Beyond the Time Barrier 1960

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You know, despite a rather browbeaten critical reception, I personally rather enjoyed Beyond the Time Barrier, one of Edgar Ulmer’s final films. If anything it is a reminder of how a great artist can be mistreated due to an “error in judgment” (adultery which led to a happy marriage that lasted until their deaths if that is an error; who am I to judge?) by Hollywood. I will always wonder what great films could have been made with major studios (hell, if just with RKO) by Ulmer, but we will never know.

While two films are considered masterpieces (The Black Cat & Detour), I personally think his Bluebeard with John Carradine was quite good, as well. I have yet to see some of his others but I always find something to take away from his films. Beyond the Time Barrier has a fascinating history as it was made by an independent producer (Robert Clarke, who was also the film’s main star) in Texas in little over a week, with assistance by the military, provided locations in the partnership. Ulmer had the distinct advantage of an abandoned station (the Marine Corps Air Station Eagle Mountain Lake) to film a location in ruins when the film’s Air Force pilot lands after ‘crossing through the time barrier’. 

Before being taken to the dystopian “Citadel” (a depressing “futurecity” where the inhabitants are practically emotionless, deaf mutes with no vocabulary and are sterile) where he is believed to be a spy for mutants, Clarke’s Major William Allison unboards his plane (after a trip in space he thought was successful) and walks amongst an air strip severely taken to the elements (there’s even a large “cut” in the middle of the airstrip that Allison must leap into and across before heading forwards) and buildings now capsized and left ravaged and still, cruel reminders of time and mankind’s mistreatment to their structures and former use (this chair where his colleague once occupied, roofs that are little more than planks and wood collapses to the ground, concrete cornerstones without the structures that once stood atop them). I think this is very impressive.

While many will wrongfully (I think, anyway) perhaps compare this to Ed Wood’s Plan Nine from Outer Space in regards to the less-than-spectacular “future suits” worn by the inhabitants of the Citadel (including the Supreme (played by wonderful character actor Vladimir Sokoloff; you might not know him by name but his face is quite recognizable as is his ability to play any number of ethnicities) and miscast Boyd Morgan as the Supreme’s chief military officer) and the sets (which weren’t so lousy to me as I personally liked the triangular design (hell, Ulmer even uses cutaways to scenes using the triangle design!) of the Citadel). 

Morgan isn’t the least bit convincing as a future military leader, a bit too old and nonthreatening in a part that might require someone with a towering figure. Sokoloff looks too much like a friendly uncle to be convincing as an authoritarian leader of a city needing to survive. If anything, you’d think Morgan could have easily brushed the Supreme aside and taken control. Morgan’s Captain of the Guard has the gruff assertiveness but his Texas Cattleman figure and voice seem ill suited for a movie set in the future, set in some art deco city, a society with mostly youth zombies. Anyway, the film is also hurt by the dull Clarke in the lead, but that Darlene Tompkins is a stunner as the Supreme’s blonde, extra-sensory granddaughter. I would have loved a little more of her during the swim. It was easy to see why Clarke’s character fell madly for her. The ending was a major cop-out regarding her, though. Just “put her away” so that she wouldn’t be a nuisance in Allison’s return to his time.

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You have three other principals rounding out the supporting cast: three scientists (one from 1971, the other two from 1994) had also travelled through the time barrier and landed in 2024, their ships damaged as a result. Each of these three is invested in Allison’s return to his time, but there are motives for them that might not be so humane. Ulmer’s own daughter, Arianne, is Captain Markova, from 1971, while German scientists, General Karl Kruse and Dr. Bourman are played by Stephen Bekassy and John van Dreelen respectively, are from 1994. Ernst Fegté was behind the triangular set designs in the Citadel. I read that the buildings used for these sets were showrooms at the Texas Centennial Exhibition Fair Park. Since I love this kind of history, the history of independent film for science fiction and horror, I eat this stuff (back stories of movie making in the 50s, 60s, and 70s especially) up.

I was surprised at the ending because it just doesn’t stop at the point when Allison arrives back to his time as I was expecting. Instead the film sees that Allison’s mission is assured: inform his government that atomic explosions should cease so that nuclear energy wouldn’t destroy the ionosphere of the earth which would allow radioactive cosmic rays from space to plague the world into apocalyptic cataclysm. Jack Pierce even is involved, believe it or not, in the old age makeup used to express the effects of crossing through the “fifth dimension” universe back to your own time. The mutants of the film sadly aren’t developed properly for us to be either sympathetic or grossed out by them…the budget probably had a lot to do with that so Ulmer had to shoot around true establishment shots of their conditions. I wish at least one or two of the mutants could have been really uglied by Pierce for shock effect so we understood the importance of returning to Earth and stopping atomic explosions destroying the “protective shield” of the world.

The film is little over an hour and twenty minutes so it doesn’t overstay its welcome, but those that react harshly towards low budget sci-fi will probably consider this a waste of time. I didn’t. I’m an Ulmer fanboy, however, so perhaps my judgment is biased.

I own the fun sci-fi MGM release called Movies 4 You Sci-Fi Classics release.