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Review: The Time Machine
Everybody has his own favorite, but The Time Machine has to rank way up there as one of the best, darkest and most prescient futuristic yarns ever spun. But while Jackson was able to infuse his movie with the spirit of Tolkien's story, indiscriminate special effects and limpid, forgettable acting leach H.G. Wells and his eerily dark vision of the future out of this one. Reading A Time Machine, you always felt humanity would pay dearly for its arrogance one day. Seeing this movie, you just end up looking at your watch.
For some reason, the locale of this film has moved from London to New York. Why? You get the feeling the producers were trying to make this movie a bit of a cautionary nuclear tale. Then the movie was delayed by 9/11, because it originally contained (and still does) some destruction-of-Manhattan sequences, most removed. Film essayists will have a field day in a few years de-constructing post and pre-9/11 Hollywood.
Guy Pearce plays the brooding, tragic scientist Alexander Hartdegen, Jeremy Irons the Uber-Morlock. Irons is great. Pearce is strangely miscast here, alternately twitchy, sweaty, distracted and simply inarticulate. If you haven't read the book, you have no idea what his motivations are, who he's is involved with, or why he's making so many staggering decisions about the human race all by himself, in a mili-second. But it's Hollywood silly, so it's all about the girl, in this time or another. This profoundly trivializes the story. The ending of The Time Machine is one of the great closings in all sci-fi, but here it has all the punch of some wet paper towels.
Increasingly, from the Star Wars series to this movie, special effects are becoming a problem for sci-fi movies. All of the bad guys look alike (the Morlocks could slip easily into Lord of the Rings, Planet of the Apes, or Return of the Mummy). Hollywood's ideas about villains are less effective than Wells prose. Enough, already, with these special-effect monsters who are all alike: loud, bug-eyed, simian, fast-moving, cannibalistic, slimy.
In the novel, Hartdegen was brave, angry, philosophical and passionate. Here, Pearce mostly seems to have been clubbed in the head early on and remains largely insensate. Aside from taking on the class issues -- one species above ground, the other below -- Wells was joining Shelley and Verne in squaring off on tech arrogance, something very much alive, especially in America, at the opening of the 21st century. That theme is almost completely obscured here, apart from a lame cautionary alarm that one of Hartdegen's friends sounds about scientists' uncertainty about where they are going. Against a backdrop of growing hysteria about suitcase-sized dirty bombs being detonated in our major cities by enraged working class kids from foreign cultures, the themes of The Time Machine are more, not less, powerful.
The actual time travel is pretty neat -- fast and beautiful -- but that accounts for only about 15 minutes of this movie. When we're not zipping ahead in time, the movie becomes simplistic and soulless. Mostly, it's just flat. Sadly, you can give it a pass, and that's a pity, an opportunity squandered. We're not going to get another remake of this book anytime soon.
"Enough, already, with these special-effect monsters who are all alike: loud, bug-eyed, simian, fast-moving, cannibalistic, slimy." What about CowboyNeal? :)
That's JRR Tolkien for you.
A preview is available at UpcomingMovies.com
The official site is here.
Should, I assume, read " Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings did great injustice to J.R. Tolkien's war and class-conscious trilogy by removing any and all characterisation and depicting the story as a dull plod through some nice scenery"
Simple mistake; probably had CAPS-LOCK on.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
devastating...
Anyone want to wager a bet that Jon will mention 9/11 again in his next article? Somehow he always seems to fit it in.
I went and saw "The Time Machine" on Friday....the theatre (being UA) sucked...and the movie didn't really help it. I was a little worried about the movie when I first walked in the theater and found it practically empty. I liked the beginning of the movie (there was a beautifal continuous shot down a flight of steps and through some hallways), and even up to the first time travel. However, after Alexander reached the far future...the whole movie went down hill. First of all, the civilization looked EXACTLY like the communities in Riven, and the underground world looked exactly like Isengard in "The Fellowship of the Rings". The time travel was cool, but as Katz mentioned, there wasn't much. I expected a LOT more as far as character development and more of an actual story. So much was left unexplained and the ending didn't really help. So, I rate this movie fairly low. To see my full review, go to Peterswift.org/html
A quote from my review: "If they had added some monkeys and woodchucks in random places in the movie, it would have been far more interesting and entertaining.
The anti-salmon
Come on, didn't you just *know* it was going to suck when the commercials proclaim it as "The Cinematic Event of the Year" or something like that -- whenever they use that kind of language in the commercial, it's usually becuase no reviewer had anything good to say about it -- not even when they misquote the movie reviewer!
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
I remember watching a movie when I was a kid about a time machine. The machine looked exactly like the one in this movie and travelling through time looked pretty much the same to. It also had those futuristic monsters. I forgot the name of the movie, does anyone know it? At the time, I was pretty impressed by it. Was this another remake of "The Time Machine" book?
Back home, people call ATMs Tyme Machines because that's the company that bought them all out. I get to college and ask where the nearest Tyme machine is in town, and I get some smack about this book, "we're not in London, sweetie," etc.
I'm about to jump in the shower and go catch a matinee of this flick, so I don't have time for a long, drawn-out reply. But I think it will be entertaining, though after reading several reviews I expect it to be inferior to the 1960 version in all aspects except effects.
I replied mostly to complain about this continuing trend of chopping scenes out of movies so as not to offend people still haunted by the terrorist attacks. Why do The Powers That Be think we'll all be reduced to sniveling wussies if we see a skyscraper blow up in a work of *fiction*? I had hoped this practice would've run out of steam by now, six months after the fact. Memo to Hollywood: If you're so concerned about offending me, leave the 'destruction of New York' scenes in your movies, and stop labeling me and the rest of your customers as potential thieves, chomping at the bit to steal movies and music from you.
~Philly
Erm, what the fsck are you talking about?
:P
Anyway, I agree with one part. For great justice, go to every theatre.
You know what you doing
It's not 'suckage', it's 'suction'.
--
The Cap is nigh. Time to get a fresh new account.
>Film essayists will have a field day in a few >years de-constructing post and pre-9/11 Hollywood.
On the same token, future Slashdot trolls will have a field lambasting both your pre and post 9/11 articles.
Anyone who who even caught a sidelong glimpse of the trailers could tell this was a lame 02's remake of the superior 60's "Time Machine."
It was instantly recognizable as a dead horse straight out of the gate.
Katz actually spent good money just so he could "First Post" a review on a shitty movie?
Dude, while I don't expect more, I certainly hope for it.
satire, n: 1) witty language used to convey insults or scorn; 2) a form of humor lost on most slashdot moderators.
We should all be immensely grateful to the British social class system. It inspired some of the greatest fantasy and sci-fi writers in modern literature, from Mary Shelley and Jules Verne to H.G. Wells.
Ummmm, John? Jules Verne was French so how exactly was he influenced by the British social class system?
"We should all be immensely grateful to the British social class system."
And we have the American class system to be grateful for Katz's endless bourgeoisie rants.
Actually, one of the comments I made to my buddies after watching the movie, was that I was impressed how _not_ slimy the Morlocks were.
They were downright creepy, a sort of cross between the "Grey Alien" look and neanderthal.
Slime is usually used to _hide_ poor costumes/effects for bad guys; it's hard to screw-up dripping. The only goo in Time Machine is the dart-poison, and the "pit".
Just like in the latest movie version of "The Count of Monte Cristo", I found they wrapped things up far too soon. Just as you start to really get into it - they realize they want to end in 5 minutes, and it's bang-bang-save-the-girl-THE-END-roll-credits.
Book adaptations should be required to be a minimum 3 hours.
Dear Katz, please READ the thesaurus entries, don't just look up the words. You used "limpid" as an insult to the acting in Time Machine - but it's actually a compliment meaning "clear", "lucid", "transparent". I think you meant "limp" like your dick.
Btw, it was a pretty good movie too!
"sweet dreams are made of this..."
If they had added some monkeys and woodchucks in random places in the movie, it would have been far more interesting and entertaining.
Except that would defeat the purpose of the whole story. The Morlocks have to eat the Eloi (who look way too 2002-human in the movie; I distinctly remember that the novel described the Eloi as looking closer to Precious Moments figurines) only because the Morlocks have run out of other animals to eat through over-hunting. (The Eloi are frugivores. We 2002-humans are designed to be frugivores too (sorry, the link has expired), but some people choose to ignore that and eat meat.)
But given the copyright industry's behavior over the last few decades, the copyright on this movie adaptation probably won't expire until the year 802701 ;-)
Will I retire or break 10K?
Please stop saying that! Hollywood movies have always been sickeningly patriotic and generally bullshit, even before 9/11.
AND IT'S 11/9!!
[rant]
I know that's just because I'm from the UK, but it makes more sense. Day/Month/Year, they go up in increasing order of size. THE US SYSTEM MAKES NO SENSE!
[/rant]
Malike Bamiyi wanted my assistance.
There is old Russian sayink:
Church is near, but road is icy.
Pub is far, I will be careful.
:)
Rhapsody in Numbers
While I concur that many of the special effects were quite interesting and perhaps even breathtaking, I found myself asking the same questions I was asking while watching the Planet of the Apes remake:
And a final question: Why, oh why, didn't "they" show us anything about how Hartdegen came to the conclusion that a time machine was 1) possible, and 2) doable by him? Why not show us how he went about creating the machine? I don't know about anyone else, but my heart sunk when "they" unveiled the machine--I thought "wow. outta thin air. oh boy. that's hollywood, circa 2002."
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist
I saw it at a Cinemark theater here last night. While not particularily deep, it was a satisfyingly consistent movie. It didn't insult the viewer's intelligence once, which is saying a lot for a movie these days. Certain plot twists, while unexpected, help the storyline along. I give it 2 thumbs up for being easy to watch and it didn't totally mangle the original concept!
"Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings did great justice to J.R. Tolkien's war and class-conscious trilogy"
As I think Tolkien himself pointed out this wasn't at all the point of his books despite what so many scholars and others think - this is a case of reading far too much into a book as happens all too often. It does happen that authors just write for the sake of a good, fun story sometimes. Tolkien wanted to create a mythology. No hidden messages about war or class, just an enjoyable story about another land part inspired by various real-world mythologies but at the same time entirely its own mythology when viewed as a complete and lovingly detailed whole. Both Middle Earth and the books were made purely for the sake of doing so.
And can someone please shoot that damn "Spirit" from a chopper so we don't have to watch those previews anymore? A Native American and his horse--someone put me out of my misery!
It looked kinda cool, but I was very concerned when I walked into a near-empty theater on a Saturday night. I went about brushing that off, realizing that the main-stream America isn't into Sci-Fi films.
Turns out main stream America just isn't into films that stink. They took a long sordid tale and jammed it into almost exactly an hour and a half, and left the parts that should have been in there out and vice versa... Even for a Sci-Fi movie, the plot made absolutely no sense into the second half of the movie.
The acting was pretty good, Guy Pearce seemed like he might've been a little out of his league (I kept on having Memento flashbacks the entire movie - that's how bored I was).
All in all, at the end, I just wished that his time machine could somehow get that hour and a half of my life back, but no such luck.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
I thought the movie could have used another 45 minutes to an hour of plot development.
This is off topic, but this YYMMDD system date only back to the way where machine and Binder appeared to help sorting. But humans usually do not "sort" real world event and say naturaly 11th September 2001. When was the last time you used to hear people saying "where will you be for 2002, July , 4th ?".
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
I remember the story as one of the most haunting memories in my life. All of the science fiction I read after it with similar themes - the apocalyptic science fiction that is so popular today - depends on this story.
Goat sex free since 2001
Don't pick on Katz.
He applies the same mouldly old 'new left' interpretation on anything he writes about.
I strongly agree that he has no fucking business writing about Tolkein.
This is off topic, but this YYMMDD system date only back to the way where machine and Binder appeared to help sorting.
YYYY-MM-DD is also the native date format in Japan and some other cultures that have strongly head-final languages (subject-object-verb sentences; adjective-noun and adverb-verb modifier structures).
ObTopic: Too bad this movie doesn't touch on any language barrier; it would have been very appropriate and cute for the Eloi people to speak Toki Pona. Note to creative staff of future films: If a movie is PG-13 or higher, you can use subtitles, as most of your target demographic group can read. In PG and G movies, show a language barrier with obvious dubbing that represents foreign language by distorting lip synchronization. (This is common in kung fu films and in anime.)
Will I retire or break 10K?
If you haven't read the book, you have no idea what his motivations are, who he's is involved with, or why he's making so many staggering decisions about the human race all by himself, in a mili-second.
The book and the movie are almost COMPLETELY different, his motivation is different in the book and in the movie (but god forbid scientific curiousity be a motivation in a Hollywood film), and the book contains nothing about changing the human race.
I mean, why would you say something like this, unless you've never read the book?
It is, however, an excellent book, the text of which is online in several places if anyone wants to read it.
This new version is a true disappointment. Take your money and spend it on something else, a stack of CD-Rs for example. It will give you greater pleasure and last longer. This movie is a stinker and does not stack up to the original in any way shape or form. I give this new remake one star *. I went to see it with an open mind, but came away thinking "damn, I wasted 8 bucks on that!"
I enjoyed this movie right up to the goat-rodeo of an ending. If the director was here right now, I'd be feasting on his brain.
The story Time Machine was great in part because of the fantastic ending; but his moving totally choked it. If you havent read the book, or even seen the older movie, do so. The story is one of the better sci-fi's ever told, and this piece of trash does not do it justice.
to learn how he was "sounding the alarm about life in England..." I do not believe JV could speak a word of english and his stories had little to do wih England.
CD Baric
The Time Machine strikes me as one of those "adventures beyond your imagination!" which is not only not "beyond" or an "adventure," but also contains no "imagination."
I don't mean to be snide, but I can't imagine how anyone could watch that trailer and think for one second that this movie would be any good. First is the opening scene with Orlando Jones (isn't he the "7-Up Yours" guy?) as Computerized Annoying Moron. Okay, singing computer guy! Jokes about recombining DNA! There's the red flag! Stop! Go no further!
One could lull themselves into a false sense of security by thinking it's just a gag made for the trailer, but he shows up again in the movie trying to be spooky ("the truth is beyond your wildest nightmares of CGI Rorscharch blots etc."), so, at that point, shouldn't huge warning bells be going off in your head? They sure were mine. I was only slightly more inclined to see this movie than Queen of the Damned with Liberace Alia.
As for the Morlocks, they look just like the animations in Planet of the Apes . I remember when the awful Roland Emmerich Godzilla came out in 1998, and all the "baby Godzillas" came out, tripping on gumballs, looking exactly like raptors from Jurassic Park -- I strongly suspect they just lifted the kinematic libraries wholesale. I wouldn't be surprised to learn The Time Machine did the same thing, ripping off Planet of the Apes instead.
I will probably see this on rental, just for grins (and I have a friend who works at a video store and gets all her rentals for free, so I'll bum it off her... there, no money to the MPAA, my Slashdot-social conscience is satisfied! Whew!)
In the meantime, all I want to know is, did Guy Pearce punch out Jeremy Irons, or knock him off a cliff, or impale him on a piece of broken machinery, then say, "Time's up, asshole!"? Because I have this bet going and I don't want to have to sit through the movie to know if I won.
We're approaching the third anniversity of the Columbine shootings. Right after they occured NBC aired the epic made-for-TV movie "Atomic Train" everywhere in the country except the Denver market.
It seems they were afraid that we would have such febble minds we couldn't distinguish between the reality of Columbine and a fictional account of a nuclear explosion near town.
My mother taped it for me, and I passed it around to my friends. I find it hard to imagine anyone taking the story seriously, and if you have any real technical knowledge the story was absolutely incomprehensible.
Hollywood movies can get it right, but it's extremely rare. For every Terminator 2 or True Lies, you have a hundred Armaggedons(sp).
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Jeremy Irons got only a few minutes of screen time, but managed to make far more of an impact on my mind than Pearce.
I wasn't expecting such a nuanced character, though I think that probably owes more to Irons than the screenwriter.
Orlando Jones' character was also highly interesting, and got very little screen time. Like Irons his attempts to communicate on a more interesting and philosophical level is ignored by Pearce's self-absorbed character, who's obsessed with saving his new chippie. Why is it that Hollywood scientists invariably are incredibly uncurious would-be action heroes who rarely do any actual science?
For some reason he could not tell from the previews that this movie, Collateral Damage, or Kung Pow for that matter, weren't going to be very good at all.
Then he sees it and is disappointed, and writes
an article to tell us something we already knew.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
I really doubt we needed an review of these movie as it was pretty obvious it was a twisted, hollywoodified, piece of crap version of a great story. Just look at the poster alone, the main character looks like someone from a CK commercial, theres a scantily clad chick in the background... as soon as you try to sell sex in a scifi film, 100% maximal suckage garanteed. Then the previews: everything is super duper action packed, theres CG all over the place, everything is flashing by mad fast, etc... Action packed? WTF, no need to even say anything on this one, and the fact it has CG means exactly jackshit, after all ANY hollywood-class film will be able to scrape up some money to have CG. And the excuse "I just wanted to see it for the CG" is weak as hell; You could say that about FF, Mummy2, Monsters Inc, etc, but NOT for this steaming pill. If you actually spent $9 to see this for just CG, I'd say that was pretty dumb. Sorry for the ranting, but this movie's existance angers me, especially the fact they took a great story and blantantly butchered it hollywood style.
"What can a thoughtful man hope for mankind on Earth, given the experience of the past million years? Nothing." -Bokonon
Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings did great justice to J.R. Tolkien's war and class-conscious trilogy
john - what are you talking about? how is LOTR a class conscious trilogy? (laying aside, for the moment, the question of exactly what flavour of crack Peter Jackson was smokng when he made the movie) There are no classes in the book - everyone we encounter is either a typical english country gentleman (hobbit) or the lord/king/tribal chieftan of some country (or the second in command). unless you mean that the point of the entire thing is to show that Sam, the only person of slightly less "class" than everyone else saves the day?
Thus far, your statement makes about as much sense as the description a Womens Studys major once gave me: a bunch of guys attempt to destroy a vaginal symbol (ring) by throwing it into a giant penis symbol (volcano) where it will be destroyed, so that the "age of men" can begin, without interferance from pesky women.
Sitting Walrus Blog
Ever since the revival of Star Trek on the small screen, various Hollywood producers have used special effects to compensate for bad -- really, bad -- plot lines and acting. Two examples come to mind; they are "Star Trek: Deep Space 9" and "Star Trek: Voyager".
"Enterprise" is better than those 2 losers, but here we again have bad acting. I'm referring to the 3 characters: Captain Archer, Hoshi Sato, T'Pol, and Travis. Travis really sticks out because his English has an Ebonics accent to it. Why, in the 22nd century, have we not eliminated Ebonics and ghettos?
As for Hoshi Sato, her only job is, apparently, to look cute. She just has that big, round cute head but is otherwise useless to the ship.
Captain Archer? Hell, William Shatner is a far better actor than Scott Bakula. The latter is just so -- what's the word -- expressionless.
As for T'Pol, I would take Spock over her any day. Those big out-of-proportion breasts with the 2nd-grade (i. e. 2nd grade in elementary school) hair looks ridiculous. Again, she has the issue of terrible acting.
One good thing that can be said about "Enterprise" is that it did not butcher the original Star-Trek theme: "... to boldly go where no _MAN_ has gone before ..." Various
politically correct types have changed "_MAN_" to "_ONE_".
-Wolf
2002 March 10
Ever since the revival of Star Trek on the small screen, various Hollywood producers have used special effects to compensate for bad -- really, bad -- plot lines and acting. Two examples come to mind; they are "Star Trek: Deep Space 9" and "Star Trek: Voyager".
"Enterprise" is better than those 2 losers, but here we again have bad acting. I'm referring to the 3 characters: Captain Archer, Hoshi Sato, T'Pol, and Travis. Travis really sticks out because his English has an Ebonics accent to it. Why, in the 22nd century, have we not eliminated Ebonics and ghettos?
As for Hoshi Sato, her only job is, apparently, to look cute. She just has that big, round cute head but is otherwise useless to the ship.
Captain Archer? Hell, William Shatner is a far better actor than Scott Bakula. The latter is just so -- what's the word -- expressionless.
As for T'Pol, I would take Spock over her any day. Those big out-of-proportion breasts with the 2nd-grade (i. e. 2nd grade in elementary school) hair cut looks ridiculous. Again, she has the issue of terrible acting.
One good thing that can be said about "Enterprise" is that it did not butcher the original Star-Trek theme: "... to boldly go where no _MAN_ has gone before ..." Various politically correct types have changed "_MAN_" to "_ONE_".
-Wolf
2002 March 10
You're both wrong. Use ISO-8601, YYYY-MM-DD. It's unambiguous, sortable, and already common in much of the world. This format is also widely used by programmers maintaining time-specific data, e.g., radar plots or weather models - it makes a very handy filename.
Unfortunately, Microsoft Windows (and at least one application) inexplicably fails to support this format, even though it's an ISO standard. Or should that be "because" it's an ISO standard?...
As for "9/11" itself, that particular date will always be said that way since 911 is the emergency number in the US, similar to 991 in the UK.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
I haven't seen the movie yet, but from what I heard and saw, they could have removed the H. G. Wells credit entirely.
- Morlocks don't talk and they have no "Uber-Morlock" leader guy
- Weena (the girl) is left to die (by the hero and the Morlocks) in a forest fire after being knocked unconscious
- The (unnamed!) time traveller hates the Eloi almost as much as the Morlocks and doesn't try to talk them into starting a revolution
- etc...
To see my full review, go to Peterswift.org/ html [peterswift.org]
Does Jon Katz post stuff on that web site that says "To see my full review, go to http://slashdot.org"? These are supposed to be Slashdot reader comments. If you want to advertise on Slashdot, go to this link. You will find all of the information on rates, ad types, etc.
i agree - the animated version was much better - and, in fact, seems to be where PJ got most of his idea of how the story should be told: the beginning of FOTR is just a CGI remake of the live-action-behind-gause intro to the earlier film.
Sitting Walrus Blog
This space intentionally left blank.
For those interested in reading the original, the text is available online here (ASCII text) or here (same, zip'ed), courtesy of project Gutenberg.
Consider this the ultimate spoiler.
Ubi dubium ibi libertas: Where there is doubt, there is freedom.
(Brittish? British? sp?)
Ah, hmm, Jules Verne was french. He was not born in Great Britain. Go back and read any decent dictionnary... or just do a quick search on the internet. Please.
(This is not the first time the english-speaking claim a foreigner as their own. See Giovanni Cabotto, for example. Who's next on the list? Machiavelli? Marie Curie? Santos-Dumont or even Count Zeppelin?)
Maybe you missed the point, the answer to his question: You cannot change the past because the future already depends on it.
PS: Did anyone else think it was realllly cool when they accidently blew up the moon? Never seen that one before.
Why is it that Hollywood scientists invariably are incredibly uncurious would-be action heroes who rarely do any actual science?
Generally, I agree. But, this is one of the reasons I liked Stargate. While Jackson ends up playing the hero role, it's his scientific curiousity that motivates him to inadvertantly strand the team in the first place.
Some people have a way with words, and some people, um, thingy.
I thought that the FX worked in really nicely. The seven-up guy's role was pretty well played (especially when he gave a summary of The Time Machine when the lead character asked about Practial Time Travel, lol), the sequence where the moon shattered was really nice, and the scenes where the machine moved through time where very cool.
I do agree, though, with this:
"the Morlocks could slip easily into Lord of the Rings"
When I saw that, I told my friend "how did they come over from LotR"
It was well worth the crappy $8 charge for movies now a-days
forget it.
But maybe that's a lesson that doesn't make any sense? Couldn't they do better than that???
Of course, this film kind of blows away any chance for doing Time Ships, which gets deeper into the whole Time Travel issue (FTR: You certainly could, theoretically change the past - just not your own past - it's allowed because in changing the past, you create a new "split" in the time stream, thus a new "future")
The sweeping scale of Baxter's Time Machine sequel, along with the "reshaped" Moorlocks and their ultra-advanced technology would have been very cool to see visualized on the big screen.
Still, as simple popcorn and eye candy fare, this movie was decent enough.
Incredibly average movie, see at matinee price.
You can see a lot of time and money was spent and result is a so-so movie.
the lower classes reject popular culture because they can't afford it, and the "upper" classes reject it becuase they've already bought and used up every artificat of popular culture before it actually hits the mainstream.
Katz, check your data! Jules Verne was French!
that one day enough of us will stop wasting our money on crappy remakes of some of the best movies ever made, and the studios might notice, maybe... well nevermind.
was forced to see it last night by the sig. other, and i was pleasantly surprised that i didn't leave the theater angry! just $8 poorer and sleepy.
heybiff
Even the Sun goes down.
i have not seen the movie yet so don't spoil it 4 me.
sdgscott
In addition, if you talk with a medical doctor, they will also tell you that this is the case.
It looks like they've turned the Morlocks into orcs. D'uh! In the book, they're pretty pathetic, lemur-like creatures. Devolved working-class folk.
I caught a few interesting things during my re-read. On his return journey to the future, the Time Traveller packs "a Kodak." Imagine, product placement, in 1898!
--Stefan
It's hard to believe, but at the time the book was written the world appeared both a lot younger, and with a comparitively short future. It won't be giving anything away to note that in one scene, the Time Traveller (he's never named) visits the Earth in 800,000 A.D. The sun is swollen and red, and things are starting to run down. The notions of radioactivity and fusion hadn't been concieved yet, and it was reasonable to guess that the sun only had a million or so years of life left!
I agree with you on this. Baxter is a great writer and I enjoyed Time Ships very much.
I've decided to mispell one or more words in all my correspondence. If you don't like it then don't read it.
This movie sucked.
I saw it last night with some friends.
Lets give it a run down.
1. That damn trailer for "Spirit" needs to be cut, it almost made me walk out of the theatre.
2. I did like the walking down the hallway scene, that was kinda cool.
3. I could understand how hollywood would want to make it a better plot by having the guy go back to save his gal, but the 4 years he was working on the machine, it gave no detail on how it was built, how it worked, etc. Which i guess is better than making something up though and making it sound stupid like "it works on the plank reaction of sub-atomic quarks in the 5th dimension" or something.
4. The Morlocks where freakin scary looking, I almost jumped out of my seat when the first one jumped in front of the screen.
5. The Eloi looked like mullato's, and thats it, in millions of years, alot more evolution should have happened, look at the morlocks!
6. I remember hearing about in the book (I haven't read it yet, but I am going to) that some eloi fasted because the Morlocks controlled them through their food. In the movie it just had that stupid dream, and thats it!
7. "Just follow the breathing" WTF!!! Ok, that iron face thing was in the dream, but how in the hell did the guy know how to get there?!
8. That computer, how the fuck was it powered for 30 million years, no less, how did it stay intact, etc.
Thats about it.
There was this woman in front of me I just about killed. She laughed at everything. "So help me I'll resequence your DNA" "HHAHAHAHAHAHAH, AHAHAHA, HAHAHHAHA, DNA!!! HAHAHA"
!!!!ARGHH!!!!!
She even laughed at the Eloi language. I hate freakin stupid people.
Come on.
Why did you even bother writing all that when you could have summed up your opinion simply by:
"Tolkien's word is the word of God. Not a single scene, character or word in the dialogue should have been changed in any way. Jackson should be shot for this blasphemy".
Because that's not what I think. But if you're going to make changes, and you have to when making a film, don't make changes for the sake of it, or at least if you do try to make them work. In what way did any of Jackson's changes make the film better than sticking to the source? In what way did any of the changes for the screen cope with difficulties inherent in the adaption process?
One scene that Jackson managed to improve on, the only one, was the bit with Khamul sniffing at the edge of the road near the start. That bit worked really well with the earthworms and things. By the time we got to Rivendell and the silly bit of "Bug-Eyed Bilbo" it was obvious that it had been a fluke.
The issue is not the changes, it's the quality of the changes. As I've said before, the animated version did Fellowship in an hour and did a better job of it.
Especially showing the less serious side of Gandalf was excellently done.
Apart from jumping out on poor Frodo in the dark and trying to scare him to death, yes.
In fact, my only gripe is with Cate Blanchet's Galadriel who had been made to sound like a doped up hippie girl.
The whole of Loth Lorien was a waste of time, the film rushed through it not even bothering with continuity. Galadriel's spooky mind powers are an example of a change that I could have lived with, but even that wasn't used consistantly.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
... for a change.
Pushin' 'n dealin', shovin' 'n stealin'
Comment removed based on user account deletion
How can you jackasses masturbate over and over to Star Wars and Blade Runner and not even know that it's "special EFFECTS"? Christ.
I think the movie succeeded in doing what the book was meant to do - it sparks the imagination!
What IS the world going to be like in 800,000 years? I can't even imagine the changes that will come in the next 50!
We, the Slashdot community, have an important influence on the story of mankind. We can affect the world profoundly - let's not forget what a vital time we are living in - how many new dangers confront the human race as well as how many new tools and capabilities.
Let's put aside our petty concerns for a minute and remember what an important time this is to the evolution of technology. We can't afford to waste time on proprietary technology and foolish restrictions. Be active! Be heard!
My favorite Spin on this was the 1979 Film TIME AFTER TIME, it took The Time Machine as a starting point and took it in a completely difffernt direction.... Why isn't this classic on DVD?
Great to see we can't stay out of the theatre for flicks like this(I can understand LOTR), hope you enjoy your sponsership of the SSSCA Katz. Bah no wonder coporations run this nation.
-- taking over the world, we are.
I was afraid of that. Haven't seen the movie, yet, but I figured it would be the typical Hollywood concoction. "We've gotta make it more appealing for the moron public! They'll never understand that whatchacallit 'theme' stuff."
It's in London?? Americans won't watch a movie based outside the good ol' USA! Move it to New York!
Whaddya mean he can't talk to the Eloi or the Morlocks?? How's he gonna act? Screw that!
Whaddya mean you don't know when he's off to at the end?? Can't leave questions in the moviegoer's mind! Screw that!
I know it's not his fault (except for the acting part), but as soon as I saw Guy Pearce in the lead, I had flashbacks of "The Count of Monte Cristo". At least in that one, it had been so long since I'd read the book that I doubted myself on whether it followed the text (or at least the spirit). Since "Time Machine" is one of my favorite novels, I don't think they'll even have that chance with me.
Solonor Rasreth
Solonor's Groovy Grove of Mystical Wonders
http://www.solonor.com
Please never use the word "hubris" again. My sides hurt from laughing, and I couldn't finish the article.
mlylecarlin
This article focuses on Pearce and the problems with the movie. He's amazingly outspoken and critical of the movie and the whole process that created it -- something I think the studios would be all over him for, especially so close to the opening. But I guess, happily, it's not like the old days where studios owned stars.
Also interesting (to me, at least!): Director Simon Wells is the great-grandson of H.G. Wells.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
JonKatz, you dumb fuck, I can't remember when special "affects" was spelled so wrong.
You do realize that the book was only a short story, right?
In fact, if you read the book, that's kind of what it feels like when it ends (I haven't seen the movie yet). It feels like it should keep going to some other time, because he only visited one time (for very long) before going to the end of time and then heading home.
While I'm on the Time Machine subject, TECH HUBRIS??!!! Where's that in the book? He uses the machine to travel to a time when there is no technology, except to make clothing and food, and stays there for the entire book, until he goes on to see the earth's death as the sun dims, which also has little to do with technology (no technology caused that). I suppose the last sentence (ending which I won't give away) could be about that, but how can you say that the book is all about technological hubris based upon a single sentence?
I think someone is lumping all of their Victorian writers into the same category without reading very carefully. Its good if that's not in the movie, 'cause it sure ain't in the book.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
Yeah, moving it to New York was silly, as was taking out scenes of New York's destruction, but really, what does it matter to the story? It was relatively easy to overlook the flaws (unlike Jurassic Park III, which while enjoyable, you had to forcibly ignore some major "no way!"s). And it did hit one hot button: outrunning the explosion and creatures clearly way faster than they were. And that chase through the tunnels almost made me seasick.
Yet, I liked particularly that he tried to go back and change the past and failed, so when he got to a future he could affect, he did. That's a good motivation. The movie flowed well, and I could empathize with all of the main characters.
It may not have been Blade Runner, but it was a fun ride and I was pleasantly surprised.
The profoundly disappinting thing about almost all big Hollywood movies these days is their utter lack of imagination. The marketing department says: slap together a cardboard hero, a good-hearted but basically stupid multiethnic girl for him to save, some flashing lights and explosions, woodenly-animated or rubber-masked mindless (therefore safely killable) monsters that jump out of the screen roaring, and an icky, icky bad guy who doesn't live by the right rules (ours) and so should be killed. Check! Plug them into a two-digit-IQ story devoid of anything remotely insightful or controversial. After all, why risk Johnny waddling home and saying "Hey mommy, I saw a naked butt!" or "Mommy, why do we have to have a war?" It might somehow decrease profits. Check! It's disturbing and sad that the totality of our mass media is so dumb and getting dumber. The purveyors of this swill say they're only responding to the market and, given low expectations the scarcity of anything better, some people pay. But can this really be what we want to see?
"I should like to say something here with reference to the many opinions or guesses that I have received or have read concerning the motives and meaning of the tale. The prime motive was the desire of a tale-teller to try his hand at a really long story that would hold the attention of readers, amuse them, delight them, and at times maybe excite them or deeply move them....As for any inner meaning or 'message', it has in the intention of the author none. It is neither allegorical nor topical." [emphasis added]
In short: Tolkien had no intentions whatsoever to make any fine points about war or about class. The story may be applicable to such things, but that is a very different thing from saying that it is "about" them.
DFL
Never send a human to do a machine's job.
I can confirm: it sucked donkey balls.
My wife and I were at my in-laws house watching "O Brother Where Art Thou?" and with about 5 or 6 minutes left to go, my friends came by to pick me up to go see this movie.
I should have stayed with my wife.
This has got to be one of the worst movies I have seen in recent memory. The plot had more holes than a swiss cheese factory. K-riminey-SHIT! I mean, where do you start with a movie this forgettably bad? Let's see:
-No explanation as to the theory or workings (or, for that matter, the origins) of the time machine. This I can sort of forgive, since that (from what I understand) is the way that it was in the actual book.
-Before it becomes obvious that she is going to die no matter what he does, he goes about the same routine (going to the rink, etc.) I would have gone back a couple of extra days and gotten her into a totally different scenario, so to speak (that is, rather than a different location within the same scenario as he did by going into town instead of the park.) In fact, when the camera starts to pan around the rink a second time, I looked at my friend and asked when Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell show up.
-These Eloi, according to the (apparently) lone English speaking person outside of Dr. Hartdigen, all learn English in their childhood as a tradition. You learn an apparently long-dead language for no reason at all? That's like me teaching my 3 year old son Sanskrit because I have some spare time. In addition, exactly who is it that teaches the language? All of the adults have "gone from this place" as she likes to continually say and all of the other people in the colony have, as she explains to Hartdigen, forgotten it (as they have had no practical use for it in their entire lives.) This also makes you ask yourself that, with all that having been explained, how does this one lone girl speak the language so well with only one other person (her little sister) to speak it with?
-When Hartdigen "talks" to Orlando Jones in the library, he is told that there is no practical application of time travel because time travel is impossible. However, when he leaves his workshop originally, he leaves all of his calculations, equations, and other material that would prove otherwise behind. Surely in the however may-odd thousand or so years that pass between those two events SOMEONE would have been able to figure all of that out and conclude that it is, indeed, possible, right?
-Speaking of the 7-Up guy, how is it that the entire system that he embodies (that big globe thing and all) gets basically dumped in somebody's back yard and remains untouched and working for 800,000 YEARS?
I suppose I could go on, but, frankly, if any of you are still reading at this point, I'll be amazed.
I do have to say that taken just as a movie, it was pretty good, aside from the god-awfully long intro.
I do think that Jackson did a respectable job. While I can agree with most of the criticisms and I also think that Bakshi's version was better, I do think there are a few things to keep in mind. A page per minute still does not an easy conversion make. There are things easily conveyed by prose that vision cannot reproduce without actors of a caliber we lack in modern hollywood. I mean a glance or a pensive experssion conveys little without a voice-over or thought monologues without a true expressive master. Sure, you can convey a scene that takes a page or two in seconds, but such a scene needs a little lingering to make a proper impression.
You also have to take into account that many members of the viewing audience had not ever read the books and had no intention of doing so. You can convey in a sentence or a paragraph things that would take ten minutes of film to convey. Some things had to be doctored or altered for the movie. Yes, it could be done better. I don't feel that it was as terrible as some of you claim.
The bit with Frodo talking to Aragorn before he left wasn't a consultation. It was to do two things. Explain what the heck Frodo was doing to the brain-dead or easily confused in the audience(I.E. subtitles for the mentally impaired), and it was to function as a foil for Boromir's failure helping to show why it was that Aragorn was the better man and Boromir, while redeemable, just wasn't as great. Aragorn never said anything like,"Yes, go Frodo!" He just said he would have gone all the way with him. Sure, I found it unnecessary, as I'm sure many of you did. I read the books and I'm fairly bright. Some folks needed it spelled out and Hollywood demands that it be spelled out so that Bubba and Billy-bob get it too.(nothing deragatory intended to anyone there, just the goofiest names I could come up with)
Honestly, most folks I know who didn't read the books and weren't hard-core fantasy fans were irked the movie was so long. They should have started with the Hobbit. It handles introing a lot of that stuff on it's own and helps show why things are going on as they are. Quite a few people love the movie, but if it was on VHS, they would have fast-forwarded through all non-combat. They think Arnold, Stallone, Van Damme, and all their ilk deserve all the Oscars. Keep in mind, while Tolkien has a big fan-base, we aren't in large enough numbers to justify a Hollywood film on our own. They need a bigger bottom line to justify those expenditures.
To sum up, it was a decent movie and worth seeing in the theater at about 7-8 bucks. It's use of effects was much more subtle than the matrix (looky what we can do with effects, see the bullet trails?!? Lookit the guy suspended in mid-air from all these angles, ain't it cool!?!) and actually enhanced the film rather than totally eclipsed it. Many of the actors did a good job, and it broke with at least a few Hollywood stereotypes for us (they let their heroes cry man! Hoo-Rah!).
Call me TinyWiz.
I was curious how the "photonic" was able to keep running for 800,000 years. Even if he was "nuke" powered, the half live of most things are in the 10-25 thousand year range. After being halfed so many times there wouldn't be enough energy to keep it running.
But this does say something.. Microsoft is not going to survive. I mean what other OS but Unix could keep running for 800,000 years without crashing. I mean its not like the morlocks or the eloi know how to hit the reset button on that photonic right?
Has anyone read "A Light in the Void", by Poul Anderson?
This was a similar story. The inventor created a time machine, but found that the farther he ventured into the future, the more energy was required to go back (it was exponential) After his third jump into the future he was unable to to his original time, so he continued to move forward - hoping technology would advance to the point that he could get back to where he started from. Along the way, there were at least 3 subplots that he was involved with in some way, even if he was just passing though.
I can't find much about it on the web. I guess it wasn't that popular?
Well, I claim this claim for
First STFU, Katz post!
Jon, you are more idiotic than usual today. Please stop inundating us with this nonsense.
The movie hasn't opened in NZ yet, but from what I've read here, I don't think I'll go and see it, I'll just read the book again.
Yeah, I definitely think this movie sucked freakin' ballz. The amount of rediculous plot holes was astounding. For instance (spoilers ahead, but trust me, I'm not giving anything away that's good):
:)
1. The dude goes back in time to save his fiancee from dying, but fails, because she dies in a different way. He then says that he could go back a thousand times and she'd die every time. But HOW DOES HE KNOW?! He went back once. The guy is so completely obsessed with saving her that he spends four years of his life reinventing science and not shaving at all and after one try he gives up? Gimme a break. I'd have at least tried twice.
2. How is it that the uber-morlack could know absolutely everything about the dude, including why he's gone into the future, by reading his mind, but doesn't know that he's going to fucking pull on his necklace? C'mon.
3. 800,000 years isn't nearly enough time for the kind of geological change that the movie was depicting when the scientist (sorry, I've forgotten the characters name, I obviously didn't care) finally goes way into the future. I mean, were they trying to be literal with those fx? That looked more like millions of years in time travel, if you ask me. And how is it that there could be that much change in 800,000 years, but 7 BILLION (or was it 700,000,000) years into the future, the Morlacks are still living in the same fucking stupid aluminum-foil skull houses?
4. I love how the uber-morlack told the scientist that they save some of the eloi who are "suitable for breeding" and then the camera quickly turns to Samantha "I've got a see through shirt" Mumba. Looks like after 800,000 years, evolution can change human into morlack, but they still just want big titties!
5. Why doesn't anyone who builds time machines use it to go back to the beginning of the universe? or the end? Dammit, I'm gonna make my own time travel movie, just to see that.
Andrew
I am doing my bit as a (non-)consumer by not renting, buying, or movie-going. Nor am I obtaining illegal copies, because that'd just make me the industry's excuse.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you need to make up your minds. Do you wish to do your bit? Or is suffering the loss of the Hollywood circus a bit too much? Remember, every cent towards your Hollywood DVD rentals, and your movie tickets, is your voluntary cent as a consumer in support of the destruction of your own freedoms.
If you believe in ethical purchasing, paste this message into all film articles on Slashdot. Remind your peers of the damage they may be doing to themselves and society!
"The Lord of The Rings" has no message. Readers may read one into it (or watchers may see one in it), but J.R.R. Tolkien did not have one. He wrote the books as pure entertainment, and nothing more.
Ref.: "The Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring", Forward by the Author, Page X, Paragraph 2, Ballantine Books Authorized Edition, 1968.
- Rohan
Just in case anyone found the cliffside dwellings interesting, they're most likely copied from Renzo Piano's Tjibaou Cultural Center located in New Caledonia (Yes, IAAA - I am an architect). He drew inspiration from the Kanak's (indigineous ppl's) tent dwellings, and the glulam structures feature operable louvers that allow for natural ventilation. Check it out.
"We should all be immensely grateful to the British social class system"
You're absolutely right. Without the actions
of the jolly ol Brits we would live in a world with no Palestinian/Israeli conflicts. What a
shame that would be.
Cowboy Bebop, the moon was blown up long ago in an accident - earth is devastated by meteors.
Although I doubt the notes would have been understood because they would be lost and lots of science is forgotten over the years (Protein glutamate receptors on toungue 'rediscoverred' 100 years aften written about by a scientist)
but the language part was asinine. So few people knew the language that I doubt it could get passed on again. Especially with the one person who knows it being so profoundly fluent in it yet apathetic towards teaching it (a useless dead language).
The movie sucked for millions of reasons. I was so horrified how bad the plot was compared to the original short story that I called everyone I knew and told them it was the first movie worse than 'CONGO'.
That puts it in perspective... Time Machine sucks and is full of holes.
Use MMM. Then there's no way anyone will be mistaken, whether you go least-to-most significant or most-to-least
2002-Feb-10
10-Feb-2002
10 Feb
Feb 10
Anyone who speaks a romantic or germanic language will have no trouble with this. So simple, no?
I just saw it and it seemed pretty cool.
After watching the trailer, I informed my wife that I'd never watch the movie, since it over-glorified the Eloi, and that the modern movie industry couldn't afford to make a movie that was true to the book.
My logic went like this:
The Eloi were the "sheeple"; they are the descendants of the "consumers" that the movie industry is targeting the movie at. The Powers That Be (TM) in Hollywood know this (their descendants will be Morlocks), and (as shown in their trailer) will refuse to show the struggle that the Time Traveller had in coming to grips with the Future: he realised that his great-to-the-Nth grandchildren would be eating Eloi. He does save a girl's life, but he doesn't bring her back to the Present with him, as he could never love anyone so stupid and self-absorbed.
I then shocked my wife by asserting that I sympathized much more with the Morlocks, and would probably have a descent collection of recipies for cooking Eloi if I were living in that time. The book fit my idea of a post-"tech revolution" scenario quite well. I think I scared her off from reading the book (she somehow made it through High School without having it be assigned reading for a class).
In any case, the Eloi's ancestors will go and watch this movie, and won't be offended by it. Meanwhile, I'll sit in my Data Center and make sure their personal information is safe on the database...
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
This remake was far superior to any other version I've seen. The special effects were great. Morlocks hunting was a less ridiculous than a nuclear warning siren luring them in. Agreedly, it's not quite clear why his final action "changed the future" since every other part of the movie seemed rather coherent. My sister and brother and friends all enjoyed it. At least they could sit through this version, while they would never be able to appreciate any previous version, much less stay awake through them.
Often wrong but never in doubt.
I am Jack9.
Everyone knows me.
...having only just watched the film over the weekend on TCM. Having been asked if there is anything missing, the house keeper replies 3 books.
I wish I could think of a witty Sig. Sigh!
one thing I thought was interesting though..... The morlocks attain the time machine and jeremy irons' character says "I am the unavoidable result of YOU" ... which could be read as "your race's decisions and actions" ... or it could mean that this morlock did what any sentient being with an inkling of curiosity would do: USE THE MACHINE!
That's something that all great time-manipulation stories have (except this one!): paradoxes that blow your mind. like the Terminator and how you find out that he couldn't have existed if he hadn't come through time from the future. How cool would it have been to find out that the time traveler **created** the morlocks? (*Oops!*)
ALSO, one thing introduced in this movie was the concept that "one cannot change the past" but... what is "the past" with a time machine? So in the end, he flies into the 99-bazillion year future and sees the exact same morlock totems ruling the landscape and goes back, saves Weena, or whatever they call her in this version, and blows the morlock hole into oblivion... but if you can't change the past, or "fate", then all he did was waste his time. (ha-ha. waste his time. hah. err..) because what he saw, if you cannot change time, was the unavoidable future. So is this a plot hole?
I think it can be argued, "no," but with some disagreeable outcomes.. 1. The Time-Traveler (in the book and first movie he has no name) failed and the other morlock encampments invaded and overcame the eloi again.. 2. The Time-Traveler misinterpreted the Morlock temples as signs that the morlocks were still there when it may have been possible that they were simply warnings from the past.. sort of a macabre museum... but i doubt this as it seemed to be pretty obviously alive, well, and thriving in opression.. what do you think?
100% correct.
No amount of matrix or lotr level CGI could ever make this swill worthy to watch.
why?
The script had so many holes I would say it was to the exclusion of non-holes.
Its so crappy and bad I feel ripped off. Truly swindled. I telephoned EVERYONE and warned them to stay away.
It was the worst big budget Sci-Fi movie in 7 years.
Avoid this crap and warn everyone.
I wish I never saw it I feel robbed.
Shades of Groundhog Day? Yeah, it was almost cartoonish. "Stay right here, don't move."
*squeeaky girly scream---crunch*
Ahhh, that was a fond memory. Somehow I don't think they inteded this scene to be funny, but it was fucking hillarious. My audience wasn't so expressive, but I laughed loud enough for at least my row.
But I really don't see that the movie was bad... it just felt a bit too short. Then again, maybe that's just compared to the last movie I saw, which was about 3 hours.... Damn halflings!
I was horrified to watch it and even more upset that with another 40 minutes maye they could have salvaged it even with all the terrible plot problems.
Instead it was a 89 minute popcorn flick.
I though LOTR and Harry Potter showed conclusively that the public does not want 89 minute films they want films almost TWICE as long, especially adventure flicks.
avoid this bomb.
LOTR ruled. Jackson did justice to Tolkien.
Best movie I've ever seen.
Fritz
A Canadian is just an American without a gun and a decent health care system. Anon.
The best part of Time Machine was the preview
for Zu Warriors. Looks kinda like a sequel
to Hidden Dragon...can't wait till it comes out!
I could find almost no other information about it
in Google though...
Don't they teach the difference between "affect" and "effect" at school anymore?
I haven't seen anyone mention this, perhaps because I only went down to level 1: Wasn't there a remake of The Time Machine done in the 1970s?
No, I'm not talking about Time After Time. I mean The Time Machine: travel into the far future, Eloi, Morlocks, etc. I saw the first part of the movie on television, but I couldn't see the end because I had to go to bed. (Being seven or eight years old, you're often forced to abide by silly rules.) Here's what I recall:
I bought the book shortly thereafter. Even at that age, I could tell that things didn't quite match up. It didn't matter: I was entranced, particularly by Wells' description of the dying earth. His words painted the picture so well, I could see it:
The last living thing on Earth? That's what I thought, and the image has stayed with me since. (I typed in the above quote from that very book. Its front cover has a picture from the 1960s version, which I didn't see until several years later. Big disapointment; I thought I was going to see the ending I had missed.)
I don't think I'll be seeing this latest remake; some books just can't be translated to the big screen. But could someone please tell me they've seen the 1970s version? I'd like to believe it wasn't just a dream....
The United States of America: We mean well.
You can't be serious!
::patiently waits on the mail bomb from /. moderators and ducks under the desk::
Do you mean to say that Hollywood took a wonderful classic novel, turned it into a droll screenplay, added expensive CGI effects, added a big name actor with an impressive list of performances, and turned it into a steaming pile of crap that they can add to the mountain? Do you mean to tell me that these big Hollywood cookie-cutter produtions can't even measure up to a smidgeon of the creativity of those independent film makers with smaller budgets?
Haha! Yeah right! Next you'll be telling me that the recording industry companies are putting out POS albumns that can't compare to the indie artists and are trying to find new ways to sell me the same album twice!
Everyone knows that big companies == better products!
Stop it! Stop it! You're making my face hurt!
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
Umm, I seem to recall Tolkein describing this scene in FotR. If I had the book cose by, I would look it up for you.
Creed
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
I went to this movie and for the first time fell asleep, this had never happened to me before and it was quite embarassing. Can I travel back in time and get my money back?
I'm not saying he didn't; I'm saying that it worked better in the film than in the book, although it was a good scene in the book.
BTW I'm assuming you mean the bit by the side of the road.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
... only because it in no way toouched on the fact that both races where dependant on each other. In fact it turned the Morlocks into a race of "bad guys". In the book, the eloia(sp?) could not survive without the morlocks.
There was a scene removed form the movie due to 9/11. In the original cut a pice of the moon hits the WTC and it look almost exactly like the lanes hitting it. However, since the scene take placew in the future, where there is no WTC, it really makes no sense. The only way it would make sense, owuld be if he went into a building, and there was a paque that said something like " Welcome to the New WTC: Dedicated to all those who where impacyed by the events of 9/11" then have THAT buildng hit by a piece of the moon, then they could of kept it.
They did a good job of portraying mans arrogance with technology. Remeber the moon bit, Jon? Also it was moved to new york because Great Britian is no longer the power hous it was 100 years ago, but the US is.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Are we supposed to believe that a temporal field would be contained and channeled by caves? At least they could have made it spherical. Soooo all the Morlocks are dead, or just that one complex? Glad I *won* passes for this film.
The monkier should have been "WHEN would you go?", since the time machine only travels in the 4th dimension (time), not in the other three!
That's why he drags the machine in the original film!
As for the '79 version, I didn't care for it becoming a "Tardis" (Time And Relative Dimensions in Space). San Franciso indeed. Hrumph!
46. The Hobo smiles, his eyes glaze over, and he burps. "Beware the man who has lived longer than the Wasteland."
When you watch the movie,
take note:
There is a part of the movie that takes place about 100 years ago - back when steam engine buggies were becoming popular. Apparently Mountain bikes were also popular because we noticed a nice set of shiny metal wheels with knobby mountain bike tires mounted to the steam buggy.
I'm not sure about the tires, but the wheels definitely metal spokes & Rims. Silly that geeks like myself notice stuff like that.
Jules Verne was French, NOT British
Hollywood always seems to miss the point when it comes to classic science fiction (Asimov, Heinlein, Wells). Classic science fiction stories explore the hopes, fears, ideas, and musings of authors on the future of humanity. In this movie, the main character's biggest question is, "Why can't I change the past?"
I went to the movie expecting a bit of thought provoking plot; and what I recieved was a plot worthy of a pulp fiction romance novel. Yuck. In the movie, the only reason he built the machine was because his "other head" was doing all the thinking. Rather than pursuing a noble scientific endevor, the hero is a lovesick, pathetic hornball.
I want my money back:(
I pity you, and all other people that couldn't enjoy the movie. Thankfully I had not read far into the book on my plane trip two years ago and wasn't interested enough to continue before seeing the movie. The movie was masterfully done, and there was a great deal of character development, although I agree there could have been more. It does seem like almost everyone that I've heard of that didn't like the movie had thought that it wasn't true enough to the book. I just hope now that the movie inspired me to read the next two books that I don't become one of you!
Jason Goemaat
jasong@netins.net
SOmeone told me that the main morlock guy was supposed to be the scientist in the future...kinda like in Back to the Future when michal j fox meets himself. Is this true>>?? and what did th morlock dude say to the scientist about why he couldnt cange the past? PLEASE help!!
Minority report lookd really good..then again..so did AI (artificial intelligence)...cant spell well...blahhh!