben, he lets them know he's following his heart. All his life he felt alone, so he's breaking the rules. Jennifer doesn't care either. She never had a real family, so she wants to be with Ben. Even if it means corrupting nature.

Ben and Jennifer Are Killed to Reset the Timeline

The Umbrella Academy Season 4's Scandalous Love Triangle, Explained

The Umbrella Academy Season 4 has a shocking love triangle emerge that threatens to destroy the harmony the Hargreeves siblings are trying to keep.

When Ben and Jen stay together, they get sick and merge into a giant, mindless kaiju . They're trapped inside as the creature devours everything in sight. Nothing harms it. Clearly, reality will be consumed if it goes unchecked. This is what the Keepers think will reset the timeline to the one that was meant to be. They call it the Cleanse, but they're just guessing. They don't have concrete evidence.

The truth comes when Five learns in The Umbrella Academy's series finale that the Cleanse must kill the siblings. This will undo what Reginald did when he let the marigold out into the world, powered them up, and caused the Multiverse to be born . That means Ben and Jennifer will die as well. The siblings accept they're saving the world and creating a timeline that will finally have no apocalypses. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Once the Hargreeves clan dies, the world is reborn. Ben and Jennifer are reborn as flowers in a park with the others . It's cute but also cruel. All they wanted was to explore true love. Instead, they paid the price for Reginald's meddling, and for his wife, Abigail, whose scientific wonder made the particles. Some fans thought maybe Ben and Jennifer might have been reborn as ordinary people, finding each other the same way The Greatest Hits' David and Harriet came into contact.

Once the Hargreeves clan dies, the world is reborn.

The Umbrella Academy Season 4 isn't up for an idealistic, fairytale ending. Ben and Jennifer are nothing more than variables in a sadistic experiment where space and time doesn't forgive, nor does nature have compassion for. These rogue elements are taken off the table in the most heartbreaking manner.

Watching them mutate is pretty hard to watch as well. They have no agency. They cry out for help, yet there is no extraction. It's torturous and a stark reminder that this Netflix series, even as it ends, will always find a way to deliver the unexpected. Love isn't as immortal, not in a world where Reginald and Abigail played god and doomed unsuspecting children in a haunting arc.

All four seasons of The Umbrella Academy are now streaming on Netflix.

The Umbrella Academy

• Cast & crew

Thread: An Insidious Tale

A couple resorts to a spell to travel back in time, hoping to prevent their daughter's tragic death. A couple resorts to a spell to travel back in time, hoping to prevent their daughter's tragic death. A couple resorts to a spell to travel back in time, hoping to prevent their daughter's tragic death.

• Jeremy Slater
• Mandy Moore
• Kumail Nanjiani

• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

More like this

Technical specs

Related news, contribute to this page.

• See more gaps
• Learn more about contributing

More to explore

Recently viewed.

Advertisement

Where Kamala Harris Stands on the Issues: Abortion, Immigration and More

She wants to protect the right to abortion nationally. Here’s what else to know about her positions.

• Share full article

By Maggie Astor

• Published July 21, 2024 Updated Aug. 24, 2024

With Vice President Kamala Harris having replaced President Biden on the Democratic ticket, her stances on key issues will be scrutinized by both parties and the nation’s voters.

She has a long record in politics: as district attorney of San Francisco, as attorney general of California, as a senator, as a presidential candidate and as vice president.

Here is an overview of where she stands.

Ms. Harris supports legislation that would protect the right to abortion nationally, as Roe v. Wade did before it was overturned in 2022, in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

After the Dobbs ruling, she became central to the Biden campaign’s efforts to keep the spotlight on abortion, given that Mr. Biden — with his personal discomfort with abortion and his support for restrictions earlier in his career — was a flawed messenger. In March, she made what was believed to be the first official visit to an abortion clinic by a president or vice president.

She consistently supported abortion rights during her time in the Senate, including cosponsoring legislation that would have banned common state-level restrictions, like requiring doctors to perform specific tests or have hospital admitting privileges in order to provide abortions.

As a presidential candidate in 2019, she argued that states with a history of restricting abortion rights in violation of Roe should be subject to what is known as pre-clearance for new abortion laws — those laws would have to be federally approved before they could take effect. That proposal is not viable now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe.

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .

Press Herald

Account Subscription: ACTIVE

Questions about your account? Our customer service team can be reached at [email protected] during business hours at (207) 791-6000 .

• Local & State

Life-size dinosaurs, a candy store tour and more to do this weekend

Take a road tip to Wiscasset for art, food, car racing and a gargantuan amount of candy.

You are able to gift 5 more articles this month.

Anyone can access the link you share with no account required. Learn more .

With a Press Herald subscription, you can gift 5 articles each month.

It looks like you do not have any active subscriptions. To get one, go to the subscriptions page .

Loading....

One of many dinosaurs that will be at Cross Insurance Arena in Portland. Photo courtesy of Jurassic Quest

Make no bones about it, it’s going to be a great weekend, starting with  Jurassic Quest at Cross Insurance Arena . Animatronic dinosaurs will delight the kids, who will also get a kick out of digging for fossils and riding on a baby dino. Another option in our weekly roundup is “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical” at the Maine State Music Theatre in Brunswick.

‘Beautiful’ at Maine State Music Theatre, Pet Rock in the Park and Jurassic Quest

Some of the candy available at the Granite Hall Store in Round Pond. Photo by Aimsel Ponti

For an even sweeter experience, we’re sending you candy shopping. We’ve shined a light on five shops  with something extra to offer and created a nifty guide of 18 to look you can find  all around southern Maine and the Midcoast. From giant shops like Sweetz & More in Wiscasset to charming places like the Granite Hall Store in Round Pond, there’s a candy shop out there calling your name.

These 5 unique Maine candy stores are a real treat

The Brackett’s Market 4-Cylinder Pros compete Saturday at Wiscasset Speedway. Anna Chadwick/Morning Sentinel

Should your sweets-seeking adventure bring you to Wiscasset, we clue you into  several other things to do  in town, including car races at the Wiscasset Speedway.

A trip to pretty Wiscasset can also include art, history, speed

Bagel sandwich with eggs, cheese and pork roll from Dutchman’s Wood-Fired Bagels in Brunswick. Photo by Aimsel Ponti

Want to hit breakfast right out of the park? Make your way to Brunswick for an egg and cheese sandwich from Dutchman’s Wood-Fired Bagels . We’re particularly partial to the one with pork roll and bodega sauce. Your taste buds can thank us later.

Pork roll and bodega sauce on a breakfast sandwich? We’re not in Brunswick anymore

Ling-Wen Tsai, “Rising/Sinking Study Chair,” wood and milk paint, 12 x 12 x 5 inches. Photo courtesy of Corey Daniels Gallery

Farther south in Wells, check out “Life Forms,” a women’s sculpture collective at the Corey Daniels Gallery. You’ll see works by about a dozen artists as you make your way through the exhibit.

Women’s sculpture collective debuts work in Wells

U.S. Navy Band Country Current performing in Tennessee. Photo by Petty Officer 1st Class April Enos

For some Sunday afternoon live tunes, head to Memorial Park in Freeport at 3 p.m. for a free performance by Country Current . The band is the only U.S. Navy country/bluegrass ensemble, and the show should be a foot-stomping good time.

See U.S. Navy band Country Current for free in Freeport

Comments are not available on this story.

Send questions/comments to the editors.

« Previous

Next »

Portland Park(ing) Day set for Sept. 20

Police say man pointed gun at troopers before he was shot and fell from Piscataqua River Bridge

Truck that fell through covered bridge was 6 times heavier than posted limit, piscataqua river bridge reopens after police shooting on i-95, portland’s former diversity director says he was ‘abruptly fired’, paul lepage reemerges to support effort to oust sen. angus king, member log in.

Please enter your username and password below. Already a subscriber but don't have one? Click here .

Not a subscriber? Click here to see your options