David Rhodes is a college history professor, who is obsessed with the death of his older brother Chris in Vietnam in 1966. When his girlfriend Laura interviews eccentric physics professor Dr. Koopman about his revolutionary time travel theories, David finds that the Professor has perfected time travel and sees a way to save his brother; by preventing the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy on the basis Kennedy will pull troops out of Vietnam.[1][2]
David materialises on the roof of the Texas School Book Depository on the day of the assassination but fails to stop Lee Harvey Oswald killing Kennedy and is framed by Oswald. Charged with murder, he is unable to provide satisfied explanations to authorities, especially when he lets slip knowledge of Oswald’s life. Jack Ruby, who originally shot Oswald, kills David. Seeing this reported in old newspapers, Laura goes back to the day before the assassination, but is hit by a car and spends a day at Parkland Memorial Hospital. Recovering and fleeing the hospital, she too fails to prevent the assassination but saves David from capture. David learns his younger self has gone into a coma due to his mind being in two places at once. They contact 1963’s Koopman and convince him they are from the future before they are arrested. Armed with their knowledge, Koopman warns the new President Lyndon B. Johnson about the Vietnam War; this only makes Johnson commit to a more brutal version of the war.
Present-day Koopman goes back to intercept David and Laura, and successfully convinces them not to interfere with history. However, David makes a brief visit to his brother, who promises he look after his ill brother. After the trio return to the present, David proposes to Laura, before they find the talk with his brother convinced him not to enlist and that he is alive.
↑Green, Bruce Seth (November 21, 1990), Running Against Time (Sci-Fi), Robert Hays, Catherine Hicks, Sam Wanamaker, Wayne Tippit, Coastline Partners, Finnegan/Pinchuk Productions, MCA Television Entertainment (MTE), retrieved January 25, 2021
