Time Travel In Film

Time travel has yet to be proven but that hasn't

stopped movies through the years from toying

with the possibility. Films released in the eighties,

nineties, and two thousands have their own ideas of how

time travel is possible,as well as the causes for time

travel, and the repercussions. A few of these films are, the

Back to the Future Trilogy, 12 Monkeys, The Time

Travelers Wife, and the Terminator Series. Though

these films are of fiction, the concepts of time travel

are based on actual theories of scientific relativity.

 

In the Back to the Future Trilogy, Dr. Emmett "Doc"

Brown and Marty McFly travel to the future and the past

trying to repair damage that can alter the future. They

time travel in a car that runs on trash and is equip with

the Flux Capacitor.The car must accelerate to 88 mph to

activate the Flux Capacitor which what makes time travel

possible. In reality driving 88mph does not make you time

travel and if it's just a point of activation for the Flux

Capacitor then why couldn't it be less? Some events can be

argued with time travel theories presented in these films

especially in Back to the Future II. Old Biff from2010

goes to 1955 in Docs time machine to give young Biff a

sports almanac. Old Biff returns and 2010 looks as pleasant

and suburban as it did before. The exchange between the two

Biffs changed the future so not only should it have changed

1985 into a disastrous town but some change should have

been shown in 2010.When asked about this the writers

said," We decided not to make anything of this idea because

this is one of those difficult time travel concepts that

general audiences have a real hard time understanding. A

detailed explanation of it would have slowed down the

story, and most of the audience doesn't ever think about

it. That's why we made certain things ambiguous and left

various things open for interpretation in hopes that the

possibility of at least one or two explanations would be

better than a "definitive" explanation that you could find

holes in." (Zemeckis, Gale)Doc and Marty find Jennifer and

carry her out of the house before Old Biff returns so a

loop hole would be to say that no matter what disaster 1985

became because of the exchange, 2010 could still become the

same exterior of the original 2010 Hillside. The trilogy

also shows people vanishing from their present time when

there is an abrupt change in history so old Biff may have

returned but as seen in the film, he gets out of the car

clumsily and in pain; one could assume he's about to

vanish. It is believed that the slightest change in history

can drastically change the future whether it is in,

fortune, relationships, lifestyle, events, birth,or death.

In the final movie of the trilogy Doc ends upturning a

train into a time traveling machine after the original was

destroyed which insinuates that any vehicle can be modified

for time travel.

In the film 12 Monkeys the government has an advanced

program that allows time travel. The machine is overseen by

scientists who send able people to the past to trace the

origins of a virus that plagues the future. Out of all the

uses of time travel this film has the largest source that

can only be described as a mechanical capsule. James

Cole, a convicted criminal, is sent to collect information

pertaining to finding a cure for the virus which kills

millions between1996 and 1997. The year 1996 pre-virus for

Cole is considered a Utopia from the year he is coming

from, 2035. Fresh air, music, and freedom are missing from

his world as an adult. Through the story James is haunted

by a dream of a man dying but later it's revealed that it's

his future; a form of Deja Vu. The characters James and

Kathryn feel a sense of familiarity for one another that

cannot be placed. My only explanation in this circularity

concept is the recognition of each others soul.

Presumably, "..the events of deja vu are encounters with

memories from a past life, and that dreams are soul travel

and soul memories.It would work for religions that believe

in reincarnation,but there is no scientific evidence to

back it up"(Carroll). The outcome was inevitable and

proves that you cannot change fate. Ultimately, Cole risks

his life to protect the future of mankind with the help of

time travel.

The novel, 'The Time Traveler's Wife' by Audrey

Niffenegger has been adapted into a film which was

released in June2009. The way time traveling is used in

this story is much different than the films I've previously

spoken about;instead of being produced with the help of

mechanical technology the ability to time travel is in

genetics. The character Henry DeTamble has a genetic

disorder which causes unpredictable time travel. "Henry is

one of the first people diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement

Disorder:periodically his genetic clock resets and he

finds himself misplaced in time, pulled to moments of

emotional gravity from his life, past and future."

(Audrey Niffenegger.1) Henry has no control over his time

travels and it becomes rather deadly popping in at random

times and place without any belongings. Not even his

clothes travel with him. The extent of his time in the past

and the future is unknown which leads him to have to steal

and pillage. It is later revealed that time travel is

perhaps triggered by stress levels and is indeed

hereditary. The disorder however causes miscarriages for

women or mice that carry future time travelers because the

embryos travel out of the womb, and then in again. Henry

works with Dr. Kendrick to come up with a cure for this

disorder for him and future carriers.

In 'The Time Traveler's Wife', the Henry limits

himself to change the past especially when it comes to

death however he does use this ability once in his life to

purchase a winning lottery ticket allowing him and his

wife to be able to buy a home and live comfortably. This

moral compass is tested also in Back to the Future II when

Marty McFly buys a sports almanac against the advice of Doc

and it gets into Biffs hands which changes the future

entirely. I suppose the difference in outcomes were due to

better judgment and not abusing the opportunity at hand.

12 Monkeys deals with more serious matters when trying to

change the future for the better. When trying to stop Dr.

Peters, Coles younger self watches his adult self die. This

will be a memory young James with replay throughout his

life. All three films have their main character confronted

by their selves at a different time which is always seen as

a possible threat in stories of time travel. "The

possibility of meeting ourselves, of gazing on ourselves

from the outside is the paradoxical event that perhaps

fascinates us the most in all the narratives on time

travel, both in literature and in cinema. A distinction

between literature and film in this respect is that, thanks

to the point-of-view, we the spectators can be

perceptively, almost physically part of this unattainable

gaze, by which we look at ourselves while we see and we

make ourselves see at the same time" (Rascaroli. 364) Each

of these films concludes that being in the same dimension

does not cancel out a person when they come into contact.

Though these films have different methods and reasons of

time travel, it's clear that many of their views on ideals

and consequences are the same. The possibilities are

endless..

Clearly these films play on real theories and

imagination, so the question is whether they are accurate

or not in plot or technique. In The Terminator the future

time machine as stated in the first film can only transport

living tissue preventing any weaponry from the future to be

sent to the past.Without an outer layer of skin the robots

wouldn't have been able to time travel in any of the films.

However if this is indeed the case why is it that in

Terminator 2: Judgment Day there is a liquid metal

Terminator sent to the past? Possibly it could imitate

living tissue or originally was wrapped in living tissue

but was discarded at some point. Through out the series

John Connor continually sends protectors to the past, first

to his mother then for himself. Being the micro chip from

the first installment of the Terminator survived the

company Cyberdyne Systems attained knowledge from it. Isn't

it possible that it's because of John Connor that the

Terminators exist in the first place? It led to the

creation of Skynet.

These films as well as many others of time travel are

based on scientific theories. Albert Einstein's relativity

theory proposes that space time is curved instead of a

straight time-line which opens the possibility of time

travel. The curve as we're a 3 dimensional being is a

circle and the film 12 Monkeys deals with circularity. The

films Contact and Donnie Darko use the theory wormholes.

"For example travel from Point A to Point B in the image is

greatly facilitated by the presence of the wormhole.

Wormholes may be possible on microscopic distances as a

result of the quantum foam which allows

particle/antiparticle pairs to leap into existence

momentarily, then subsequently disappear. Interestingly,

wormholes allow travel between different times as well as

different locations,so time travel may be theoretically

possible." (Corbett)Wormholes are said to exist at the

center of a blackhole. The television show Doctor Who

refers to the theory of quantum physics. " According to one

interpretation of quantum physics, every time a quantum

object, such as an electron, is faced with a choice, the

world divides to allow it to take every possibility on

offer. In the simplest example, the electron may be faced

with a wall containing two holes, so that it must go

through one hole or the other. The Universe splits so that

in one version of reality -- one set of relative dimensions

-- it goes through the hole on the left, while in the other

it goes through the hole on the right. Pushed to its

limits, this interpretation says that the Universe is split

into infinitely many copies of itself, variations on a

basic theme, in which all possible outcomes of all possible

"experiments"must happen somewhere in the "multiverse".

The film, The Butterfly Effect and the television show Tru

Calling deal with time travel on a more personal and

physical level. Both have huge repercussions because of the

main characters constant attempts of change, it alters the

universe and its balance. It entails recurrence and relies

on initial conditions. The Butterfly effect is based off of

the Chaos Theory that deals with dynamic behavioral

systems. There are so many theories yet to be proven and

they are constantly used as a base in science fiction.