Yesterday

 

 (cultpix.com)

THE YESTERDAY MACHINE-1965-After a college kid is shot by unknown assailants a reporter Jim Crandall (James Britton; the director's brother) goes to interview him at the hospital. Dr. Blake (Charles Young) tells Jim the boy's story and in a flashback we learn the boy's attackers were dressed in Civil War clothes and his cheerleader girlfriend disappeared. After night club singer Sandra Del Marr (Ann Pelligrino) croons a song, police Lt. Partane (Tim Holt) and his assistant Lansky (Robert Kelly) inform her of her cheerleader sister's disappearance. Later a weird detective finds a Civil War cap that's the real thing, along with the girl's sweater. Partane relates a story to Lansky from WW2 involving some young concentration camp prisoners who should have been old and a German physicist Prof. Von Hauser. Later Jim and Sandy investigate an old house near where her sister's sweater was found. After Jim knocks out a guy who attacked Sandy they seem to go back in time and meet a guy on a horse in a tri-corner hat. When the guy sees Jim's cigarette lighter he declares "Witchcraft!" and rides off. After walking around they are transported to the lab of Prof. Von Hauser (Jack Herman) who's doing experiments with time traveling. He has a former Egyptian slave as a servant and is quite kindly until Jim calls Hitler a madman. The long winded mad scientist explains in detail how he mastered time with something called "The Minus Ray". Meanwhile Sandy is reunited with her sister. Later Von Hauser plans to send Sandy's sister into the future but with the help of the slave (who's killed) Jim escapes and rescues the women. Partane arrives and kills Von Hauser and destroys the machine. 

This movie is mostly talk and not much else. The story's sole proof of time travel are 4 characters. It's very cheap and badly acted. Writer/director Russ Marker wrote the shoddy NIGHT FRIGHT with John Agar. 

Tim Holt was a popular young star before WW2. On his return from the war (a decorated officer) he starred in Orson Welles' THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS and co-starred in THE TREASURE OF SIERRA MADRE but soon after was regulated to westerns (some successful, some not). He grew disillusioned with Hollywood and moved to Oklahoma. For years his filmography ended with the Sci-Fi monster film THE MONSTER THAT CHALLENGED THE WORLD (made over two years after his previous movie) but then THE YESTERDAY MACHINE showed up. His final film role was in Herschel Gordon Lewis' hillbilly drama THIS STUFF'LL KILL YA!

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