“TimeQuest” proposes a ‘what if’ storyline involving the assassination of J.F.K. Many questions are posed as to what the world would have been like if the assassination had been thwarted. In the film, a time-traveler goes back to show Jacqueline Kennedy what happens on November 22, 1963. At first, we don’t know his motives, but as they become clear the question remains, what do they do? I still really enjoy catching low-budget independent films when I can, and admittedly I jumped all over getting a copy of this one for one simple reason, it had Bruce Campbell. Yes, I’m a B.C. junkie and cannot get enough of his movies. Being the ultimate B-movie actor, the quality of the movies he chooses to work on fluctuates. But I can always find something to like even with the really bad ones. (Good, bad, he’s the guy with the gun.) Fortunately, “TimeQuest” doesn’t fall into that category. Is it a great movie? Not really.

But writer/director Robert Dyke did manage to produce a movie with a pretty good premise, and a very interesting ‘what if’ scenario. I never found it boring, and was actually quite fascinated with the ideas Dyke explored in terms of an alternate future.

It was also interesting to see Ralph Waite as the Time Traveler. He really wasn’t given much to do in the film, but the scenes he had showed what a great actor he still is. I was surprised by some of the other casting in the film as well. Larry Drake shows up as J. Edgar Hoover, and though he gives a pretty good performance I could still see him as Durant from “Darkman.” Barry Corbin gets a shot (no pun intended) at playing Lyndon Johnson.

I mentioned before that one of my draws to the film was the casting of Bruce Campbell. Here he plays a controversial filmmaker, whose films play a big part on the whole time travel scenario. Campbell shows up from time to time being interviewed on a TV show. You see him quite a bit, but Campbell fans will surely feel that he was underused.

“TimeQuest” is a film that has a tremendous amount of potential. The fact that it falls short of being a really great movie lies mostly in its low-budget stature, and is in no way the fault of it’s direction, acting or writing. It’s a movie that I would like to see re-done with a larger budget, so that the full scope of the ramifications of Kennedy’s survival could be explored visually.

I’d still recommend the DVD to Bruce Campbell fans, if for no other reason than to see their favorite actor on screen. If you’re at all a Science Fiction fan, I will say despite the budgetary constraints, “TimeQuest” is still a heck of a lot better than a most of the ‘made for Sci-Fi channel’ original movies.

Directed by: Robert Dyke
Starring: Victor Slezak, Caprice Benedetti, Vince Grant, Bruce Campbell, Barry Corbin, Larry Drake
Extras: None
Specifications:
Studio: Ardustry
Release Date: 6/10/2003 (Available)
Region 1
MPAA Rating: R
Website

We'll give TimeQuest a C+.