Am not sure what this film was about: memory loss, time travel, special abilities, gifted children, government conspiracy ... or something else? The dialogue doesn't help. Neither does the way it is filmed, grainy and over exposed. Basically it is a bit boring. There are good actors like LeVar Burton and Malcolm McDowell and Trevor Goddard but they are not served well by the script. Underwhelming.
12 Reviews
"It was your special ability that drew their attention"
hwg1957-102-26570416 July 2020
Warning: Spoilers
Back to the Futile
NoDakTatum21 October 2023
A trio of time travelers land in the present and try to find out who they are, why they are here, and why is the host of "Reading Rainbow" after them? Paul (Daniel Baldwin), Jessica (Stacey Haiduk), and Carter (T. K. Carter) all land with skull caps that make Harvey Korman's fake chrome dome on "The Carol Burnett Show" look chillingly realistic. They eventually take manual labor jobs, and keep their special powers a secret. Paul is telekinetic, Jessica is psychic, and Carter can make fire without the use of flammable liquids. Paul is rescued from baddies by Aaron (Richard Herd), who runs an organization that helps children born with these powers. Aaron is aided by a psychic boy Roland (David Netter), who communicates telepathically. Paul rescues Jessica, and hints at a past future that neither one especially remembers. They also rescue Carter, and go on the run. LeVar Burton is Winstrom, who is very psychic. He also has some mean henchmen (Tom Poster, Trevor Goddard), and a mysterious boss Holden (Malcolm McDowell). They chase our heroic trio, and the heroic trio runs and hides, using their powers when needed, until the true reason they were sent back in time is discovered.
"Yesterday's Target" is yesterday's news. The film is too small to live up to its hopeful intentions. For a huge underground organization, Aaron seems to be running a very small psychiatric hospital with a handful of patients. The action scenes lumber along on their average special effects and small budget. The film tries to be a road movie, but it never gets far enough down that road. A switch to time travel thriller never works, as the climactic mission that the three are sent on is really not all that exciting. The semi-name cast is pretty good. Baldwin is an old hand at these B action movies, but Burton has been such a goody-goody staple on children's television, he can gather no menace to play the part of Winstrom, despite the despicable murders and whatnot. McDowell turns in his usual psycho performance, proving he will appear in anything for a buck. While Samson's direction is adequate, I got the feeling he was confined by his cable TV movie budget. A big screen action blowout run by Cronenberg or John Carpenter probably would have had the desired effect. There may have been more to Bourla's script, the film is a choppy eighty minutes long. "Yesterday's Target" seems half done, and never grabs the viewer like it should. It combines "X-Men," "The X Files," and "The Terminator," but seems satisfied to end on time and nothing more.
"Yesterday's Target" is yesterday's news. The film is too small to live up to its hopeful intentions. For a huge underground organization, Aaron seems to be running a very small psychiatric hospital with a handful of patients. The action scenes lumber along on their average special effects and small budget. The film tries to be a road movie, but it never gets far enough down that road. A switch to time travel thriller never works, as the climactic mission that the three are sent on is really not all that exciting. The semi-name cast is pretty good. Baldwin is an old hand at these B action movies, but Burton has been such a goody-goody staple on children's television, he can gather no menace to play the part of Winstrom, despite the despicable murders and whatnot. McDowell turns in his usual psycho performance, proving he will appear in anything for a buck. While Samson's direction is adequate, I got the feeling he was confined by his cable TV movie budget. A big screen action blowout run by Cronenberg or John Carpenter probably would have had the desired effect. There may have been more to Bourla's script, the film is a choppy eighty minutes long. "Yesterday's Target" seems half done, and never grabs the viewer like it should. It combines "X-Men," "The X Files," and "The Terminator," but seems satisfied to end on time and nothing more.
Yesterday's Target is pretty darn bad.
tarbosh2200012 December 2012
Warning: Spoilers
Paul Harper (Baldwin) has telekinesis. Jessica Harper (Haiduk) can see into the future. And Carter (Carter) has flame-throwing abilities. These three unlikely allies are on the run from Winstrom (Burton) and his boss Holden (McDowell). It seems Winstrom also has special powers and is after them. Also they can travel through time and are all in our present day. It's never made completely clear why any of this is happening. Who will become Yesterday's Target? If you look up the phrase "video store shelf-filler" in the dictionary, there just might be a picture of Yesterday's Target. Also you have a pretty awesome dictionary. It's an out-and-out sci-fi slog, but the filmmakers might have figured that if they get a good cast and make sure it's 79 minutes long, viewers could tolerate anything. Well, this movie proves them wrong. The short running time, which we normally approve of (usually for action movies) seems too truncated to support a science fiction film with some complex ideas. It's choppiness would indicate that there's plenty left on the cutting room floor.
As for the cast, clearly LeVar Burton was trying to shed his "Reading Rainbow" image by playing the baddie (not entirely convincingly) both here and in his episode of "Deadly Games" on TV at the time. He has an evil hat that makes him look like a sinister Herman Cain. Presumably that's all you can do to make LeVar look eVil. Malcolm McDowell does almost nothing, although in one scene there is a poster for A Clockwork Orange (1971). You can practically see director Barry Samson snickering to himself about how clever and "meta" he is. Actually, you can imagine him doing that throughout the course of this turkey. Daniel Baldwin puts forth a modicum of effort, as do Haiduk, Carter and Herd, but you can't really blame them for not bringing their A-game to this dud. Interestingly, Baldwin calls a character "Sparky". In Desert Thunder (1999) he calls someone "Slappy". Is Baldwin ad libbing this stuff? If so, are these the only ad libs he can come up with? Does he call people "Sparky" and "Slappy" in real life? What would you do if Daniel Baldwin called you one of these names? These are the true mysteries of Yesterday's Target.
Special mention should go to Trevor Goddard, who we are fans of. Even his screen presence can't save things. Yesterday's Target is the type of movie that would be played on the Sci-Fi channel before they became "SyFy" and got into the whole phase of movies about dinosharks, dinocrocs, sharktopuses, sharktopiranhas, giraffehippobirds, slothtoadchickens or whatever else these geniuses deem as top-shelf Science Fiction. Asimov, Heinlein and Clarke would surely be proud. But as far as Y'sT, at least there's no CGI to screw things up even further. Adding to the annoyance is that all the characters are continually arguing, and there's little-to-no character development, so you really don't care about their plight.
Yesterday's Target is pretty darn bad. Despite the cast, you'll want to avoid this one.
As for the cast, clearly LeVar Burton was trying to shed his "Reading Rainbow" image by playing the baddie (not entirely convincingly) both here and in his episode of "Deadly Games" on TV at the time. He has an evil hat that makes him look like a sinister Herman Cain. Presumably that's all you can do to make LeVar look eVil. Malcolm McDowell does almost nothing, although in one scene there is a poster for A Clockwork Orange (1971). You can practically see director Barry Samson snickering to himself about how clever and "meta" he is. Actually, you can imagine him doing that throughout the course of this turkey. Daniel Baldwin puts forth a modicum of effort, as do Haiduk, Carter and Herd, but you can't really blame them for not bringing their A-game to this dud. Interestingly, Baldwin calls a character "Sparky". In Desert Thunder (1999) he calls someone "Slappy". Is Baldwin ad libbing this stuff? If so, are these the only ad libs he can come up with? Does he call people "Sparky" and "Slappy" in real life? What would you do if Daniel Baldwin called you one of these names? These are the true mysteries of Yesterday's Target.
Special mention should go to Trevor Goddard, who we are fans of. Even his screen presence can't save things. Yesterday's Target is the type of movie that would be played on the Sci-Fi channel before they became "SyFy" and got into the whole phase of movies about dinosharks, dinocrocs, sharktopuses, sharktopiranhas, giraffehippobirds, slothtoadchickens or whatever else these geniuses deem as top-shelf Science Fiction. Asimov, Heinlein and Clarke would surely be proud. But as far as Y'sT, at least there's no CGI to screw things up even further. Adding to the annoyance is that all the characters are continually arguing, and there's little-to-no character development, so you really don't care about their plight.
Yesterday's Target is pretty darn bad. Despite the cast, you'll want to avoid this one.
Time travelers attempt to change their bleak future in our time.
shroom14 September 1998
In this unwatchable "story" of four time travelers who come to our time from what appears to be a post apocalyptic future, Daniel Baldwin, in a performance where he is mostly catatonic, attempts to rally his three compatriots to stop the evil doings of Malcolm McDowell. It seems there was more to the story at some point in the making of it, but what would amount to the "good parts" seem to have ended up on the cutting room floor.
Yesterday's Target (1996)
fntstcplnt23 August 2019
Directed by Barry Samson. Starring Daniel Baldwin, Stacy Haiduk, T.K. Carter, LeVar Burton, Malcolm McDowell, Richard Herd, Page Mosley, David Netter, Trevor Goddard, Tom Poster. (R)
Time travelers with superpowers are hunted by the host of "Reading Rainbow" in this D-grade sci-fi thriller. Baldwin (who couldn't look more like his "30 Rock"-era brother, Alec, even with an assist from deepfake tech) mumbles and mutters his way through the film without a lick of charisma or earnestness; as for Burton, he trades in Geordi's visor for a cowboy hat and looks exactly as threatening with it on as you'd expect. The story tries for twists and turns by presenting the action in a non-linear fashion, but it just makes a muddle of all the goings-on; not even McDowell's hammy villain (which he can do in his sleep) can liven things up. What little action can be found is generic and poorly directed/edited. There are the kernels for a decent genre potboiler here, but don't waste your time scouring this wasteland of entertainment to find them.
17/100
Time travelers with superpowers are hunted by the host of "Reading Rainbow" in this D-grade sci-fi thriller. Baldwin (who couldn't look more like his "30 Rock"-era brother, Alec, even with an assist from deepfake tech) mumbles and mutters his way through the film without a lick of charisma or earnestness; as for Burton, he trades in Geordi's visor for a cowboy hat and looks exactly as threatening with it on as you'd expect. The story tries for twists and turns by presenting the action in a non-linear fashion, but it just makes a muddle of all the goings-on; not even McDowell's hammy villain (which he can do in his sleep) can liven things up. What little action can be found is generic and poorly directed/edited. There are the kernels for a decent genre potboiler here, but don't waste your time scouring this wasteland of entertainment to find them.
17/100
Dreadful
Leofwine_draca3 July 2018
Warning: Spoilers
YESTERDAY'S TARGET is a rubbishly little television movie detailing a plot involving time travel. The whole thing has a cheap and grainy look which has to be seen to be believed; I found the whole thing quite unwatchable. Poor old Daniel Baldwin stars and makes no impression with his acting whatsoever, while a miscast LeVar Burton hams it up a lot as the villain of the piece. The story is mindless and stupid, and the action scenes laughable.
I never knew Levar Burton was such a bad actor!
anonreviewer3 August 2004
The main problem with this movie is that most of the actors are out of their league with this kind of genre.
I had not really seen Levar Burton in much else, but he really does NOT have much of a handle on playing the heavy/the villain. Cuz he really stinks up the joint here.
The chick (stacy haiduk) is not too good either.
And the guy who played a role in Seinfeld had best stick to comedy.
Baldwin is not that great, either, although he does a better job than anyone else but Carter, who acts serviceably.
The two "agents" are pretty bad, too!
So basically this movie does not have much in the way of acting.
However it has nice production values and a nice stylish look to it.
And the script is not that bad; not great, but not bad.
Not a bad movie to watch if you have some time to waste, but nothing sepecial.
I had not really seen Levar Burton in much else, but he really does NOT have much of a handle on playing the heavy/the villain. Cuz he really stinks up the joint here.
The chick (stacy haiduk) is not too good either.
And the guy who played a role in Seinfeld had best stick to comedy.
Baldwin is not that great, either, although he does a better job than anyone else but Carter, who acts serviceably.
The two "agents" are pretty bad, too!
So basically this movie does not have much in the way of acting.
However it has nice production values and a nice stylish look to it.
And the script is not that bad; not great, but not bad.
Not a bad movie to watch if you have some time to waste, but nothing sepecial.
Came Back From the Future To Retroactively Steal From Umbrella Academy
scythertitus22 July 2022
It's about a time travelling group of children with powers who grew up together but it's also very angsty. There are lots of similarities plot-wise to suspect that Gerard Way saw this and was like "What if this, but good?" before throwing in some X-Men and Doom Patrol along with it for good measure.
You could argue this is a 90s attempt at something like a Doom Patrol, although it is plainly awful. The effects, action and acting are all terrible and there is almost no story when you break it down. Some films are ahead of their time, and some really should not have been made until later, and this is the latter. I'm not saying it would work all that much better, but with a different script, actors, and effects it might have been alright.
Overall you should almost certainly should avoid this. There are a couple of funnily bad moments, but most of it is just dull.
You could argue this is a 90s attempt at something like a Doom Patrol, although it is plainly awful. The effects, action and acting are all terrible and there is almost no story when you break it down. Some films are ahead of their time, and some really should not have been made until later, and this is the latter. I'm not saying it would work all that much better, but with a different script, actors, and effects it might have been alright.
Overall you should almost certainly should avoid this. There are a couple of funnily bad moments, but most of it is just dull.
Just so dull.
amoskarl26 July 2022
It's as if Terminator and X-men had an unholy baby!
Aaron137518 January 2022
This film was obviously doing an X-men thing without having to buy the rights to the famous superhero team. They just threw the time traveling stuff as a bonus. What we get could have worked, but they apparently did not work with the script much as it sort of never really goes anywhere or explains anything. Maybe this thing was supposed to be a pilot for a television show, but it literally tells the viewers as little as possible on its way to its tepid conclusion.
The story, we see some stuff and then a man and a woman walking about and not looking too good. Three years later, Urkel named Roland here draws bad pictures that another man somehow is able to figure out who they are. He contacts a man who exhibits telekinetic powers. Then he finds a woman with the ability to see ever so briefly into the future and then a guy with pyro-kinetic powers. And thus the Y-men are born to combat all those who would deny the next step in human evolution, or something, it really makes no sense as there are two organizations and by the end of the movie I still didn't know what either ones purpose was...
We get a pretty strange cast as Levar Burton is the bad guy, doesn't really work. Malcolm McDowell as a sort of bad guy and Daniel Baldwin as a rather unlikable hero...well that is not fair, not too many likable characters in this film at all and that is probably more due to the crummy script which seemed like they wanted to do something cool, but could not figure how to bring it all home.
So, totally not a good movie as it seems like it wanted to be more, but failed to do so. Not sure if they planned for this to be a series as so many things are left vague, but then again the film ends with everything sort of being done. I just think they were trying to do an X-men film as they have so many elements one finds in their comics, but they were doing it on the cheap.
The story, we see some stuff and then a man and a woman walking about and not looking too good. Three years later, Urkel named Roland here draws bad pictures that another man somehow is able to figure out who they are. He contacts a man who exhibits telekinetic powers. Then he finds a woman with the ability to see ever so briefly into the future and then a guy with pyro-kinetic powers. And thus the Y-men are born to combat all those who would deny the next step in human evolution, or something, it really makes no sense as there are two organizations and by the end of the movie I still didn't know what either ones purpose was...
We get a pretty strange cast as Levar Burton is the bad guy, doesn't really work. Malcolm McDowell as a sort of bad guy and Daniel Baldwin as a rather unlikable hero...well that is not fair, not too many likable characters in this film at all and that is probably more due to the crummy script which seemed like they wanted to do something cool, but could not figure how to bring it all home.
So, totally not a good movie as it seems like it wanted to be more, but failed to do so. Not sure if they planned for this to be a series as so many things are left vague, but then again the film ends with everything sort of being done. I just think they were trying to do an X-men film as they have so many elements one finds in their comics, but they were doing it on the cheap.
Only for the fans of 1994-2001 " new cable sci-fi TV era"
SaintNinja12 August 2023
I always try to find something positive in anything, and here are my thoughts. The movie is weak, but It was pretty well shot for TV (straight to VHS). It could be good series. I disagree with people about cast: all actors are watchable pros. But I disagree even more about X-Men parallels. Old school sci-fi played with these themes many years before Terminator and X-Men. Read some "The Weapon Shops of Isher" by A. E. van Vogt (1951) or early novels by Frederik Pohl. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't recommend this movie to mainstream watchers. But if you have soft spot for TV/VHS low budget sci-fi from 1994-2001, it can be worth checking. It's too short by the way. I give 10/10 for the atmosphere of the dark late 90s.
Not bad
liammurphy16 June 2003
This film had great possibilities had it had a bigger budget, better acting and realised Daniel Baldwin is by far the worst actor among his brothers as he makes a pretty poor hero and sleepwalks through his role. Malcolm Mcdowell as his usual hammy villain,is poorly underused with about 3 lines throughtout the movie. the guy from star trek should definatley stick to Star trek
Don't be mislead by the hilarious quote on the box
'anyone waiting for terminator 3 should look no further''
could have been great but as it is most people will have seen this kind of thing made better in the past
6/10
Don't be mislead by the hilarious quote on the box
'anyone waiting for terminator 3 should look no further''
could have been great but as it is most people will have seen this kind of thing made better in the past
6/10
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