TIME AFTER TIME

US, 1979, 112 minutes, Colour.
Malcolm McDowell?, Mary Steenburgen, David Warner, Charles Cioffi.
Directed by Nicholas Meyer.

How pleasant to see Malcolm McDowell? as benign, bespectacled, shy H. G. Wells. How imaginative to have Jack the Ripper (and David Warner is persuasive) escape from London 1893 to San Francisco 1979 and murder again in Wells' time machine. How much better to see the 'prophetic' Wells trying to cope with our times, freedoms, technology (and see ourselves through Wells' Victorian eyes) as well as pursue the Ripper and save the heroine. The screenplay is full of delightful touches as well as offering us crime and romance. Written and directed by novelist Nicholas Meyer who arranged for Freud to treat Sherlock Holmes in The Seven Per Cent Solution.

1. The significance of the title, its ambiguities, indication of plot, theme, H.G. Wells and his interests?

2. Audience expectations from the basic imaginative plot? The appeal of the 19th. century, the shuffling of time, imagination and fantasy, a story of H.G.Wells, a story of Jack the Ripper, the time machine? Nicholas Meyer and his imaginative treatment of 19th. and 20th. centuries? The success of the shuffling of tine and the imaginative conceit?

3. Panavision photography, London in the 19th. century and the atmosphere of Jack the Ripper, H. G. Wells' house? The special effects for the travelling through time? San Francisco in 1979? The contrast of worlds? The contribution of the old-fashioned lush score?

4. The enjoyment of seeing 1979 and the contemporary world through the eyes of Victorian H. G. Wells? His awareness of so much change, the types of change in human behaviour, the appearance of cities? Technological change? The expected Utopia and yet the history of war and violence? The change in freedom? The differences in language and jargon? How well did the film comment on the Victorian world and its standards and the modern world?

5. Audience interest in the concept of time, the reality of time? The irrevocability of time? The right time for living and experiencing and people being out of time? The imaginative experience of comparisons of times, learning about the two eras, seeing the similarities, the differences? Wells' final comments on love sustaining people whatever the situations? The ironies of Jack the Ripper saying that he was at home in 1979, an eccentric in 1893 but as part of the world of the '70s?

6. The traditional presentation of Jack the Ripper and his murders, the prostitute, the subjective shots, the flirting and the sudden violence? The police chase? The identification of Jack the Ripper with Dr. Stevenson? Friend of Wells, elite society, intellectuals? The chess game and his always beating Wells? Suggesting that Wells had to understand his mind ? The shock to the group with the police search? His disappearance? His knowing about the time machine and using it? Jack the Ripper quickly adapting to 1979, learning to live quickly in San Francisco, resourceful with money, hotels, television, appreciating the changes? The repetition of his crims and San Francisco providing an updating of the London prostitutes and their world? The Ripper's menacing wells and Amy? The anticipation of his murders by Wells, the car chase through San Francisco, the Ripper's wanting to have the key to move freely through time to murder? The irony of his not murdering Amy but her girlfriend? The thwarting of predictable events? The final confrontation in the museum and his death? A successful character portrayal by David Warner of Jack the Ripper?

7. Malcolm McDowall? and his style and presence as H. G. Wells? A 19th. century intellectual, his friends' comments on his sermons, his attitudes towards religion ? and his later praying in the Grace Cathedral and his being evicted, his optimism about the future, theories of Utopia and the elimination of war, his scientific skill and imagination, his anticipated permissiveness and his articles on free love (and Amy's later laughing at this)? The making of the tine machine, displaying it to his friends, having the nerve to go? His integrity in pursuing the Ripper, his motives for doing this, the shattering experience of the voyage through time?

8. Wells arriving in San Francisco, the exhibition and his seeing his fame and his own future?

9. His response to America, 1979, to San Francisco ? and his discovering where he was? His fascination with the machines, his almost being knocked over by cars, his taxi ride, fascination with watching Amy drive ? and his later driving? The various machines, hiding under the seat at the cinema , his awareness of change of manners, the place of women, the Queen, his searching through the banks and his detective ability to search out the Ripper, the humour of the encounter with Amy, the speeding taxi through San Francisco streets, the visit to McDonald's,. his coping with the language? The friendship with Amy and his love for her? The contrast with the Ripper and the chase through the buildings and streets of San Francisco?

10. The character of Wells shyness. intellectual. resourcefulness, beaten at chess by the Ripper? His skill in detection, visiting the banks. the cathedral. his trying to cope with the police and the mistake of calling himself Sherlock Holmes? A man of integrity?

11. Amy as the liberated young woman of the 20th. century, of the 170s? Her work in the bank, her love for her work, her career? Her girlfriend and their discussions? Her invitation to Wells, the outing and enjoying it? The talk on the revolving restaurant? Her revealing her own story and getting Wells to reveal his own? especially about his marriage? Their outings. the return home, the meal. the lovemaking and the bond between the two? Her not believing his story,. despite her experience of the Ripper at the bank? Her fears?

12. Amy's decision to let Wells try to prove the truth, the visit to the Museum, the moving ahead to the Saturday,, the disbelief, the newspaper and her joy, the sudden news of her own death?

13. The police and their obtuseness, the reaction to the early morning call and death, arresting Wells,, the long interrogation, the final apologies after the death of Amy's friend?

14. Trying to thwart the Ripper ? Amy asleep, her door open, audiences thinking that she had been killed? The shock to find that it was her friend? Wells' not returning? The final confrontation with the Ripper?

15. The declaration of love in the museum, the Ripper's death. Wells' leaving and Amy's inability to go ? her final decision? The connotations of the information given that Wells married a woman called Amy?

16. Audience delight in such imaginative exercises, the stimulation of the imagination and understanding by this kind of 'what if .... ?' especially with non-celebrities? Seeing ourselves through their eyes, irony, disappointment,, comparisons?