Somewhere In Time (Jeannot Szwarc, 1980): USA

Reviewed by William Conlin. Viewed on DVD.

There is something missing from Richard Collier’s life. He’s young, handsome and quite a successful playwright. The one thing he lacks is the love of his life. While on a spontaneous vacation to Lake Michigan he finds that missing love at an opulent hotel.  There’s just one problem: she was there nearly 70 years in the past.

Now, I ask you this question: if you were in his position, what would you do? Would your obsession get the better of you or would you defy all odds and travel across time itself? In Jeannot Szwarc’s classic romance film Somewhere In Time that question is posed and answered with a beauty rarely found in film.

Starring Christopher Reeve (Superman) as the playwright who travels back to 1912, Jane Seymour (Live and Let Die) as the beautiful subject of his obsession and Christopher Plummer (The Sound of Music) as her overprotective guardian, Somewhere In Time is a perfectly cast romance film and is at the top of my list when it comes to Valentine’s Day favorites.

Although it was a commercial failure when it first came out Somewhere In Time has become a cult classic in the time travel genre. Written by famed Twilight Zone scribe Richard Matheson (based on his novel Bid Time Return) Somewhere In Time is a touching story of life, loss and the endurance of love over time and space. I highly recommend this film not only for Valentine’s Day, but also for any day when you feel like watching a well-crafted, well-performed film.

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Published:
02.14.09 / 8pm
Category:
DVD, Films