After the kids went to bed, I tripped through some not-the-usual streaming offerings, and happened upon a mock documentary (and about) The History of Time Travel on Amazon Prime.

So the mock documentary isn't so not-usual for me. I like real documentaries, as well as some of the mock-umentaries, as long as they're done well. Usually the subject is less important than the delivery. For example, I've enjoyed and recommended (even before now) an interesting history of the toilet. Some of my favorites in school were those that linked wheat to the invention of the fork and nuclear submarine. There are a few good chain-of-invention series on Netflix, but it none as clever as that early film series from the 1970s. At least not that match the fond memories I have of that.

This one was clearly a mock documentary, because time travel isn't real, as far as we know. At least time travel into the past isn't real. I travel in time every day, but usually "forward at regular speed" (thanks for that, Dimitri Martin). I say usually, because I do have two machines that seem to accelerate time. I can sit in front of screens, like phone or tablet or television, and time will seem to have zipped by faster than I noticed. I also find that if I sleep well, I won't have experienced any change in time, but an entire night will have disappeared while I lay in my bed.

But this show, The History of Time Travel, sets out to deliver the tale of the first time machine, its inventor, and the things you can imagine around its invention and early use. It doesn't star anyone I'd seen in anything else, which added a little to its credibility as an apparent documentary. And, not unlike some other documentaries, there was a little roughness around the characters, some seeming newness or discomfort to being in front of a camera or presenting the story, that also led some credibility.

A handful of experts in the fields, physics, history, and fans of the inventor, start telling the tale about this grand attempt to invent a time machine. An attempt that really had people believing. There were solid physics, and investment in time and experiment, passion and intent, and broad acceptance by government, military, and peer scientists.

Alas, it wasn't to be. Until it was.

Cleverly, as the documentary shifted between the characters telling their stories and the reenactments, the story changed. Cleverly and subtly, at first. Shifts in clothes and background, and appearance or demeanor of the character. And then phrasing that shifted from how close to how it happened. At one point, clearly sharing how the machine was repeatedly used by the different events the characters were telling, about the death of the mother. She died so many times.

Until you get clues like these, I wouldn't say it was predictable, but as the film started, and as I watched it, I thought "if they stick to the documentary format, it'd be clever to see the story change because the time travel worked." Of course, that's how it was done. The way they did it, and the story it tells, even knowing the mother dies repeatedly, isn't spoiled by this advance warning. Really, what other mechanism would a mock documentary have to share time travel? A fall-flat "time travel works" introduction into a movie-long flashback would be one. Surely, there are lots of other ways to make time travel movies, but how many stick to the form of the documentary?

Whether learning about toilets, or fake time travel history. Documentaries can be entertaining and informative. While there's some amateur edge to this one, it works. It may be intentional, even, as it lends itself to the ways the scenes and characters change, to bring that legitimacy to the story.