The Time Machine Review
by Karina Montgomery (karina AT cinerina DOT com)June 21st, 2002
Time Machine, The
Matinee
Directed by the grandson of the book's author, H.G. Wells, this Time Machine is naturally benefited by the current technology both in presentation and in supposition. Guy Pearce looks like death warmed over in the scenes when he should be the most lovable, but besides that, I really enjoyed this film. If you don't know the story, maybe the title will give you a clue: a man invents a time machine and uses it. In the classic tale, however, he goes maybe 100 years ahead in our future and then, accidentally, 800,000 years into the future and discovers a new world right where jolly old England used to be. In it, humans have divided into extreme sub-species. Mayhem, etc. It's amazingly forward-thinking of Mr. Wells to have written this in 1899, and even more forward thinking to properly update it with modern technological know-how.
Orlando Jones, as an our-near-future interactive library database, provides much of the audience touchstone for the film as well as summarizing the important plot points for the unread audiences. With one barnyard sound effect he sums up the whole Eloi/Morlock issue and gave me the most memorable moment in the film. He is obviously an artistic improvement on HG's 1899 edition, but I think that venerable old author would have loved him. Amusingly, the film apes its own origins with no shame, including making reference to itself in the library. Sexy Irish hip hop star Samantha Mumba (she has a song on the Legally Blonde soundtrack, bizarrely) plays one of the fetching Eloi. Normally reliable Jeremy Irons is head Morlock, and it is regrettably in his demesne that the film starts to break down for me.
However, the effects are naturally spectacular. The beautiful cliff-dwellings of the Eloi and their Amazonian flavor lend them a more human, less stupid feel than that in the novel. The Morlocks are both more horrible and more recognizably human than they come across in the book, which I think serves the story well. The delicate issue of the time-space continuum is handled visually and neatly, and overall does not skip modern theory, using contemporary cinematic language cribbed from Star Trek but totally appropriate for the translation of this beloved Victorian work. Hey, whatever gets the kids reading, right? Pearce becomes more handsome as he becomes more alive when challenged in this brave new world; his departure from his 1899 life is welcome, so unpleasant a character as he was becoming.
I won't lie to you and say that this is a totally faithful retelling; the ending is cleaned up a little bit, the Traveller makes a different choice at the end, and a few other minor details. But the spirit of the book (OK, except for the end choice made by the Traveler, thereby kind of blowing the theme off) is there. Check it out.
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These reviews (c) 2002 Karina Montgomery. Please feel free to forward but just credit the reviewer in the text. Thanks.
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