A Path in Time (Video 2005) Poster

(2005 Video)

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4/10
Teenage Time Travel Fantasy
DeusWar1 January 2021
Warning: Spoilers
How should you make a good movie? Let's get our checklist:
  • Great Soundtrack
  • Great Special Effects and Graphics
  • Good set complete with believable props
  • Innovative new take on time travel technologies
  • Super Secret Underground Antarctic Mega-Base
  • Global Conspiracy
  • Cliché Coming-of-Age Teen Story
  • Emotional Scene of loss
  • Strong Moral Message


How should you destroy it? Let's get our checklist:
  • Try to do it all in under one hour
  • Rapidly make up characters as you go
  • Try to explain the antagonist, motive, etc. in under a minute
  • Make the timing of plot events super confusing (time travel movie)
  • Take a lot of time to explain the confusing time travel devices, but still leave the audience confused
  • Jump around between scenes rapidly with little explanation
  • Throw in a moral element without much connection to the story
  • Rapidly end it without real resolution of plot


Although the idea for this movie had a lot of potential, overall watching it feels like being blind-folded, thrown onto a roller-coaster, and suddenly unmasked during the steepest decline of the ride. Once you get off the ride and catch your breath it's all over. I am not quite sure what happened, but a little bit more time on character and plot development would have been helpful. I would say that this movie could have used about 30 more minutes to be a decent flick, but instead tried too hard to do too many things at once.
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2/10
"Waste of Time" should be the title.
theage3063 April 2019
No subtitling for us hard of hearing and background music, noise and whatever else drowning out the character words and speech. No real verifiable plot that I could really discern. Jumps around in time and place like there was a fire the actors needed to be at. Confusing at best but that seems to be the Hollywierd way these days. Very short attention span required! Save your time and forget this one.
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1/10
TERRIBLE writing, acting, directing, camera - FUNDAMENTALIST RELIGIOUS PROSELYTIZING
dbh8509 December 2019
I didn't know this was a Christian movie. I thought it was sci-fi. I should have read the description. That's on me.

Within a few minutes, it was easy to see that everything about this film is terrible, starting with the writing. The acting was so stiff and unnatural - very poorly written dialogue and absolutely terrible delivery. They looked like 6th graders reading through lines that they didn't understand.

The directing was terrible... was there a director at all? A person who actually can SEE what's happening? The camera work is possibly the worst I've seen. I couldn't stick with it through the whole thing. It just was too ghastly.

I wouldn't mind a faith-based movie if the movie itself was good, but it seems they are always the worst ones. I don't know why this is, but it's long puzzled me. In the first few minutes, I thought "this is as bad as a faith-based movie." Then came a line about God and... that's when I knew it was hopeless.

I was hoping for an indie sci-fi story. Some of those are quite good, without expensive equipment and effects. Young filmmakers starting out can come up with some truly creative stories. This was nothing like that.

Don't spend any time on this awful, awful film. Do ANYTHING instead. Count grains of rice in a bag. Speculate about how many drops of water make a gallon. Read up on the history of Tanzania. Watch your fingernails grow. Just... don't watch this film. Protect your brain!
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1/10
It's not what you think.
mjart-8726729 December 2019
Thus is literally a failed attempt at Christian propaganda. Seriously you can tell the one guy is reading the lines, he's not even looking at the kid he's supposed to be talking with.
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1/10
Dire awful film, feels like high school production
ambisset9 February 2021
I love time travel films and persevered with this one longer than was wise for my sanity.

It started well decent initial effects, then there was a very odd stilted scene. The main character passes by 3 other boys in the school corridor by the lockers, all three of the boys lines were delivered as if someone was holding the script off camera. They were incredibly wooden and unbelievably bad actors. It immediately broke all sense of suspension of disbelief one expects from a film. Suddenly everything felt out of place and felt forced.

Then the scene shortly after with his dad at the fair, again more awful acting as if the actor had never delivered lines on camera before. Then a scene with the dad telling the main character why they moved and suddenly out of nowhere all sorts of religious references rammed into the plot in a most unusual and unbelievable way.

It was if the story was two completely different plots a sci-fi story with a let's stick some god stuff in for good measure and make it a "wholesome" film. Utterly nauseating rubbish.

I watched for another 10-15minutes but it became rapidly apparent that it was only going to get worse with random god comments thrown in at laughably bad moments adding nothing to the story and only serving to highlight that this was not a story but a "christian values" film trying to cram in bizarre messages during a sci-fi plot.

I don't know who on earth thought this was a good idea it was just unwatchable rubbish, do these people thing this will convince people who enjoy sci-if to turn to a christian god?? More likely it will make them even more convinced it's all nonsense.

In summary a sci-fi film that is meant to be about time travel turns out is about an extra terrestrial supernatural being who demands worship. Unwatchable rubbish avoid, literally do anything else.
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8/10
Fun Sci Fi Excursion with a Christian Underlying Theme
dial911book13 October 2020
Sometimes reviews are helpful, of course, but any review that tells me to NOT watch something betrays the agenda of the reviewer. I might give an atheist movie like Religulous a 1 (or not), I wouldn't tell you not to watch it.

The story line of A Path in Time was pretty easy to follow actually, if you watch any sci fi at all. The special effects and music were just fine for this kind of movie as well. The script needed a "doctor" and I'm guessing the author didn't want to spend the time or might have felt offended by the feedback. Had the script been upshifted in pacing a notch and revised to use more common phrasing, and had some of the actors either been selected differently or pushed to greater potential, the whole presentation would have carried the sense of urgency and excitement that the story deserved.

I thought Jason Mitchell, Claire Thomas, and the fellow who played the father were especially convincing and likeable.

Whatever the "coulda been betters" we might identify, I nevertheless found the story captivating and I watched it all in one sitting, wanting to know what is going to happen next.

I used to feel uncomfortable watching "Christian" movies, somehow resisting the references to God, Christ, the Bible. As an agnostic and later a new Christian, I sometimes felt like the thoughts and feelings the Christian characters exhibited were not something that was either real or would resonate with me.

Now a Christian over 36 years, I can report: the thoughts, feelings, and conversations of many "Christian" characters in such movies reflect what really happens in our minds and lives. We actually take scriptural words seriously and discuss them. So I actually identify with the characters and what they are feeling and saying. I understand the "doubters" in such stories as well.

It's funny how some reviewers think they are attacking a movie, with eyes rolling and condescension, by calling it "Christian." Somehow they think it is trite or childish or proselytizing when a Bible is used or read by a character, for example. Then I think of a movie like Hobo with a Shotgun, or any of the grisly Saw movies, etc., and I wonder if these same "enlightened" reviewers realize that portraying torture, destruction and death is itself actually proselytizing for the worst possible human behavior.

I'd watch A Path in Time or darn near any faith-based or Christian movie 100 times before I'd watch any movie like Saw for more than 15 minutes into its horror show. You choose what you put in your mind and call entertainment.
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7/10
Good Hallmark-style Christian family movie...
ulisses_phoenix23 May 2020
If you enjoy the Hallmark channel, you'll love this film. It's definitely TV-movie-quality and the style feels like something you'd see on the Hallmark channel. The editing and cinematography are pretty good -- only a couple of mistakes that will likely go unnoticed by viewers -- the lighting, camera angles, and continuity are spot on. The special effects are pretty good, too. As with nearly all movies that feature young actors, the acting is about the quality you'd expect from a TV movie. (Great acting takes talent AND experience, and it's rare to find great performances from young players unless they are surrounded by great A-level talent and directing, and even then it's rare.)

This is a religious movie, if you haven't figured that out already, with a Christian message. As with many Christian projects, the authors have favorite verses from the Bible that they want to talk about and this film is no different. In this one the passages they highlight are Romans 8:38-39 and 2 Thessalonians 2:15. (You can look them up -- not much of a spoiler if you do. It's your choice.) The story contains several metaphors which enhance its value, but the plot is simple (for a time-travel story) an there's no real back-story or other deep intricacies to the plot. As I said, it's a TV movie.

The ending is left open-ended as if the producers wanted to use this film as a pilot for a series or to leave room for a sequel. If you're bothered by movies that don't end with all the loose ends neatly tied up, be prepared for a sudden, unfinished story.

All in all, this is a great family movie that most people will enjoy, especially those whose religion is very important in their lives.

Triggers: strobe effects, text content at >200 wpm
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8/10
Christian time travel???
ed-brennan19 February 2020
Not as bad as others who reviewed this said. It is a Christian movie. I expect this was the foundation story for more to come..but didn't???
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