I love time travel stories. I've read all the classics: "All You Zombies," "A Sound of Thunder," "By His Bootstraps," "Mimsy were the Borogoves." Time travel movies, not so much: they all seem to be about meeting, winning, and finding infinite happiness with The Girl. But when 9-22-63 dropped on Netflix, I saw that the disillusioned writer and his buddy work together together to prevent the Kennedy assassination. Gay subtext -- ok, I'm in.
Scene 1: Elderly Adult Education student Harry (Leon Ripper) reads a story about a boy whose his father murdered his mother and siblings on Halloween night, 1960. Teacher Jake (James Franco) gives him an A+ -- right in front of the class. What if he got an F?
Then Jake goes to the run-down diner near a horrible closed factory and orders a burger from elderly Al (Chris Cooper, left), who complains about his eating habits. Not a good idea to diss the food you sell, buddy.
Al goes into the kitchen for a few minutes, then returns, pale and haggard, and collapses.
Scene 2: Jake takes him home. Big reveal: He's got cancer. "But you were fine five minutes ago." "Come over tomorrow, and I'll explain everything"
Back to class: A film about shock therapy in the 1930s, while students laugh and are bored. So are we establishing that Jake is an awful teacher, or that kids today are awful?
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Scene 3: At the diner, Al says he'll explain everything if Jake goes into the closet, looks around, and comes back. I'd be suspicious -- there could be bodies in there, or he could lock you in and keep you a prisoner. But Jake goes in...
And...plop! He's outside the diner, but back in the early 1960s. There's a billboard for Moxie Cola, and kids playing softball instead of scrolling on their phones. So it's like the wardrobe that leads to Narnia, You can also go back in time via a secret staircase (on Dark Shadows) or in an elevator (Time at the Top).
It's a wonderful, joyous, absurdly idealized world. I couldn't get a screenshot that would do it justice. Everything is very bright, with primary colors dominating. Delighted factory workers file out for their lunch break. A milkman (Colin Doyle) drops a bottle, and exclaims "For the love of Mike!" No profanity in 1960, har har. Three girls drive past in a pink convertible.
An old guy notices that Jake is from the future, and yells "You shouldn't be here!" So he runs back into the diner, and ends up in the present day.
"You were just in October 21, 1960," Al explains. The time portal always goes back to the same moment. He doesn't know where it came from or how it works, and he hasn't told anyone about it. But now that he's dying, Jake has to take over his goal: to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. So he wants a random stranger to do the job?
Scene 4: Jake accepts time travel instantly, but wonders why Al is interested in the JFK assassination. "Because if JFK lived, he would have stopped U.S. involvement in Vietnam, all those boys would be alive, and the world would return to how it should be, always summer, primary colors, food that tastes good, polite kids, no divorce (hear that, Jake?), white men in charge (isn't your boss a woman, Jake buddy?), no gay people, and everyone joyful all the time."
Left: 1960s guys.
"Then why haven't you prevented the assassination already?"
Al tells him to go back to 1960, carve something in the tree outside, and see if it's still there today.
Scene 5: Jake goes back -- same moment. He pushes off the "You don't belong here!" guy, carves JFK while locals glare at him, and rushes back to the present.
Left: Josh Duhamel, who plays Adult Education Student Harry's father, the one who murdered his family on Halloween, 1960. Yeah, I thought it was fiction, too.
Yep, the carved JFK is still there. But then it fades away.
"When you return to the present, time will reset. You can stay for years, but when you get back, it resets. And no matter how long you're away, only two minutes have passed in the present." That's a lot of very precise rules for a magical gateway.
Oh, the reason he suddenly got sick: he went through for two years while Jake was signing the divorce papers.
"So if everything resets, how can I prevent the JFK assassination?"
"You have to go through, and never come back."
I guess we've established, that Jake hates his job, he has no friends, his wife has divorced him, and his father is dead, so he has nothing to stay in 2016 for -- except the internet, global travel, medical breakthroughs, gay neighborhoods, cultural diversity....but it's a trade-off: life is perfect in the 1960s. Um...I know this is Stephen King's nostalgic memory, but still, it's a little naive. Ok, a lot naive. Life wasn't perfect in the 1960s, even for straight white men.
Al has prepared a fake id for him, a lot of early 1960s money, and a notebook full of sports matches to bet on, so he can support himself.
Jake thinks he is crazy and runs off.
Scene 6: The Adult Education Program graduation. Everyone is bored, not-engaged, not joyous, and the principal disses Harry, so Jake says "Screw it! I'm going back to 1960!"Al's dead, so Jake grabs the stuff, goes to the diner, and heads through the portal.
More after the break. Caution: Explicit
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