10 Funniest Time Travel Movies, Ranked

There are some more serious-minded sci-fi movies that explore time travel, sure, like The Terminator films, Looper, and Primer. But time travel is also a somewhat ridiculous and probably even impossible concept in so many ways, and that makes it something filmmakers are more than happy to have some fun with. Enter the more light-hearted time travel movies; those that also function as comedies.

Below are some notable ones, ranked roughly in terms of how funny they are. A couple have some more dramatic moments, but all generally function as comedy films alongside being time travel stories. Also, this will mostly focus on time travel films over time loop movies, so that disqualifies a couple of notable movies that are more about being stuck in time repeating rather than traveling through (sorry, Groundhog Day and Palm Springs).

10 ‘Back to the Future Part III’ (1990)

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Even if the first two movies are better, Back to the Future Part III still ends up being a solid conclusion to the Back to the Future trilogy, and does have an admittedly creative premise. After the first movie went back to the past, and the second spent time in the past and the future, Back to the Future III opts to go way back into the past; about a century, rather than a few decades.

As such, it ends up being a Western, raising the stakes surrounding getting back to the future because it’s so far back, and because Doc Brown finds love in the past. It’s a good thing the saga ended up concluding here, because there probably would’ve been further diminishing returns if there had been a fourth part. As it stands, Back to the Future feels pretty good – and certainly complete – as a trilogy.

9 ‘Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure’ (1989)

Director: Stephen Herek

There’s a charmingly silly set-up for Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, but the execution and overall endearing quality of the film ensures it works. Principally, it follows two high school slackers – the titular Bill and Ted – as they utilize a time machine for the purposes of not failing their history class, what with the unprecedented ability to actually go back and see the parts of history they need to be knowledgeable about.

Anyone wanting a “realistic” take on time travel won’t get it here, but those after a movie following two lovable doofuses fooling around with time travel will find that in spades within Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. It’s also a valuable film for the fact that it helped make Keanu Reeves a star, even if it’s quite at odds with the sorts of action-focused movies he’d later become well-known for starring in.

8 ‘Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me’ (1999)

Director: Jay Roach

The first Austin Powers movie, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, was about a man out of time, but not necessarily a time travel movie in the traditional sense. The titular Austin Powers was cryogenically frozen in the late 1960s and unfrozen in a largely changed world 30 years later. The sequel, The Spy Who Shagged Me, escalates things by incorporating actual time travel.

Austin Powers and his nemesis, Dr. Evil, go back to the 1960s, with this setting allowing the series to even more explicitly parody the sorts of old-school James Bond movies that were being made around that time in history. It’s a solid sequel, though perhaps not quite as great as the original (at least both are better than Goldmember, which has its moments, but not as many).

7 ‘About Time’ (2013)

Director: Richard Curtis

Alongside all these other comedic time travel movies, About Time sticks out on account of it being a little more serious overall. It’s still generally funny for the most part, functioning as a romantic comedy with time travel elements, though there are consequences of time travel explored throughout. In other words, it’s about the ups and downs of something that people probably won’t ever be able to do for real, and how it would impact real-life relationships.

It’s not perfectly done, but About Time is an admirably ambitious blending of various genres, and it jumps around between feeling funny, heartwarming, and tear-jerking. It’s hard to call any time travel movie realistic, necessarily, but About Time might well feel the most grounded, and the stakes are a good deal more personal and contained compared to other more action-focused or explosive time travel romps.

6 ‘Time Bandits’ (1981)

Director: Terry Gilliam

Terry Gilliam has always had a singular style, making movies on his own terms for better or worse, though Time Bandits might well be one of his most approachable and broadly appealing movies, if not his most. It’s family-friendly though not exclusively a kid’s movie, focusing on a young boy who goes on a journey through history with a group of time-traveling dwarfs.

It’s all a bit outlandish-sounding on paper, but the execution of Time Bandits is genuinely charming and undoubtedly creative. Gilliam’s firing on all cylinders and making something that’s comedic, sci-fi-related, fantastical, and a little fairytale-esque, all at once. It’s the sort of old-fashioned movie that feels of its time, but also a little out of time (funnily enough), existing entirely on its own and having an undeniably unique tone throughout.

5 ‘Back to the Future Part II’ (1989)

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Though it doesn’t quite equal the first movie, Back to the Future Part II is an overall very good sequel, and a clever blend of recycling things that worked the first time around while pushing things forward narratively in other ways. Yes, 1955 is traveled to in both movies, but Back to the Future Part II also memorably goes forward in time to 2015… which is now in the past, technically, but such is life/time.

Rather than feeling like Back to the Future Part II, you could almost call this film Back to the Future Squared (to the power of two). It multiplies things to dizzying effect and feels even more high stakes, not to mention a tiny bit darker… not enough to feel overly grim or serious, sure, but it is a film that takes a few risks while also delivering a premise that feels in line, to some extent, with the original.

4 ‘Summer Time Machine Blues’ (2005)

Director: Katsuyuki Motohiro

An underappreciated time travel movie, and perhaps one of the most overall underrated international sci-fi movies ever made, Summer Time Machine Blues deserves a bigger fanbase than it’s seemingly built up to date. It’s a small-scale time travel movie in the best of ways, with a series of chaotic events unfolding because a group of students use a time machine to fix their air conditioner’s broken remote.

It’s a film about capturing the heat, occasional boredom, and endless wonder of summer when you’re young, playing out in a way that’s oddly relatable and tangible, as far as time travel movies go. It’s simple and a little silly at times, sure, but it all feels very intentional. Summer Time Machine Blues is just an overall good time, and a potential cult classic patiently awaiting true cult classic status.

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3 ‘Army of Darkness’ (1992)

Director: Sam Raimi

Perhaps it’s a tiny bit of a stretch to call Army of Darkness a time travel movie, but the entire wild plot of the film only happens because Ash Williams finds himself whisked back hundreds of years in the past at the end of Evil Dead 2. That film was already pretty comedic, but Army of Darkness goes even further into slapstick territory, being more of an action/comedy film than a horror movie.

It’s not particularly scary, and outside the time travel, it’s also not really a science fiction movie. But what Army of Darkness does succeed in being is hilarious, over-the-top, and consistently entertaining. It’s a glorious and strange conclusion to the original Evil Dead trilogy, and it’s also impossible to overstate how much fun it is as its own distinctive film.

2 ‘Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes’ (2020)

Director: Junta Yamaguchi

Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes is a film with an innovative approach to the topic of time travel, not being easily definable as a time travel movie in the traditional sense, but also feeling distinctive from the kind of time loop comedy perfected by Groundhog Day. It’s a movie about a screen that lets people see two minutes into the future, and what happens when a group of people slowly realize the potential things such a device can allow.

The fun of Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes is seeing things escalate and get more mind-bending, so it’s best not to spoil too much beyond the set-up. It’s also a movie that’s ambitiously filmed, done in a way that makes the whole film look like it was shot in one take. It’s also shot in real-time… sort of. Again, the playing around with time travel complicates things, but in a fun way. It’s a charming movie with a playful sense of humor throughout, and perhaps even a modern low-budget classic.

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1 ‘Back to the Future’ (1985)

Director: Robert Zemeckis

To the surprise of no one (especially considering the sequels have already been mentioned, and referred to as debatably inferior), Back to the Future can be crowned the best comedic time travel movie ever made. It’s the one to which all other funny movies about traveling through time are compared, and it’s just so efficiently written, directed, and acted throughout, feeling largely perfect.

It revolves around one young man being sent back 30 years, and having to tread carefully so as to not alter history too much, or else he runs the risk of never being born and ceasing to exist. Back to the Future is a nearly impossible-to-dislike film, and it’s endured in a way that makes the sheer idea of it ever being remade sound preposterous. It’s a classic, it’s a clever sci-fi film, it’s an entertaining comedy… it just works super well, but you probably knew that already.

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