Lyle Swann (Fred Ward) is a dirt bike racer participating in the Baja 1000. During the race Swann accidentally goes way off course. He then stumbles into a test facility that is conducting a time travel experiment. Swann and his bike get picked up in the experiment and are transported back in time to November 5, 1877. Not realizing what happened, Swann races away looking for the racecourse. When the scientists try to bring him back from 1877, he is no longer in range. Swann races on and comes across a Mexican. Frightened by the dirt bike, the man has a heart attack and dies. Swann ends up sleeping in the desert overnight and buries the man in the morning.
Swann heads off again looking for the racecourse but has a run-in with an outlaw named Porter Reese (Peter Coyote) and his gang, Carl and Claude Dorsett (Tracey Walter and Richard Masur). Reese is fascinated with the machine that runs on wheels. He becomes obsessed and decides to steal it. The gang follows Swann to the village of San Marcos. The locals are frightened by the bike and Swann’s red suit. They think he is the devil. The run-in Swann had with the gang in the desert was witnessed by Claire Cygne (Belinda Bauer). She hides Swann as the local priest, Quinn (Ed Lauter), chases Reese out of town. Claire and Swann have sex.
Following Reese and the Dorsett brothers are Sheriffs Ben Potter (L.Q. Jones) and Daniels (Chris Mulkey). Potter believes that Reese is responsible for killing his son two years ago. Reese and the Dorsetts manage to steal the dirt bike and kidnap Claire. Swann convinces Potter to help him go after the outlaws.
“Time Rider: The Adventures of Lyle Swann” was released in 1982 and was directed by William Dear. It is a science fiction adventure film and a part of the subgenre weird west. The movie was produced, scored and co-written by Michael Nesmith. At one time Nesmith was a member of the rock group “The Monkees”.
There is a lot of cheese in the movie. The whole thing is basically ridiculous, but it’s supposed to be. At times the comedy out weights the science fiction. It’s not great but it is kinda fun. Granted, it could have been better, but it was a really decent effort and enjoyable for what it is.
There is a Wilhelm scream when Claire shoots Carl Dorsett’s nose off. There are at least three movies that have November 5th as the destination date in traveling back in time. In addition to this movie is “Back to the Future” 1985 went back to November 5, 1955 and “Time after Time” 1979 went back to November 5, 1979. The motorcycle featured in the film is a custom Yamaha XT500 Baja racer. The stunt driver was John Hateley. Mike Nesmith has a bit part as a racing official.
The paradox illustrated by the movie is referred to as a causal loop, the bootstrap paradox, information loop, ontological paradox, or a predestination paradox. It is a contradiction of cause-and-effect in time travel and the potential disruption to a timeline resulting from changes in the past that affect the current reality. When going back in time you cause something to happen that affects current reality. In this case Lyle Swann, in having sex with Claire, is his own grandfather.
The time travel aspect has an interesting little implausible quirk. The medallion that Claire steals from Swann belonged to his grandfather, in essence himself. Since the object didn’t originally exist in 1877 it could not have been passed down to Swann. The medallion has no origin.