A Glean movie guide
Mind-Bending Time Travel Thrillers
Don't blink.
Narrative puzzles and temporal paradoxes that will leave you questioning reality.
Handpicked for this guide
The movie list
- 01
Primer
A notoriously complex puzzle of causal loops that demands multiple viewings to fully untangle.
A group of fledgling inventors discover a complex method to manipulate reality. At first, they successfully game the stock market with it, but the consequences of the invention start to catch up with them.
- 02
Predestination
A masterclass in narrative structure featuring a series of shocking, interconnected identity reveals.
Predestination chronicles the life of a Temporal Agent sent on an intricate series of time-travel journeys designed to prevent future killers from committing their crimes. Now, on his final assignment, the Agent must stop the one criminal that has eluded him throughout time and prevent a devastating attack in which thousands of lives will be lost.
- 03
Timecrimes (Los Cronocrímenes)
A tightly wound thriller where a man becomes the architect of his own temporal nightmare.
A man accidentally gets into a time machine and travels back in time nearly an hour. Finding himself will be the first of a series of disasters of unforeseeable consequences.
- 04
Triangle
A recursive nightmare on the high seas that redefines its protagonist with every loop.
When Jess sets sail on a yacht with a group of friends, she cannot shake the feeling that there is something wrong.
- 05
12 Monkeys
A gritty, atmospheric mystery where the past and future are locked in a tragic, circular embrace.
In the year 2035, convict James Cole reluctantly volunteers to be sent back in time to discover the origin of a deadly virus that wiped out nearly all of the earth's population and forced the survivors into underground communities. But when Cole is mistakenly sent to 1990 instead of 1996, he's arrested and locked up in a mental hospital. There he meets psychiatrist Dr. Kathryn Railly and the son of a famous virus expert who may hold the key to the Army of the 12 Monkeys; thought to be responsible for unleashing the killer disease.
- 06
Arrival
A cerebral masterpiece that uses alien linguistics to deliver a profound, perspective-shifting twist.
Taking place after alien crafts land around the world, an expert linguist is recruited by the military to determine whether they come in peace or are a threat.
- 07
The Call
A ruthless South Korean thriller where a phone call across time triggers a deadly game of cat and mouse.
In the fall of 1987, a group of small-town friends must survive the night in the home of a sinister couple after a tragic accident occurs. Needing only to make a single phone call, the request seems horribly ordinary until they realize that this call could change their life…or end it.
- 08
Tenet
An ambitious espionage epic built around the mind-melting concept of inverted entropy.
Armed with only one word - Tenet - and fighting for the survival of the entire world, the Protagonist journeys through a twilight world of international espionage on a mission that will unfold in something beyond real time.
- 09
Mirage (Durante la tormenta)
A complex web of alternate realities where one small change erases a mother's entire life.
During a mysterious thunderstorm, Vera, a young mother, manages to save a life in danger, but her good deed causes a disturbing chain of unexpected consequences.
- 10
Looper
A stylish noir where an assassin must outsmart his future self in a world of fixed timelines.
In the year 2044, time travel has not yet been invented but in 30 years it will have been. When the mob wants to get rid of someone, they will send their target into the past where a looper, a hired gun, like Joe is waiting to mop up. Joe is getting rich and life is good until the day the mob decides to close the loop, sending back Joe's future self for assassination.
- 11
Source Code
A high-tension race against time that uses an iterative loop to uncover a hidden conspiracy.
When decorated soldier Captain Colter Stevens wakes up in the body of an unknown man, he discovers he's part of a mission to find the bomber of a Chicago commuter train.
- 12
Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes
A charmingly inventive one-take film that finds infinite complexity in a two-minute delay.
A cafe owner discovers that the TV in his cafe suddenly shows images from the future, but only two minutes into the future.