The most important commodity for a time-travel fantasy is sincerity. The audience must be able to ‘buy’ how the time-travel works. From The Time Machine to Back to the Future, each movie lays down its own set of rules, and if we ‘buy’ it, the conceit works. Fortunately for the mostly forgotten sci-fi drama The Philadelphia Experiment, the rules are more or less followed.
Dave ( Michael Pare) and Jim (Bobby Di Cicco) are typical Navy guys circa 1943. Jim has a sweet wife with a baby on the way, and Dave is a cocksure womaniser. The two unwittingly participate in an experiment to make their battleship invisible to enemy radar, and – wouldn’t you know it – things go horribly awry. The battleship literally vanishes, tossing Dave and Jim right on into…
…. 1984! The best scenes in the movie depict Jim and Dave as they slowly begin to realize that they are not where (or even when) they’re supposed to be. Fortunately, an aimless goofball named Allison ( Nancy Allen) shows up to act as a not-so-reluctant hostage, and the chase is on! The scientist who was in charge of the experiment slowly begins to realize who the two fugitives really are…or were…or will be. It gets confusing, but that’s part of the fun.
Pare is an awful actor. I’m sorry, but there’s just no way to be nice about it. At best, he doesn’t get in the way of the plot; at worst, he’s unintentionally hilarious, as when he throws a petulant hissy-fit in a hotel room scene that may have you laughing out loud. As the obligatory ‘female along for the ride,’ Allen…well, let’s just say she doesn’t give her finest performance. You’ll be wondering how she ever had a successful career. If it seems like an actor is reading from cue cards, well, that’s just bad acting. The supporting actors fare a little better, with Eric Christmas doing a fine job as the kindly old scientist, and the always-welcome Stephen Tobolowsky has a few fun scenes as a military genius guy.
Director Stewart Raffill keeps the movie moving at a brisk enough pace, keeping an even balance amidst a cluttered screenplay. The Philadelphia Experiment veers wildly from ‘sci-fi adventure’ to ‘culture-shock comedy’ to ‘sappy romance’ to ‘ecological morality tale,’ but it does this in such a breezy and entertaining style, that you won’t mind the cinematic schizophrenia.
Since this was made in 1984, back when C, G, and I were merely three unrelated letters, you can expect some of the special effects to look, well, lame. However, the constant lightning bolts and electrical surges look reasonably cool, at least for a high-end 1984 B-movie. As is the case in all entertaining science fiction, The Philadelphia Experiment comes at you with a straight face, and never panders or gets overtly silly.
