Predestination is one of the best examples of the time traveling film genre.
The film focuses on one individual who is transformed from Jane, to John, to the Barkeep
to the Fizzle Bomber at different stages of his or her life.
The story explores the paradoxes that originate from time travel and the central theme of
the movie is that everything is predestined.
In this video I’ll be analysing the more intriguing aspects of the film and I’ll
also be laying out the timeline of the movie in as linear a fashion as possible.
In the film time travel was been invented in 1981 and people can on go back and forth
54 years from that year.
Time traveling agents are recruited by the Temporal Bureau, an agency run by a mysterious
Mr Robertson, who is also a time traveller.
The aim of the Bureau seems to be going back in time to prevent future crimes.
The Bureau has strict rules for their agents regarding how many jumps they are allowed to make
and which jumps are authorised and which jumps aren’t.
The reason for these restrictions is because of the effects of time travel which include
the onset of psychosis.
Every time an agent makes a jump he leaves some matter in the time
period he has jumped to and from. This continued deposition of matter leads to permanent damage
to the agent’s mind.
The four main characters in this movie are all the same person from different times and
they all have different agendas.
Jane wants to find purpose and meaning. She attempts to join Space Corp - an organisation
dedicated to space travel and exploration. She is looking to be hired as a romantic and
sexual companion for the men of Space Corp but she fails to make it into the organisation
when when it is discovered that she has two sets of reproductive organs.
John is a lost soul, left depressed after the loss of both the love of his life and
also his daughter.
After John’s meeting with the Barkeep he becomes a temporal agent and this
transforms his life and gives him the purpose and meaning he’s been looking for.
The Barkeep’s mission is to create his own existence. He needs to go back in time and
ensure that John meets Jane, and that the resulting baby Jane from their union is transported
back in time so that she can become adult Jane.
The Barkeep is also preoccupied with trying to locate the Fizzle bomber, a terrorist who
has been detonating bombs across many years, killing thousands of innocent people.
In 1975 the Fizzle bomber causes extreme devastation as one of his bombs killed over 10,000 people
in New York City and the Barkeep is driven to try to prevent this bombing.
The Fizzle bomber who used to be Jane, John and the Barkeep has been driven mad from the
effects of time travel. With his bombings he is attempting to play God and is trying
to minimise the loss of life in the long run.
He believes that the bombings prevent future incidents which would result in more loss
of life and justifies his actions to be for the greater good.
1945 - Baby Jane is left at the orphanage.
1963 - Jane meets and falls in love with John.
After their whirlwind romance John inexplicably leaves Jane and she is heartbroken.She also
discovers that she’s pregnant, scuppering any chance of being part of Space Corp.
1964 - Jane is told that she was born with both male and female reproductive organs.
During the trauma of her giving birth Jane’s female sex organs were damaged and as a result
the Drs advise her to undergo full gender reassignment and begin living as a man.
At this time her baby, who she has also decided to name Jane, after herself is mysteriously
snatched leaving adult Jane distraught.
1970 - Jane is now John and he meets the Barkeep.
The two engage in a conversation and John tells the Barkeep the story of his life. At the
end of his tale the Barkeep offers to put John’s ex lover before him in order for
John to kill him. John is bitter about his ex lover’s desertion and blames him for
the ruination of his life. This is when the Barkeep introduces John to time travel and
the two go back to 1963.
In 1963 John realises that it was he himself
that Jane feel in love with and despite knowing the outcome of their ill-fated romance he
falls in love with her all over again. The Barkeep leaves Jane and John and makes an
illegal jump forward to 1970.
In 1970 the Barkeep tries to prevent
the Fizzle bomber once again and the two end up in a tussle and the Barkeep is knocked
out. Once he comes to, he encounters someone who in an attempt to contain the Fizzle bomber’s
bomb is now on fire. The Barkeep recognises that this is John and he pushes John’s time
traveling field kit toward him - a violin case. John then transports himself to 1992,
presumably the year he came from. The Barkeep realises that he has failed to prevent the
Fizzle bomber and he ruminates on the thought that everything is predestined. He then jumps
back to 1964.
In 1964 it is revealed that it is the Barkeep
who snatches baby Jane. Before he kidnaps her from the hospital he has a conversation
with Mr Robertson. The Barkeep regrets the future pain he will be causing Jane by his
actions. Mr Robertson tells him that that’s the way it has to be. Jane, John, Baby Jane,
the Barkeep all exist within a predestination paradoxical loop. They are free from ancestry
and history which makes them the perfect temporal agent. Reassured, the Barkeep goes ahead with
the snatching and jumps back to 1945.
In 1945 the Barkeep leaves baby Jane at the
orphanage and time travels back to 1963 where he left John and Jane to fall in love.
In 1963 the Barkeep then convinces John to leave Jane and become a temporal agent. The two then
jump forward to 1985. In 1985 John becomes a temporal agent and
the Barkeep jumps back to back in time to to retire. Before he leaves Mr Robertson gives
him a folder with more leads on the Fizzle bomber. Before we too jump back with the Barkeep,
we’ll stay a little longer with John who goes about his missions as a temporal agent,
helped along by voice notes created by his future self.
1992 - One such mission involves preventing the Fizzle bomber’s 1970 bomb from going
off and John travel’s back to that year. When John is attempting to contain one of
the Fizzle bomber’s bombs he encounters the Fizzle bomber himself. The pair are involved
in a shootout which costs John precious moments in trying to contain the bomb.
This results in the bomb exploding and John catches on fire.
A figure emerges from the shadows and hands John his violin case, allowing him to transport
himself into the future - more specifically 1992.
There John undergoes extensive facial reconstructive surgery to become the Barkeep who is aware
of all that has gone on before regarding Jane and John’s relationship and how John’s face
came to be burned.
The Barkeep starts creating voice notes to help John on his missions when he becomes
a temporal agent in 1985.
The Barkeep is given his final mission - to unite Jane and John and once he is successful
he will be retired, i.e. decommissioned.
He goes back to 1970 in order to have his fateful conversation with John and then goes
through all the motions to bring John to 1985 to embark on his career as a temporal agent.
Once the Barkeep is in 1985 he believes it’s his time to retire and he jumps back to 1970
to collect a bottle of whisky which he used in a bet during his conversation with Jon.
Then he jumps forward to 1975 where he plans to retire.
In 1975 The Barkeep attempts to decommission his field kit but it doesn’t work and instead
continues to allow him to jump back and forth in time if he so wishes.
The Barkeep then finds clues in the folder that Mr Robertson gave him which leads him
to locate the Fizzle bomber and once he meets the Fizzle bomber that he realises that it
is he himself who becomes the Fizzle bomber.
Distressed by the realisation the Barkeep shoots the Fizzle bomber dead vowing never
to become him.
But as the film ends it’s implied that the Barkeep continues to time travel which leads
him to become psychotic and adopt the philosophy of the Fizzle bomber, thus ultimately becoming
the Fizzle bomber.
Now that we have worked through the timeline let’s revisit the first scene in the film
and review who the 3 characters are, which version of Jane are they and what time period
do they come from?
John, who has become a temporal agent has jumped back from somewhere after 1985 onwards
- presumably 1992 as that’s where he jumps back to after his face is burned.
The Barkeep has jumped to the scene from 1963 after uniting John and Jane.
Even though the Barkeep is aware of what happens to John with his burned face, having lived
it all before and having gone through a facial reconstruction.
He presumably makes the illegal jump to try and break the cycle and kill the Fizzle bomber
before he can get to John.
But as we have seen, the Barkeep fails in his attempt and as everything is predestined.
John is meant to be burned and then to become the Barkeep.
The Fizzle Bomber in the scene is there from any time period after 1975 onwards when the
Barkeep starts jumping back and forth using his field kit that didn’t decommission,
This jumping back and forth is what leads to the Barkeep’s psychosis
and ultimate transformation into the Fizzle bomber.
Mr Robertson’s motivations for handing the Barkeep the folder that leads him to the Fizzle
bomber becomes clearer when his conversations with the Barkeep is examined more closely.
He mentions that the Fizzle bomber’s existence helped the growth of the Temporal Bureau.
Mr Robertson needs the Fizzle bomber to exist
and he needs the Barkeep to become the Fizzle bomber.
He tells the Barkeep that his field kit will decommission when the Barkeep reaches his
final destination.
The fact that the field kit doesn’t decommission in 1975 means that the Barkeep has not yet
reached his final destination which is to become the Fizzle bomber.
In fact Mr Robertson lays the seeds for the Barkeep continuing to make illegal jumps all
the way back in 1964 when they meet just before the Barkeep snatches Baby Jane.
Mr Robertson hints how he feels that rogue agents working outside the parameters of the Bureau rules
could achieve so much more.
In the film 11 agents are mentioned but we never see them and as there are two time traveling
temporal agent versions of original Jane at the same time - i.e. John and the Barkeep
- it’s interesting to contemplate whether these other agents are also other agent versions
of Jane in the film, stuck in other paradoxical time loops or whether the other agents are
seperate people, having their own misadventures in their own paradoxical time loops.
So the question is are the other agents all Jane or are there others like Jane?
And leaving you with that thought I conclude my explanation and analysis of Predestination.
As always I hope you enjoyed this video and remember to subscribe to LondonCityGirl for
more film analysis videos in the future.