30 Greatest Time Travel Movies Ever Made

What makes a great time travel movie? Is it a believable plot device explaining time travel? Is it just having a cool story? The truth is a great time travel movie hits on more than one of those tropes, and the best time travel movies ever made are ones you probably already know by heart. 

Just a couple of rules for the list. In order for a movie to be considered, the plot has to be centrally about time travel and not used as a deus ex machina, like in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban." And it can't be a film where time is used as a construct, like in "Arrival" where the main character experiences time all at once but doesn't actually time travel. 

These are the best time travel movies of all time. 

30. Timecop

Note: This article contains plot spoilers.

Release date: Sept. 16, 1994

Director: Peter Hyams

Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Mia Sara, Ron Silver, Bruce McGill, Gloria Reuben

Budget: $27 million

Box office: $101.6 million

Bottom line: Sometimes, it's OK to not think too deeply about the mechanics of time travel and just have a damn good time watching a movie. 

"Timecop" is a time travel movie presented as a straight action piece. It does that well enough that we can ignore a time travel machine that essentially involves a modified go-kart track. 

Movie fans loathe giving Jean-Claude Van Damme credit for a great run in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but he was box-office gold beginning with "Bloodsport" in 1988 until things came crashing down with a series of flops like "The Quest" in 1995 and "Double Team" in 1997.

If we're doing JCVD rankings, "Timecop" deserves to be near the top. 

Streaming on: Amazon ($)

29. Safety Not Guaranteed

Release date: June 8, 2012

Director: Colin Trevorrow

Starring: Aubrey Plaza, Mark Duplass, Jake Johnson, Karan Soni, Kristen Bell, Jeff Garlin, Mary Lynn Rjaskub

Budget: $750,000

Box office: $4.4 million

Bottom line: Few time travel films are able to incorporate the depth of characters that "Safety Not Guaranteed" pulls off. It's a huge credit to a trio of leads in Aubrey Plaza, Mark Duplass and Jake Johnson. 

That the film spends so much time talking about time travel but not actually time traveling is an aside. This is a romantic comedy at heart and leans into that to its benefit. 

In one of the bigger director come-ups in the last 20 years, Colin Trevorrow made this movie for $750,000 and its reception led Universal Pictures to hire him to direct "Jurassic World" as his next movie. With a budget of $150 million. 

Streaming on: Tubi

28. Somewhere in Time

Release date: Oct. 3, 1980

Director: Jeannot Szwaroc

Starring: Christopher Reeve, Jane Seymour, Christopher Plummer, Teresa Wright

Budget: $4 million

Box office: $9.7 million

Bottom line: Most people know Richard Matheson because he wrote the novel "I Am Legend," which has been made into movies several times, most notably by Will Smith in 2007. But Matheson also wrote "Bid Time Return," which was the basis for "Somewhere in Time," probably a movie your grandma really loved back in the day. 

Within the subgenre of romantic time travel movies, "Somewhere in Time" stands out in large part because of how much movie fans loved and miss Christopher Reeve. Outside of "Superman," this is probably his signature role. 

In an interesting twist, director Jeannot Szwarc would helm "Supergirl" in 1984. 

Streaming on: Tubi

27. Last Night in Soho

Release date: Oct. 29, 2021

Director: Edgar Wright

Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Thomasin McKenzie, Matt Smith, Terence Stamp, Diana Rigg, Michael Ajao

Budget: $43 million

Box office: $23 million 

Bottom line: Director Edgar Wright is truly one of a kind. He's crafted a career out of making groundbreaking films, and his last few years have gotten more away from the comedic bend he was known for early on. 

While "Last Night in Soho" ended up being a box-office flop, our guess is a lot of that had to do with the pandemic.

Wright has a knack for finding stars on their way up, which he's done here with Anya Taylor-Joy fresh off the success of "The Queen's Gambit" on Netflix. 

Streaming on: Amazon ($)

26. Freejack

Release date: Jan. 17, 1992

Director: Geoff Murphy

Starring: Emilio Estevez, Rene Russo, Mick Jagger, Anthony Hopkins

Budget: $30 million

Box office: $37 million

Bottom line: "Freejack" is off the chain. A bananas, early 1990s sci-fi/time travel movie starring Emilio Estevez as an F1 race car driver who is snatched out of time the moment before he's obliterated in a fiery crash during a race. 

With time travel movies, they don't always have to be works of art. "Freejack" is definitely not that. No doubt Anthony Hopkins was a bit frosty about the film being released as he was gearing up to win an Academy Award for "Silence of the Lambs" when he called it "terrible" on "The David Letterman Show" around the time of its release. 

"Freejack" isn't terrible. It's actually a lot of fun. If you like "Robocop" and "Total Recall," this is in that vein. 

Streaming on: HBO Max

25. Time Bandits

Release date: July 10, 1981

Director: Terry Gilliam

Starring: Craig Warnock, John Cleese, Sean Connery, Shelley Duvall, Ian Holm, Kenny Baker, Peter Vaughan, David Warner, David Rappaport, Jack Purvis

Budget: $5 million

Box office: $42.4 million

Bottom line: Kids who grew up in the 1980s remember "Time Bandits" well from an extended run on cable television throughout the decade, right at the advent of HBO, Showtime and Cinemax. 

Director Terry Gilliam has an affinity for time travel in his films. You'll see his name on this list again soon. "Time Bandits" was the first film in what Gilliam called his "Imagination Trilogy," followed by "Brazil" in 1985 and "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen" in 1988. 

What made "Time Bandits" so endearing is the kid at the heart of the story — smart as a whip, time-hopping, 11-year-old Kevin. Upon rewatch, the thing that stood out was the bonkers ending to this movie. Had it not been for the deaths of several leads in the decade following its release, we have no doubt a sequel could have been pulled off. 

Streaming on: HBO Max

24. The Final Countdown

Release date: Aug. 1, 1980

Director: Don Taylor

Starring: Kirk Douglas, Martin Sheen, Katharine Ross, James Farentino, Ron O'Neal, Charles Durning

Budget: $12.5 million

Box office: $16.6 million

Bottom line: Just one year removed from "Apocalypse Now," we got Martin Sheen in a great sci-fi film with "The Final Countdown." A movie that asks the question of what would happen if our most tricked-out, modern aircraft carrier was transported back in time to one day before the attack on Pearl Harbor. 

"The Final Countdown" has one cool thing about it that not a lot of time travel movies have — it ends on a fairly large cliffhanger.

Netflix, please be advised, we would like a 10-episode reboot whenever you get a chance. 

Streaming on: Tubi 

23. Peggy Sue Got Married

Release date: Oct. 10, 1986

Director: Francis Ford Coppola

Starring: Kathleen Turner, Nicolas Cage, Barry Miller, Joan Allen, Kevin J. O'Connor, Jim Carrey, Catherine Hicks

Budget: $18 million

Box office: $41.5 million

Bottom line: It may have been too close after the release of "Back to the Future" for movie audiences to fully embrace another time travel movie, but "Peggy Sue Got Married" is one of Kathleen Turner's better films and the best film legendary director Francis Ford Coppola made in the 1980s, which proved to be the wasteland of his career.

"Peggy Sue" would be much higher on the list were it not for the absolutely bonkers performance of Coppola's nephew, Nicolas Cage, in one of his first leading roles. The discord between Turner and Cage later led to a lawsuit after she said he was arrested for two DUIs and for stealing a chihuahua during filming.

Cage sued for defamation and won after proving the claims weren't true, and she was ordered to pay Cage's legal fees and make a "substantial" donation to charity. 

Streaming on: Starz

22. Don't Let Go

Release date: Aug. 30, 2019

Director: Jacob Aaron Estes

Starring: David Oyelowo, Storm Reid, Byron Mann, Mykelti Williamson

Budget: $5 million

Box office: $5.3 million

Bottom line: "Don't Let Go" was a criminally underrated movie when it came out in the summer of 2019. It's a low-budget film that does that thing where it seems like it cost a lot more than it did. 

"Don't Let Go" also skirts the edge of our "can't use time as a construct" rule. It also essentially steals most of its reasoning with how time works from the 2000 film "Frequency" to great effect.

Why "Don't Let Go" works so well is because of the two stars at its heart, the brilliant David Oyelowo and up-and-coming actress Storm Reid, who we hope is in our favorite movies and television shows for the next 30 or 40 years. 

Streaming on: Amazon ($)

21. MIB3

Release date: May 25, 2012

Director: Barry Sonnenfeld

Starring: Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin, Jermaine Clement, Emma Thompson

Budget: $225 million

Box office: $624 million

Bottom line: The "Men in Black" franchise — the Will Smith version — came to a fitting close with "MIB3" in 2012, thanks to a smart time travel plotline that saw Josh Brolin stepping in as a young Tommy Lee Jones, which turned out to be a perfect fit. 

It's such perfect casting because we can't think of another actor in Hollywood that could have actually played Jones' younger version. There's an especially poignant scene at the end that involves Will Smith's character "J" watching a mind-bending twist that wraps all three films together. 

Streaming on: Freeform

20. 12 Monkeys

Release date: Dec. 29, 1995

Director: Terry Gilliam

Starring: Bruce Willis, Brad Pitt, Madeleine Stowe, Christopher Plummer

Budget: $29.5 million

Box office: $168.8 million

Bottom line: Terry Gilliam gets two films on the list with "Time Bandits" and "12 Monkeys."  The latter earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for Brad Pitt. 

"12 Monkeys" was actually a loose remake of a French short film from 1962 called "Le Jetee" that used nuclear war as the backdrop for time travel. "Monkeys" uses a virus Bruce Willis is trying to hop back in time to stop from wiping out most of the earth's population. 

Gilliam worried Pitt wouldn't be able to pull off the fidgety aspects of his character so he simply took away his cigarettes and it did the trick. 

Streaming on: Amazon Prime

19. Star Trek (2009)

Release date: May 8, 2009

Director: J.J. Abrams

Starring: Chris Pine, Zach Quinto, Zoe Saldana, John Cho, Eric Bana, Bruce Greenwood, Winona Ryder, Karl Urban, Anton Yelchin, Leonard Nimoy

Budget: $150 million

Box office: $385.7 million

Bottom line: We should give the "Star Trek" reboot from J.J. Abrams more credit for being one of the better sci-fi films of the last 20 years. It catches a handful of young actors right before they shoot out of the stratosphere and has a wonderful villain in Eric Bana. 

Where the movie really kicks into high gear is when the time travel aspects start to enter the picture and we get New Spock and Old Spock. The scenes between Chris Pine (Captain Kirk) and Leonard Nimoy are especially memorable. 

Our sadness really lies with the big-budget fourth installment of the current "Star Trek" franchise that never came to fruition. It would have leaned more heavily into the time travel aspects and brought back Chris Hemsworth as Captain Kirk's father. 

Streaming on: Amazon ($)

18. Planet of the Apes (1968)

Release date: April 3, 1968

Director: Franklin J. Schaffner

Starring: Charlton Hesston, Roddy McDowall, Maurice Evans, Kim Hunter, James Whitmore, James Daly, Linda Harrison

Budget: $5.8 million

Box office: $33.4 million

Bottom line: The original "Planet of the Apes" essentially uses the same rules for time travel as "Interstellar" — the further you get away from the Earth and continue to experience time the same, it is occurring at a much faster rate back on Earth. 

In that vein, we don't even realize it's a time travel movie until that last, awe-inspiring shot of the Statue of Liberty on the beach, Charlton Heston crumpled in the sand and realizing that he'd actually made his way back to Earth. Just thousands and thousands of years in the future. 

Streaming on: YouTube

17.  Palm Springs

Release date: July 10, 2020

Director: Max Barbakow

Starring: Andy Samberg, Cristin Milioti, J.K. Simmons

Budget: $5 million

Box office: N/A

Bottom line: Released in the middle of the pandemic, the Andy Samberg-led "Palm Springs" was one of the bigger hits put out when movie theaters were still closed. It even ended up with Golden Globe nominations for Best Motion Picture Musical or Comedy and Best Actor in a Motion Picture Musical or Comedy for Samberg. 

You will see this trope several times because it's the most reliable time travel device — repeating the same day over and over again. "Palm Springs," however, does something unique. In most of these types of films, it's just one person getting to live that day over and over.

When Samberg realizes there's more than just him in the loop, the film takes off. 

Streaming on: Hulu

16. Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home

Release date: Nov. 26, 1986

Director: Leonard Nimoy

Starring: William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, George Takei, Walter Koenig, Nichelle Nichols

Budget: $26 million

Box office: $133 million

Bottom line: OK, we will go ahead and say it. "The Voyage Home" is a better "Star Trek" movie than the "Wrath of Khan" and is better than both of the sequels that came out in the 2010s. 

Another way to look at "Voyage" is as the conclusion of a three-film arc that began with "Khan" continued to "The Search for Spock" and ended here, with director Leonard Nimoy making a sci-fi film about environmentalism that earned four Academy Award nominations and saw the crew of the USS Enterprise traveling back in time to steal humpback whales in order to save the planet in the distant future. 

It's not as wacky as that sounds. If you like sci-fi and time travel movies, this is worth your time. 

Streaming on: Paramount+ 

15. Flight of the Navigator

Release date: Aug. 1, 1986

Director: Randal Kleiser

Starring: Joey Cramer, Paul Reubens, Veronica Cartwright, Cliff DeYoung, Sarah Jessica Parker, Matt Adler, Howard Hesseman, Albie Whitaker

Budget: $9 million

Box office: $18.5 million

Bottom line: "Flight of the Navigator" is a movie that kind of got lost in the wash in the mid-1980s but has stayed alive in the hearts and minds of fans over the last 30-plus years. 

Plenty of things stand out about "Navigator" on numerous rewatches — the amazing special effects (for the time), a young Sarah Jessica Parker in one of her first movie roles and an especially smart use of time travel. 

It's no surprise this movie is getting a reboot on Disney+ with director Bryce Dallas 

Streaming on: Disney+

14. Hot Tub Time Machine

Release date: March 26, 2010

Director: Steve Pink

Starring: John Cusack, Rob Corddry, Craig Robinson, Clark Duke, Crisping Glover, Lizzy Caplan, Chevy Chase

Budget: $36 million

Box office: $64.6 million

Bottom line: John Cusack spent long enough in "serious" movies that it was a welcome sight to see him getting back in the comedy game, where he first started, with "Hot Tub Time Machine" in 2010. 

We love a good time travel movie, and as far as comedies go, this is one of the best to blend the two genres together. Cusack showed he was as good at knowing when to get back in the comedy game as when to get out. He was the only member of the main cast to not appear in the 2015 sequel, which grossed almost $50 million less than the original and was demolished by critics and moviegoers.

Motley Lou, indeed. 

Streaming on: Hulu, TNT

13. Predestination

Release date: Aug. 28, 2014

Director: The Spierig Brothers

Starring: Ethan Hawke, Sarah Snook, Noah Taylor

Budget: $5 million

Box office: $5.4 million

Bottom line: No film will melt your mind more than "Predestination" — a largely forgotten and underappreciated film out of Australia from 2014. 

We could not get into the plot mechanics of "Predestination" without giving away every bit of the plot. This usually wouldn't matter, but we're assuming quite a few people haven't gotten the chance to see it yet. 

Streaming on: Tubi 

12. The Terminator

Release date: Oct. 26, 1984

Director: James Cameron

Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Michael Biehn, Paul Winfield

Budget: $6.4 million

Box office: $78.3 million

Bottom line: This is the movie that made Arnold Schwarzenegger a huge star and established the "Terminator" franchise to begin with. Since the original film's release in 1984, there have been five sequels and a television series. 

The franchise itself is totally based off time travel. And in the hands of director James Cameron it's handled as well as it ever has been. "Terminator" has an underrated twist. John Connor sends his top lieutenant, Kyle Reese, back in time to save his mother at the same time the machines do. Then Reese gets his mom pregnant. With John Connor.

Mind blown. 

Streaming on: Tubi, Amazon Prime

11. Looper

Release date: Sept. 28, 2012

Director: Rian Johnson

Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, Piper Perabo, Jeff Daniels, Noah Segan, Garret Dillahunt

Budget: $30 million

Box office: $176.5 million

Bottom line: If you want evidence that Rian Johnson is a genius filmmaker, look no further than his 2012 film "Looper." He wrote, directed and drafted Joseph Gordon-Levitt to star in this movie after JGL starred in his first feature, the teenage detective noir "Brick" in 2005. 

Any time travel movie worth its weight in plutonium should draw you in for multiple viewings, which "Looper" does with ease. This movie also features peak, post-prime Bruce Willis, and actress Emily Blunt seems to have a thing for finding her way into elite time travel and sci-fi movies.

It's not her last appearance on this list. 

Streaming on: Netflix

10. About Time

Release date: Sept. 4, 2013

Director: Richard Curtis

Starring: Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel McAdams, Bill Nighy, Tom Hollander, Margot Robbie

Budget: $12 million

Box office: $88.5 million

Bottom line: Richard Curtis has written and directed some of the best romantic comedies of the last 20 years. His foray into time travel movies stayed in that vein with "About Time" about a lineage of men who can time travel. 

"About Time" is about more than just time travel or the romance between Domhnall Gleeson and Rachel McAdams at the heart of the film. It's about learning to appreciate life as it happens. "About Time" was also, somewhat surprisingly, the last movie Curtis directed. 

"The difference between having a good idea for a movie and a finished movie is the same as seeing a pretty girl across the floor at a party and being there when she gives birth to your third child," Curtis said. "It's a very long journey." 

Streaming on: Netflix

9. Happy Death Day/Happy Death Day 2U

Release date (Happy Death Day): Oct. 13, 2017

Release date (Happy Death Day 2U): Feb. 13, 2019

Director: Christopher Landon 

Starring: Jessica Rothe, Israel Broussard, Suraj Sharma, Steve Zissis

Happy Death Day budget: $4.8 million

Happy Death Day box office (budget): $125.5 million

Happy Death Day 2U budget: $9 million 

Happy Death Day 2U box office: $64.6 million

Bottom line: We are cheating a little bit here by listing "Happy Death Day" and its sequel "Happy Death Day 2U" in one spot, but that's in the hopes that people discover both movies for the first time and at the same time. And realize the story is just one movie, essentially. 

Considering the total budget of the two movies put together was roughly $14 million and the two movies grossed almost $200 million together, we'd be surprised if we don't get another installation in the "Happy Death Day" franchise at some point. 

Happy Death Day streaming on: Amazon ($)

Happy Death Day 2U streaming on: Hulu

8. Avengers: Endgame

Release date: April 26, 2019

Director: Anthony Russo and Joe Russo

Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Josh Brolin,  Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson, Chris Hemsworth, Jermey Renner, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd, Brie Larson, Karen Gillan, Benedict Wong, Gwyenth Paltrow

Budget: $400 million

Box office: $2.798 billion

Bottom line: There has never been a bigger movie in Hollywood history than "Avengers: Endgame" — the finale to the 11-year long "Infinity Saga" from Marvel Studios. And one of the things we loved most about it was how seamlessly it integrated time travel into the plot. 

While the actual time travel is pure adrenaline rush, the scenes where our heroes discuss time travel are almost as good, most notably when Ant-Man/Scott Lang tries to explain time travel to Tony Stark and when Rhodey offers his solution to fixing The Snap. 

One thing the filmmakers did when it came to time travel in this movie is something we wish more would do when they play in this genre. They contacted actual physicists. Doing research pays off. Imagine that. 

Streaming on: Disney+

7. Terminator 2: Judgment Day

Release date: July 3, 1991

Director: James Cameron

Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong, Robert Patrick, Joe Morton

Budget: $100 million

Box office: $520.9 million

Bottom line: The original "Terminator" film in 1984 used time travel as its major plot device and created one of the all-time mind-bending plot twists when John Connor sends his own dad back in time to meet his mom for the first time. But our money is with "T2" for the sheer spectacle of it all. 

For all of the plot mechanisms that time travel offers, it's really at home in the expert hands of director James Cameron, who drafts Joe Morton in as the scientist who eventually creates Skynet — the artificial intelligence system that wipes out almost all of humanity. 

Streaming on: Netflix

6. Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure

Release date: Feb. 17, 1989

Director: Stephen Herek

Starring: Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter, George Carlin, Bernie Casey

Budget: $10 million

Box office: $40.5 million

Bottom line: You will never have more fun time traveling than when you hit the metaphysical waves with Bill S. Preston, Esq., and Ted "Theodore" Logan in the surprise hit from 1989 that was the first step on the road to gigantic movie stardom for Keanu Reeves.

San Dimas High School never had a senior presentation like the one Bill and Ted delivered in order to graduate with their class. And, in turn, save humanity itself.

But make sure you press pause on the two turgid sequels. 

Streaming on: HBO Max

5. Donnie Darko

Release date: Oct. 26, 2001

Director: Richard Kelly

Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Drew Barrymore, Noah Wyle, Mary McDonnell, Patrick Swayze, James Duval

Budget: $4.5 million

Box office: $7.5 million

Bottom line: This bonkers time travel movie from director Richard Kelly is where a lot of us decided to buy a ton of Jake Gyllenhaal stock. 

What we love the most about "Donnie Darko" is that it mixes so many genres effortlessly. All at once, it incorporates sci-fi, high school drama, time travel, family drama and, in the opinions of many, essentially a superhero movie as well. 

While writer/director Richard Kelly blew the goodwill from this movie on the dreadful "Southland Tales" — one of the more epic disasters in Hollywood history — it proved Gyllenhaal was a viable leading man. 

Streaming on: HBO Max

4. Groundhog Day

Release date: Feb. 12, 1993

Director: Harold Ramis

Starring: Bill Murray, Andie MacDowell, Chris Elliott

Budget: $25 million

Box office: $105 million

Bottom line: If we're getting into a discussion of what Bill Murray's best leading role was, it probably boils down to a trifecta of "Lost in Translation" and "Ghostbusters." But No. 1 is "Groundhog Day" directed by the late Harold Ramis. 

This is Murray hitting at the height of his powers. As he got older, he was able to pull off more dramatic roles with more weight to them, but he was at his comic apex with the tale of a weatherman repeating the same day over and over again. 

For all its success, this movie proved to be the undoing of longtime friends Murray and Ramis, who clashed over what type of movie they were making. The two didn't speak again until 2014, shortly before Ramis died. 

Streaming on: Amazon Prime, Starz

3. Deja Vu

Release date: Nov. 22, 2006

Director: Tony Scott

Starring: Denzel Washington, Paula Patton, Val Kilmer, Bruce Greenberg, Adam Goldberg, Jim Caviezel

Budget: $75 million

Box office: $180.6 million

Bottom line: If we could force Denzel Washington to make another time travel movie, we would. If only because "Deja Vu" is just so, so good. It's a time travel movie but also a thriller and also a whodunnit. 

Leave it to Washington, who is perhaps the greatest actor of all time, to step into the time travel genre and drop the mic. Can you imagine what this movie would have been with anyone else in the leading role? 

On that note, the pairing between director Tony Scott and Washington should also go down as one of the all-time great director-actor duos of all time. Scott directed 16 films in his career, and a quarter of them starred Washington. 

Streaming on: Amazon Prime

2. Edge of Tomorrow

Release date: June 6, 2014

Director: Doug Liman

Starring: Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt, Bill Paxton, Brendan Gleeson

Budget: $178 million

Box office: $370.5 million

Bottom line: The plotline of "living the same day over and over" makes yet another appearance. But it was never done better than what we got here. 

Based on the Japanese manga novel "All You Need Is Kill" by Harushi Sakurazaka, this is the best movie Tom Cruise has made in the last 20 years. And the only of his late period movies that holds up to his 1990s heyday. 

By the time he dies for the 100th time, you're there with him. It's also director Doug Liman's best movie by a long shot. 

Streaming on: Amazon ($)

1. Back to the Future

Release date: July 3, 1985

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Starring: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Thomas F. Wilson, Crispin Glover, Lea Thompson, James Tolkan, Claudia Wells

Budget: $19 million

Box office: $388.8 million

Bottom line: No movie about time travel has ever been as good or as fun as "Back to the Future." It's an infinitely rewatchable delight (imagine that) turned down 40 times before it was finally greenlit following the release of "Romancing the Stone" from director Robert Zemeckis. 

In one of the more interesting sliding doors moments in Hollywood history, Zemeckis actually shot the film for one month with Eric Stoltz playing Marty McFly, realized it wasn't working, and fired him in order to replace him with his first choice, Michael J. Fox. 

Made for just $19 million, then grossing almost $400 million at the box office and spawning two blockbuster sequels, it became one of the most profitable franchises of all time. 

Streaming on: Amazon Prime