Time Signatures

Time Walker (a.k.a. Being from Another Planet) is a 1982 B-movie. It was directed by Tom Kennedy. This movie (under the title Being from Another Planet) was featured in Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode 405, which first aired on July 4, 1992.

Plot
While Douglas McCadden (Ben Murphy), a California university professor, explores the tomb of the ancient Egyptian king Tutankhamun, a sudden earthquake causes a wall in the tomb to collapse, revealing a hidden chamber. In this chamber, McCadden finds a mummy in a stone sarcophagus. Unbeknownst to McCadden, the newly discovered “mummy” is not the body of a dead ancient Egyptian. Rather, it is an extraterrestrial alien in a state of suspended animation, which had been wrapped up and buried alive thousands of years before. The alien is also covered with a dormant, once-toxic, green fungus.

The body is brought back to the university, and McCadden has it examined by Dr. Ken Melrose (Austin Stoker) and X-rayed by student Peter Sharpe (Kevin Brophy) prior to a press conference about the discovery. While reviewing his X-rays of the body, Sharpe discovers that there are five crystals situated near the “mummy’s” head. Sharpe then steals the crystals, makes another set of X-rays to cover his theft, and sells four of the crystals to students who are unaware of their origin. The second X-ray session gives the body an excessive dose of radiation, which not only re-activates the corrosive, flesh-eating properties of the fungus, but also causes the alien to awaken from its state of suspended animation and arise from its sarcophagus.

At the press conference the following day, one of McCadden’s students touches a patch of fungus on the sarcophagus and one of his fingers is destroyed. Then, the sarcophagus is opened to reveal that the mummy is gone. Melrose and his colleague Dr. Hayworth (Antoinette Bower) attempt to identify the fungus and impede its growth.

At first, everyone assumes that the disappearance of the mummy is the result of a fraternity prank. However, Wendell J. Rossmore (James Karen), the president of the university, wants to pin the “theft” on McCadden, so that he can give the directorship of McCadden’s Egyptian expedition to Rossmore’s flunkie Bruce Serrano (Sam Chew Jr.).

Meanwhile, the “mummy” tracks down the students who possess the stolen crystals, because the crystals are actually crucial components of an intergalactic transportation device that will allow the alien to return to its home planet. The alien violently reclaims its crystals, and, when he brutally attacks a female student, Lt. Plummer (Darwin Joston) is called in to investigate the crime. As more students turn up dead or seriously injured, Plummer believes that he is on the trail of a serial killer.

While Plummer conducts his investigation, McCadden translates a hieroglyphic text from the sarcophagus in the hope that it will shed some light on the identity of the mummy. The text reveals that Tutankhamun found the alien in a coma-like state. Thinking that the unconscious alien was a god, Tutankhamun and his attendants touched it and were killed by its infectious fungus. The king, his attendants, and the alien were then buried together in the king’s tomb. McCadden, having figured out that the “mummy” is an alien, makes the connection between the alien and the crystals. He then traces the stolen crystals back to Sharpe, who admits to the theft and gives McCadden the one crystal he kept for himself.

In the film’s denouement, McCadden, Rossmore, Serrano, two students, a security guard, and the alien all wind up in a boiler room where the alien has set up its transportation device. The alien activates the device by placing the last recovered crystal on it; his mummy wrappings disintegrate, revealing his true form. The security guard attempts to shoot the alien, but accidentally shoots McCadden instead. The alien takes McCadden’s hand, and the two disappear. A single crystal is left where the alien stood. Serrano grabs the crystal, and the fungus begins to destroy his hand.

from wikipedia