Timestalkers
Tags: flashback

Plot synopsis:
Dr. Scott McKenzie (William Devane) is a college professor and ardent fan of the gunslinger culture of the Old West. A year ago, McKenzie watched his wife and son die in a car crash caused by a drunk driver attempting to flee the police. With his friend, General Joe Brodsky (John Ratzenberger), McKenzie attends an auction of Wild West memorabilia, where they agree to bid on a pair of steamer trunks and split the contents between them. As the auction is conducted, flashbacks show the items' histories in the 19th century. At the time a man, Joseph Cole (Klaus Kinski), is looking for a gunslinger who has a pair of distinctive ebony-handled pistols marked with stars. Some cowboys he encounters on the road point him towards the town of Crossfire, California. At the town saloon, he inquires about the man but is harassed by a trio of local thugs, one of whom shoots at him, hitting instead one of the trunks which Dr. McKenzie is bidding on in the present. Cole quickly shoots all three men dead, an event memorialized by a local photographer. In the present, McKenzie and Brodsky win the trunks at auction and McKenzie begins sorting through the contents, noticing the picture of the men who Cole killed.
Under photo enhancement, McKenzie notices Cole in the background of the picture and identifies the gun Cole is carrying as a .357 Magnum from the 1980s. Despite this, chemical and spectroscopic testing indicates that the photograph is at least 100 years old. McKenzie becomes convinced that Cole is a time traveler. After writing up his findings, he is approached by a woman, Georgia Crawford (Lauren Hutton), who claims to be working on similar ideas. Together they locate Crossfire in the present. When they split up to search the town, Georgia ducks into an old barn and removes a crystalline device which she uses to travel back to the 1880s. There she searches for Cole at a nearby river, but her horse is spooked by a rattlesnake. She dispatches the snake with a futuristic gun. Hurrying back to town, she is followed by Cole, who had observed her from afar. He arrives too late to stop her from traveling to the present, but he uses a device of his own to find out the time to which she traveled. In the present, McKenzie hears a noise and arrives at the barn just in time to see Georgia return from the past. When he confronts her, she admits to being one of a number of time travelers from the 26th century. Returning to McKenzie's home she explains that Cole is a renegade scientist from her time who she has been sent back to stop. She believes that Cole, who developed the time travel technology with her father, is intending to change history. Through research, Georgia and McKenzie determine that Cole is likely trying to kill Matthew Crawford, an adviser to President Grover Cleveland.
The gunfighter who Cole is searching for, the mysterious "Star-Handled Stranger," was a gunslinger who crucially helped protect the President and his escort from bandits. Matthew Crawford was Georgia's ancestor and killing him would erase her entire family from history, including her father who had opposed Cole's desire to continue research on time travel. McKenzie and Georgia enlist Joe Brodsky's help in determining President Cleveland's movements, but before Brodsky can give them the information, Cole murders him and flees into the past. Finding a copy of the information, they discover that Cole is traveling back to July 11, 1886, when the mysterious "Star-Handled Stranger" helped save President Cleveland from a bandit attack. Traveling back in time to 1886, Georgia and McKenzie watch as the attack begins. When the Stranger arrives on the scene and tries to enter the attack, he is shot dead by Cole. McKenzie then takes the Stranger's signature pistols and rides towards the battle himself. Cole follows him. While McKenzie manages to kill the attacking bandits, Cole shoots Matthew Crawford. McKenzie then kills Cole in a one-on-one duel. Returning to the stagecoach, Georgia and McKenzie discover that Matthew Crawford was merely wounded. As the stagecoach drives off, Georgia and McKenzie return to the present where Georgia gives him a gift before returning to her own time. She is somehow able to send the knowledge of the death of McKenzie's wife and child back to his earlier self so that he is able to save their lives.

Review: There's few time travel pictures that I don't pick apart with fourth dimensional reasoning and this is one of them.
There's a very wonderful scene as the time traveling bad guy wants into an Army base, so he travels back to before it was built, crosses where the perimeter fence will be and then returns to the present on the other side of the fence !
William Devane does a great job as the writer who writes the book that causes time travel to be invented.
When he discovers an old tin-type with a man holding a very modern-day gun, he steps into an adventure with Lauren Hutton that leads him into fulfilling his greatest wish to be a gunfighter.
John Ratzenburger forgets Cliff on "Cheers" to play a very likeable Army Colonel and Forrest Tucker appears too in his very last movie role as an Old West Collector (Shades of "F-Troop," perhaps).
This wonderful movie is great for the whole family as Hutton repays Devane's kindness with an act that probably eliminates the entire movie from even occurring.You have to see it to know what I mean..
Time travelling with a gun slinging Klaus Kinski and western memorabilia nut William Devane?
"Timestalkers" is a playfully modest little made-for-TV production that's full of warmth and covers an interestingly ambitious concept.The story follows Professor Scott McKenzie (William Devane), an old western memorabilia collector discovers in a photograph from 1866 a 20th century .357 Magnum revolver in the hands of a cowboy (Klaus Kinski).
Scott soon starts questioning the possibility of time-travel and writes a paper on it.
Then strangely a lady appears who claims that she believes him and he soon discovers that she's a time-traveller too.
She wants him help her find out why this time-traveller has gone back to the old-west and eventually stop him from changing the face of history.Early on the plot moves back and forth between the past and present.
Some of the items that Devane's character looks at or purchases at an auction have a history that involves the magnum-toting gunman.
Some foreseeable plot-holes creep in, but it's inventively told and works well with its collective gimmicks.
The chintzy special effects create some charm, and so does the cheesy igniting sparks cutaways.
The uncanny music is whimsically scored.
Devane gives a winning performance and Kinski's glazed turn offers that venomously cold tinge.
Lauren Hutton is fetchingly palatable.
John Ratzenburger and Forest Tucker pop in with fun support parts.
It looks cheap, but it's actually better than its limitations allow it to be.
I have been looking for this movie for almost 20 years, since I first viewed the movie & Finally!
It made such a huge impact on me that I never forgot it or stopped looking.
Great actors, action & story plot.
Time & time travel has always been a big part of my life & every movie pertaining to time-travel peaks my interest and gives me new ideas and ways of looking at thing & life around me.
Or to experience the old west to sit with the Indian's in peace.
Thank you for a wonderful movie & even better actors to go with it..
"Timestalkers" is without doubt the very best of all time travel films, it`s well acted, and directed, and it is not spoilt by OTT special effects.
Bill Devane is great in the lead role, and it`s nice to see Klaus Kinski in a more commercial type role.
The basic plot centres around an old trunk and it`s contents picked up at a car boot sale (garage sale in the US), a photo revels in the distance a man with a very modern gun, and so our journey starts, and it`s edge of the seat stuff all the way....
A film to be remembered for the ages.
I watch westerns on a weekly basis, and one day i was browsing through the internet looking at Sci-Fi westerns when i saw Timestalkers.
I did some research to find that it is a rare film.
Afterwords i bought it on VHS off eBay. When i watched this film i found it had a good storyline.
William Devane plays to role of a man with an obsession for the old west.
He finds and old photo from a trunk bought at auction, in the photo he sees a man holding a man holding a 1980 magnum.
He encounters a lady from the future and they travel back to the old west.
William Devane plays a great role in the film,and it is very well shot.
This film is a rarity in the Sci-Fi western section, apart from Back To The Future 3 i have only seen this film as being great.It is worth watching alone or with the family, it will leave a fond memory to last forever burning in our hearts..
Well Done and Fun To Watch..
I watched this for the first time last week on TV.
Really a well done film with a real twist to the plot.
Good action and interesting build up to the finale.
which is what I like in a film..
Clever time travel ......
a must see for Kinski fans ....................
The fast moving and clever time travel plot is greatly enhanced by the presence of the duster clad Klaus Kinski.
He has a lot of screen time, along with a fine performance by William Devane.
After his wife and boy are killed in a car wreck, Devane purchases an old western trunk, which contains the intriguing 1886 photograph, that sets the story in motion.
One memorable scene involves Kinski entering a fence protected compound.
The film holds interest throughout, and the ending is very satisfying.
I bought "Timestalkers" because I am a big fan of both Klaus Kinski and William Devane.
Keep in mind that this is a TV movie, with a rather limited budget.
Nothing in it is original, and as most other time travel films, it asks you not to think too much about the logic of time travel.
It's basically a nice little family film that you can watch with your kids on a lazy afternoon and have some fun.
Granted, the absence of real tension and the fact that the antagonist is not truly menacing is a problem, but I am willing to disregard that problem because I find the overall experience of watching this quite pleasant.
The cast is pretty good and it's a pleasure to watch them on screen.
There's lots of nostalgia here for those who remember the 80s..
Cowboys, time travel & Klaus Kinski.
Cowboys, time travel and Klaus Kinski, it doesn't get much better than this.
This film is one of those little gems that should be watched every Xmas along with The Great Escape and Its a Wonderful Life.
Like all good films it starts with tragedy, then a small mystery.
The back story is well presented and not complicated; like many I could mention.
Also, the story doesn't jump back and too; as is all too common these days.
Klaus Kinski is a joy to watch with his rolling eyes and tough talking and big cowboy coat.
The time traveling is cool and does not involve a Tardis; another bonus..
Super cheesy, but entertaining.
Lots of really cliché lines.
Actually, it would probably make a really great drinking game now that I think about it....
A Decent Time Travel Adventure.
Though dated and low-budget with sometimes awful sixties electronic music that periodically resonates nicely and some questionable effort at time-travel special effects that are both different but sometimes tacky, this particular time travel movie has some pretty decent and intelligent storyline tidbits that most of this genre omit.
In the beginning there is some nice time displacement English dialogue though it fades eventually during the movie (unlike the more previous comedy version - DEMOLITION MAN, 1993) and there is the relatively rare use of detective work that is fairly prominent in this movie a bit like though not as intense as the contemporary public television HISTORY DETECTIVES.
As another post revealed there is a nice use of time travel within time travel to great effect by Klaus Kinski as well as the ending being a rather up to one's interpretation of how the movie really circles around or does it.
Overall this is a relatively predictable but decently presented time travel scenario without particularly the overblown action.
This is a more educated, though not totally believable low-budgeted time travel entertainment.
I probably wouldn't have commented on this film.
After getting into a discussion about 80's sci-fi movies with a friend, this title popped up.
Having originally seen this waaaay back in 87' I can say it didn't really get much better with age.
Just one more failed pilot for a series that CBS couldn't avail itself to try producing.
It was however a enjoyable effort but one that most viewers could probably see being skewed into a "Voyagers" type programming pigeon-hole had it gone to full series.
Alas, it could have not just been entertainment but educational too!.
Just give me back some time..
This is a haphazard Sci-Fi western that is hard to build interest in.
For a TV movie the special effects are pretty decent.
A history professor(William Devane) and a time traveler(Lauren Hutton)try to foil a mad scientist(Klaus Kinski)from among other things prevent a presidential assignation.
At times Hutton is quite fetching, but her appeal easily wears thin.
Devane and his ever present hammy smile can also be tolerated.
Kinski is excellent as the long white haired loose cannon of a scientist.
Also in the cast are: John Ratzenberger(from TV's "Cheers"), Forrest Tucker and John Considine.
At least, Hutton fans will be pleased..
Kinski hams his way through this time travel adventure as the Cardboard Cutout Bad Guy, yelling half his lines, and he made me want to smack him every time he does.
Lauren Hutton seems so confused by the content of her lines you suspect she was born speaking another language--Urdu, maybe-- and had to memorize them phonetically.
Clichés abound, the science isn't believable, they never made me care about the time travel "adventure," and the result is William Devane was trying to sisyphus this thing up a hill made steep as an Alp by its shortcomings.
As bad as it is, the Casio keyboard music and cheesy credit sequence manages to make it worse.
A star for Devane, nothing for everyone else..
Hate to be a naysayer--No, actually, I don't--but this is a laughable time-travel story.
The gimmick of coming up to a fence, going back in time to before the fence was built, crossing the future perimeter, then returning to the present, is a ridiculous waste of time-travel energy.
However, the fact that the good guys don't go back in time to warn the general about his killer does not bother me.
As Robert Silverberg proved in his great time-travel-novel-cum-thought-experiment, "Up The Line," if you try to go back five-minutes to change what just happened--and you fail--you will only get into more trouble, especially if you run into yourself five minutes ago!
A plain silly, highly implausible movie.
(And I do like Lauren Hutton.) A much better movie is "Back to the Future 3"--or, for that matter, any of the three BTTF movies..
Magnum Killer in the old west.
In Timestalkers William Devane plays a professor with degrees in physics and history and a passion for the lore of the old west who gets to see some of his theories actually come true.It all starts out quite innocently enough as he and fellow western buff John Rafsenberger purchase a bunch of items at an auction and Devane gets a photograph with gunslinger Klaus Kinsski showing what he believes is .357 Magnum in his holster.
He writes a paper on it and that brings Lauren Hutton in from the future.
She's hunting Kinnski down as he's the number 2 time traveling guy from 500 years in the future, Hutton's father being number one.Devane's got a lot of issues on his own and he joins Hutton in on the hunt because whatever Kinsski's got planned it's going to change history in a big way.
We do learn of a secret trip that President Grover Cleveland made to the west in 1886 and Kinsski's going to do something there possibly.
By the way don't dwell on the obvious.Timestalkers marks the farewell performance of Forrest Tucker who plays a rich western history buff who provides a valuable clue to Kinsski's intentions.The film is a far fetched idea with some presidential history that never really happened.
No more far fetched than a Three Mesquiteers western of a couple generations earlier where President Garfield secretly goes west and agrees to help the Mesquiteers save their ranch, but his real assassination gets in the way.Timestalkers is a nice family film and for those who don't like seeing the laws of time and space violated, it's OK if Lauren Hutton does it in a good cause..
One of the best time travelling films ever..
William Devane is the greatest cheese actor in the entire world.
i got so excited after i found out he was going to be in THE HOLLOWMAN that i bought a ticket straight away.
So you have the ability to travel in time but you don't go back and stop your friends murder?
He knew the General was going to be killed and he was his friend but he did nothing to stop it or go back in time to change it.
If he was a friend why did'nt he stop it?
Or at least go back in time to stop it?.
*Guilty Pleasure* My Favorite Time Travel Flick.
I have scrupulously checked out all the net "lists" of time travel movies and I believe I have seen over 95% of all the listed films, which ain't bad.
I have seen TIMESTALKERS twice, no mean feat considering how hard it is to find a copy.
It has a "made for TV" feel, clearly some budget limitations, no major stars aside from deVane, and relies on a heavy-handed plot device -- the near-magical appearance of a beautiful woman (Hutton) from, of all places, the future.
(As if we don't enough beautiful woman in the past and present, and we need to borrow some more from the future...?) I have written a lot of reviews for IMDb and usually at this juncture I would usually be explaining how the producer should consider another career, or deVane's agent must have been desperate when he signed for this...?
This is, oddly, my favourite time travel film and I will try to explain why.
Leaving aside the production standards, leaving aside the aforementioned bizarre plot device, I was hooked by the core story of a man who loses his wife and tries to carry on, as best he can, without her.
To keep busy, he even takes up a strange hobby -- practising his "fast draw" with an old replica western revolver.
In spite of all the negatives, those two specific plot arcs, and the way the writer ultimately resolves them both, captured my fancy and moves this to the top of my list.
Klaus Kinski was a strange casting choice.
An actor who never, even once, managed to speak English without an accent, he wandered through the 70s and 80s basically playing bad guys.
But again, this is not about Kinski.
This is about the way the writer resolves this story and frankly it is the best resolution I have ever seen.
Great show had hoped it was pilot for series.
My wife and I both loved this TV episode, acting, plot, and action.
A key plot concept was that one could not normally alter the future by changing the past and the finding of the antique photograph of a modern pistol supports the idea that if time travel to the past has occurred the effects are already part of our history.
At the end of show when the time travel device was run over by the wagon wheel, it appeared that it was undamaged and we assumed it was to be found by Devane at some later time to lead into a TV series.
Every time we see Devane in a film or TV show, we are reminded of "Time Stalkers".
Fun 80s time travel movie.
History professor Scott McKenzie (William Devane) inadvertently begins a time traveling adventure when he spots a man (Klaus Kinski) holding a .357 Magnum in a picture from 1886.
As he begins to dig for more clues, McKenzie is visited by Georgia Crawford (Lauren Hutton), a woman from the future who is also hunting this gun toting mystery man.
This made-for-TV movie originally aired on CBS and is a pretty engaging time travel story.
While Hollywood goes around picking classics to remake, they should really focus on something like this - a film with a great concept that could be made bigger.
Screenwriter Brian Clemens did a lot of work on THE AVENGERS and for Hammer in the 70s and this plays like it could have been a pilot for a TV series.
Director Michael Schultz expertly jumps from the present to the 1800s and all of the actors do a fine job.
Hell, even Kinski seems to be restraining himself here.
Co-starring John Ratzenberger, Forrest Tucker, Danny Pintauro, Tracey Walter and James Avery..
I finally watched the whole thing.
This movie is on constantly on cable.
I had the morning off, so I watched it.
The evil german guy shot two cops in the professors house...
later on the professor and Lauren Hutton don't even mention it.
If General Cliff Claven got shot to death by the evil german guy, why doesn't the professor and Lauren Hutton go back in time 5 minutes and warn him?
This was another movie, that although it's full of holes and overall a terrible movie, I watched the whole thing.