Время простоя: Встреча с Великим Разумом

1994 Doctor Who spinoff film

Downtime is a direct to video spin off of the long running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was produced by the independent production company Reeltime Pictures. It is a sequel to the Second Doctor serials The Abominable Snowmen (1967) and The Web of Fear (1968). Downtime stars Nicholas Courtney, Deborah Watling, Jack Watling and Elisabeth Sladen reprising their roles as Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart, Victoria Waterfield, Professor Edward Travers and Sarah Jane Smith, respectively. It introduces the character of Kate Lethbridge Stewart. The film received overall mixed reviews from critics, but was successful enough to get a sequel, Dæmos Rising, in 2004.

Sometime after Victoria had parted company with the Doctor on 20th century Earth (Fury from the Deep), she is lured back to the Detsen Monastery in Tibet (The Abominable Snowmen) by a dream telling her she'll find her late father there. Instead, she finds the Great Intelligence, which still possessed the mind of Professor Travers (The Web of Fear). 15 years later, Victoria is the vice chancellor of New World University. New World is an institution that claims to offer spiritual guidance to distraught youth. In reality, New World is the headquarters for the Intelligence's new plan to conquer the world by infecting all of the computers. Both the administration and students await the coming of a "new world" that will be heralded by the chancellor, the Intelligence possessed Travers. Victoria's motives are well meaning but misguided, having been manipulated with a promised "light of truth". The students themselves have been brainwashed through their computer courses and are slaves of the Intelligence. Outsiders refer to them as "chillys". The Intelligence needs a final missing Locus to attain its goal. It believes the Brigadier has it, but the locus (a small wooden carving of a yeti) is actually with his daughter Kate and grandson Gordon on their narrowboat. New World attempts to gather information on the Brigadier by asking Sarah Jane Smith to investigate him. Sarah lies about knowing the Brigadier and later warns both him and UNIT. The Intelligence then arranges a meeting between the Brigadier and a corrupt UNIT captain named Cavendish. Throughout the story the Brigadier is aided by a New World student named Daniel Hinton, a former student of his from the Brendon School. The Intelligence's conditioning failed on Hinton, though at times he is still under its influence and at one point becomes a Yeti. He can communicate with the Brigadier through the bardo or astral plane.

The initial script read through took place in March 1995, with filming beginning on Friday 24 March in South West London with the scenes set at the Brigadier's home. The university campus scenes were shot at the University of East Anglia in Norwich. DWB Editor Anthony Brown, who had attended UEA, suggested the location after another had fallen through, as the distinctive Ziggurat shaped student residences Norfolk and Suffolk Terrace echoed pyramid motifs in the script. UEA students were recruited as 'Chillys' (extras) through the campus newspaper Concrete. Filming at the university was delayed slightly when the fire alarm sounded during the recording of some internal scenes. Production of some external scenes had to be rescheduled thanks to unseasonal spring snow storms — ironically, snow was conspicuously absent from the first Yeti story, The Abominable Snowmen. The later Reeltime production Dæmos Rising followed up on some of the elements of this story, specifically with the characters of Kate Lethbridge Stewart and Captain Cavendish. A clip from one of the scenes with Sarah and the Brigadier was planned to be shown as a flashback in The Sarah Jane Adventures. However, when the BBC requested permission from the owners of the Downtime copyright, it was refused and the clip was not shown. Daniel Hinton is named after Craig Hinton, the Doctor Who fan and novelist.

Music from this video composed by Ian Levine, Nigel Stock, and Erwin Keiles was released on CD by Silva Screen Records in December 1995. The 'Monastic chant' heard in the opening and closing themes was the same chant that was used in the Doctor Who story Planet of the Spiders.

The film received overall mixed reviews from critics. Dave Owen of Doctor Who Magazine praised the performance of Nicholas Courtney, stating that he was, "the undeniable star of the show". Similarly, Dylan Rees reviewed the film in his book Downtime The Lost Years of Doctor Who, praising the character arcs of the Brigadier and Victoria, but criticized the Yeti costumes, although he stated the production was "incredibly high for a film of this nature.