The packaging for "Timelock" has Sean Connery's name in big letters, and your assumption is that he plays a major role in this little-known film. In fact, he has about three lines, plays a welder (“Welder number 1” in the cast list), uses an acetylene torch and mutters rather aggressively for no apparent reason. The real stars are Robert Beatty - and even he doesn't appear until half-way through - Betty McDowall (an Australian actress who was notable mostly for a large number of tv roles), and Lee Patterson (likewise).
Neither McDowall nor Patterson are particularly remarkable, though it might be said that all they have to do is look worried, and occasionally get a little hysterical, but at least they're better than most of the rest of the cast, who say their lines with a flatness that is remarkable for its lack of interest, and perform their parts as though none of them had ever been in a movie before.
The story is about a little boy who accidentally gets locked in a bank vault - one that can't be opened again till the following Monday morning. It takes place in one set for the most part, (it's based on a play by Arthur Hailey), and while there's some tension in the script, there's absolutely no character-building, which is why it's perhaps not surprising that everyone looks so bored with their roles.
This was director Gerald Thomas' third movie (and Connery's fifth), and you have to wonder if Thomas was given the job the day before shooting starting, and that he then decided he'd get the thing filmed, take the money, and forget style, pace, tension and characterization. It's not surprising that most of his career was spent making the Carry On movies - some thirty or more of them. These are notable for weak scripts, pathetic direction, and no sense of style. They were only popular because a large repertory of English comedy actors held them together.
Watch Time Lock or Timelock if you wish, but don't expect to be moved, exhilarated, or surprised. This is bland film-making at its very best/worst.
