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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.
A preview is available at UpcomingMovies.com
The official site is here.
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
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
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?
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.
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
You try fitting in 400 (I forget the exact count and it depends on the version anyways) pages, 9+ fully developed charcters, numerous subplots and a heap of other stuff in a 3 hr movie. For the most part I believe that translating a book into a is almost impossible. My general rule of thumb is "good book=bad movie" and "good movie=bad book", there is simply too many differences between the genres. When it comes to FoTR and Peter Jackson I personally think he did an admirable job, and made quite a good movie(I havn't talked to someone who didn't like it yet). I heard the origional movie was 6 hr long, you can see the evidence all over the place, I don't remember Gandalf ever teling Sam to stay with Frodo in the movie (I could be wrong there) although Sam states it numerous times, and did you notice the three stone trolls in the background when they're camping at night when the only mention of them was made in the party at the begainning. Where would you of fitted all the extra depth that you claim is so lacking? I personally hope that when it comes out on DVD it will include the FULL 6hr movie also. Can you imagine all 3 of them together in uncut form, 18 straight hr of LOTR!!! (then again it might be better to watch them over a few days;)
I stole this Sig
I was going to get all defensive, but after reading your criticisms, I have to agree with you. Most of the stuff you mentioned could have been cut.
The irritating thing about LoTR was the changes he made were defended by "it would fit into Tolkien's universe if it happened this way". Of course, that's not much of an excuse; if Tolkien wanted Arwen to be involved at the Ford, he would have written it that way.
That being said, I thought it was a great movie (and I'm using "great" in the appropriate sense, not the mindless hype-ish "great" that everyone else tosses around), if not a great adaptation.
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?
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.
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.
Katz, check your data! Jules Verne was French!
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!
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.
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
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! ... Let's put aside our petty concerns for a minute and remember what an important time this is to the evolution of technology.
As regards technological evolution, I note that in Wells' original, it was the Morlock's love of machines and enslavement to the idea of "mechanical progress" that led them at last to cannibalism and moral degeneracy.
The film fails, as the Pal version did in the 1960s, by dropping the key theme of Well's book: the time traveller discovers the end result of class warfare. The proles won by letting the rich think they'd won because they enjoy a life of luxury, but instead they are just cattle being fattened.
Wells was a Fabian Socialist with a huge sense of irony and these influences informed all his work. But socialism and irony is apparently too dangerous for Hollywood. Instead, Pal's film changed it into a metaphor about nuclear warfare and survivalism, and Wells Jr changes it into a metaphor about the perils of leisure development. What a crock.
The Time Machine is here. The end-of-the-earth chapter, which seems to give Katz the willies, is a perfect little End-Of-Colonialism piece, very typical of the time. Hodgson's House on the Borderland , Night Land , and Stapledon's Last and First Men are more of the same, but with their own charms.
`I grieved to think how brief the dream of the human intellect had been. It had committed suicide. It had set itself steadfastly towards comfort and ease, a balanced society with security and permanency as its watchword, it had attained its hopes -- to come to this at last. Once, life and property must have reached almost absolute safety. The rich had been assured of his wealth and comfort, the toiler assured of his life and work. No doubt in that perfect world there had been no unemployed problem, no social question left unsolved. And a great quiet had followed.
`It is a law of nature we overlook, that intellectual versatility is the compensation for change, danger, and trouble. An animal perfectly in harmony with its environment is a perfect mechanism. Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. There is no intelligence where there is no change and no need of change. Only those animals partake of intelligence that have to meet a huge variety of needs and dangers.
`So, as I see it, the Upper-world man had drifted towards his feeble prettiness, and the Under-world to mere mechanical industry. But that perfect state had lacked one thing even for mechanical perfection -- absolute permanency. Apparently as time went on, the feeding of the Under-world, however it was effected, had become disjointed. Mother Necessity, who had been staved off for a few thousand years, came back again, and she began below. The Under-world being in contact with machinery, which, however perfect, still needs some little thought outside habit, had probably retained perforce rather more initiative, if less of every other human character, than the Upper. And when other meat failed them, they turned to what old habit had hitherto forbidden.
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