Rotten Tomatoes

Movies / TV

    Celebrity

      No Results Found

       View All       Movies Tv shows Shop News Showtimes

      When Time Expires

      TV-PG 1997 1h 33m Sci-Fi List
      Reviews 33% Fewer than 50 Ratings Audience Score A series of chain reactions will destroy the Earth unless a time traveler successfully completes his mission. Read More Read Less

      Audience Reviews

      View All (5) audience reviews
      Audience Member Easy to watch, lot better then movies made now, Rated 4 out of 5 stars 01/16/23 Full Review steve k The KISS rule applies to this turkey--Keep It Simple, Stupid! Whoever wrote the script has a weak grasp of internal logic and cause and effect, seemingly throwing darts at a random plot dartboard whenever they had to answer the question, what next? The performances are professional-grade, but the backstory makes less and less sense the more you try to think about it. Guy shows up from "out there" to carry out a simple act that will tip the balance of Earth's future so it can join a cosmic alliance of peace and advanced technology. Some guys are sent to stop him. Fine--leave it there! But no, the writer has to keep defying logic every time he tries to explain something. He can't seem to keep straight who the "League" and the "Ministry" are, or why people from either might want to stop the mission. It would have been better to have a distinctly "other" villain to keep things clear. There's a lot of overwrought nonsense about watches that beep to warn you when you are changing the timeline, as if a warning after you've done something wrong somehow prevents you from causing the damage you would have done by doing it. Or why it matters who puts change in the fateful parking meter, or which change, or precisely when. In the end, it's another character who puts money in the meter, well after the cop shows up to write a ticket, and he just waves it off with a literal "Whatever!" Which just about sums up the story, so i guess it's appropriate in a sense. After that wet firecracker of a climax, instead of the critical act preserving Earth's future, for no apparent reason it rewrites the past. Suddenly the love interest's life of bad luck and disappointment is set right, and our hero appears to woo her anew. Why? How? "Whatever!" Tangled, twisted time manipulation plots are tricky for the best screenwriters--hacks should just KISS. Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 03/31/23 Full Review Audience Member This Richard Greico effort grew on me as it went along. An alien sent to Earth to perform a simple time calibration exercise of feeding a quarter into a parking meter in a small dead-end American town is followed by a team of assassins who aim to stop him. Film stays within its budget limitations and offers some humour in the budding romance between the alien and a local waitress/bar server. Seemingly simplistic plot works for the film and in the end proves both clever and amusing. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 02/13/23 Full Review Audience Member Alien Richard Grieco is a demoted planet investigator doing a 'timeline analysis' on Earth. Seemingly menial assignment of making sure a parking meter does not expire is magnified in importance with a couple of strange coincidences. Film owns an odd appeal; playing the waiting game in a dead-end Texas town. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 02/24/23 Full Review Audience Member was not too bad, would watch it again, want the name of the opening song Rated 4 out of 5 stars 01/14/23 Full Review Read all reviews Post a rating

      Cast & Crew

      Show Less Cast & Crew Show More Cast & Crew

      Photos

      View All When Time Expires photos

      When Time Expires

      When Time Expires (1997) When Time Expires (1997) When Time Expires (1997) When Time Expires (1997) When Time Expires (1997) View more photos

      Critics Reviews

      View All (1) Critics Reviews
      Dennis Schwartz Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews One must swallow a lot of hokum to still like this film. Rated: B Apr 28, 2017 Full Review Read all reviews

      Movie Info

      Synopsis A series of chain reactions will destroy the Earth unless a time traveler successfully completes his mission.
      Director
      David Bourla
      Producer
      Paul Colichman, Stephen P. Jarchow, Mark R. Harris
      Screenwriter
      David Bourla
      Production Co
      Regent Entertainment
      Rating
      TV-PG, PG-13
      Genre
      Sci-Fi
      Original Language
      English
      Release Date (Streaming)
      Jun 1, 2017
      Runtime
      1h 33m