Time travel has come back, big time

Sturdy plot device spreads across film dimensions, genres

Scientists and film historians can agree: Time- travel movies continue to expand at unprecedented rates.

This is clear from the current crop of movies flying into the multiplexes. Writer/ director Richard Curtis’ romantic comedy About Time concerns an eccentric British family whose men have the ability to revisit their past lives. The seasonally appropriate animated film Free Birds features a sci- fi first — time- traveling turkeys.

“No matter the premise, it remains a timeless concept for movie storytelling, if you can forgive the pun,” says film historian Leonard Maltin. “In spite of all the technological advances we’ve seen, we can’t seem to pull time travel off. So it never seems to wear out its welcome in film.”

Which is a good thing, because early 2014 will feature an even bigger slate of universe- bending films. The trailer for Mr. Peabody & Sherman ( due March 7) came out with Free

Birds. The animated film features a genius talking dog who builds a WABAC ( pronounced “Way Back”) machine to teach his adopted human son about history firsthand.

Also due in spring is the next chapter of the most absurd time- traveling premise, the sequel to 2010’ s surprise hit Hot Tub Time Machine. The crew ( including Craig Robinson and Rob Corddry) try to go back in time again but accidentally head to the future in their unorthodox vessel.

Almanac ( Feb. 28) features a group of teens who discover a secret plan to build a time machine. Even the mutants of the X- Men franchise are getting into the action with X- Men: Days

of Future Past ( May 23). And that’s just the first half of the year.

What’s bringing on the fourth-dimension love? Maltin chalks it up to the need for movie escapism. And it’s perfectly logical from a scientific point of view. “The concept is just so tempting and pure wishful thinking,” says educator Bill Nye, aka “The Science Guy,” who knocks down the scientific reality of the feat.

The change in history’s ( and the main) course serves as the center of Free Birds. Turkeys voiced by Woody Harrelson and Owen Wilson travel back to the first Thanksgiving to get their own kind off the menu.

“It’s so ridiculous and so fitting, so why not turkey?” asks screenwriter/ director Jimmy Hayward. “But let’s face it, they are traveling back to save their own species.”

The recent spate of time- traveling has created a specialty for Rachel McAdams, who has been married to one era- hopper ( The Time Traveler’s

Wife in 2009) and engaged to another ( Midnight in Paris in 2011).

So it was only natural that Curtis would ask McAdams to star as his time- traveling main character’s true love in About Time.

“I thought for sure she’d say no,” Curtis says. “But the people who enjoyed the other films will realize it’s Time Travel 3 for Rachel.”