Movie Review: Time Bandits

This is a fun little movie that made it into my Que and then up to the top. And because another movie became unavailable, it made its way into my mailbox.

It was made in 1981 and stars John Cleese, Sean Connery, Shelley Duval, and some others, who all played bit parts. The real star of the show is a young man named Craig Warnock, who plays a young boy who gets caught up with a group of Time jumping Dwarf thieves, who do a good impression of the 3 stooges.

The Dwarfs worked for the Supreme Being when they stole a map that shows where the time portals would open and when. If you jumped through them, you ended up in a new time. So the Dwarfs stole the map, go to one location, steal everything you want, then jump to a new time and your filthy rich. Good plan except they seem to have the worst luck in the world and were being continually pursued by the Supreme being.

They happen to jump into Kevin's room and he joins them in their first robbery when they join up with Napolean and steal him blind. Then jump into Robin Hoods time, when he assumes they are giving all the treasure to the poor. They then get seperated and Kevin goes to ancient Greece. He decides he is happy there, when the dwarfs show up and do a magic trick, by taking all the gold everyone has, and then going through a portal that lands them on the titanic.

Meanwhile, ultimate evil who is imprisoned in the Tower of Ultimate Darkness in the Land of Legends is trying to lure them to him. While on the titanic, they decide they are going after the object of desire in the Tower. So when it sinks, Evil opens up a portal for them to get to the Land of Legends.

Once there, they are captured by Ogres who want to eat them, but Kevin outsmarts the Ogre and they steal the ship. This is fine until they find out the ship is really a Giants hat and he walks out of the ocean onto land. So they use potions to put him to sleep and begin their quest for the Tower of ultimate darkness.

To not spoil the whole show, it is a great little story that has a few plot holes, and issues, but it well worth the watch. It gets a bit slow in places and the English accents get a bit old.

But for a fun little movie on a dreary afternoon, it is just the ticket and I highly recommend it. I had seen it years ago when it first came out and then again about 12- 15 years ago, and had still forgotten a lot of the story.

If you haven't seen it or its been 10+ years like me, check it out.

Until next time...