Barnes & Noble

A defiantly old-fashioned romantic drama tinged with fantasy, Somewhere in Time has acquired a cult following in the two decades since its theatrical release, and is among the few non-Superman movies for which Christopher Reeve's work is remembered. Based on a little-known novel by Richard Matheson, this modest film directed by Jeannot Szwarc (Jaws 2) reinforces the dreamy notion that true love transcends time and place. Reeve plays an inexplicably sad Chicago playwright who, upon seeing a 1912 photo of a famous actress (Jane Seymour at her most luminous), believes he's met her before. Transported some seven decades into the past through the power of his will, he encounters the woman and begins a passionate affair with her. Obviously mindful of Hollywood's classic period romances, Szwarc re-creates the early 20th century with painstaking care, capturing the pictorial beauty of Michigan's Mackinac Island with diffused lighting and warm colors. Reeve and Seymour make such a beautiful couple that even the bittersweet conclusion of their relationship won't dampen viewer enthusiasm. Ed Hulse

All Movie Guide

Christopher Reeve got away from Superman and related costume roles in this dramatic fantasy film, adapted from Richard Matheson's 1960s vintage novel Bid Time Return. A young playwright, Richard Collier (Reeve), is approached by an elderly woman on the occasion of his first triumph in 1972 -- all she says to him is "Come back to me" and leaves him with a watch that contains a picture of a ravishing young woman. Eight years later, he visits the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island and comes upon a photograph of the same woman, whom he discovers was an actress who made an appearance at the hotel in 1912. He becomes obsessed with the image and what the woman -- who died the night she approached him in 1972 -- meant by what she said. In a manner somewhat reminiscent of the film Laura, he falls in love with her and her image as he learns more about her life and career. Then he comes upon the suggestion of a professor at his former college that time travel may, in fact, be possible, using an extreme form of self-hypnosis to free the person from the place they occupy in the time-stream. Collier's feelings for the woman are so strong that he succeeds, bringing himself back to the hotel in 1912 on the eve of her triumph. He meets the actress, Elise McKenna (Jane Seymour), and the two fall in love despite the machinations of her obsessive, autocratic manager (Christopher Plummer), who feels threatened by Collier's presence. Bruce Eder

Product Details

• UPC: 025192055256
• Source: UNIVERSAL STUDIOS
• Presentation: Wide Screen
• Editions: Subtitled, Dubbed, Special Packaging
• Sales Rank: 2,197