Rating: 
Summary: H.G. Wells revisited but also reduced
Review: This film is a very much enriched adaptation of the book by H.G. Wells. First it contains a romantic beginning and a voyage in the past to correct the death of the girlfriend of the hero. Unluckily you cannot change the past, you can only change the circumstances of events. But the main bulk of the film is of course going to the distant future, to see what the earth and humanity will be. It projects the tale in the book into thefinal episode of the book : the disappearance of the hero with his time machine. The film also changes the philosophical meaning of the book. In the book, humanity in the future is divided in two species, one living underground and working, the descendents of the working class, and one living on the surface on the luxuriant nature without having to work, the descendents of the bourgeoisie. In other words H.G. Wells invests darwinism into the schematic vision of the first industrial revolution and its class struggle. Unluckily in the future the working species hunts the non-working species who are their meat. In the film the same evolution is caused by a natural catastrophe : the disintegration of the moon and its falling onto the earth. We can note that the surface species has regressed to a primitive state and the underground species has become some kind of devilish industrial species that works to produce nothing, the slaves of their own underground pointless industry, some modern representation of the devil or hell. One point is common : this world has lost all connection with god, all religious dimension, and this future world is the result of some darwinistic evolution. It is the future of humanity after the death of God, though less clearly in the film than in the book. The rest you have to see by yourself. The special effects are quite good and they really look natural. The suspense of the film is also very strong. But I will regret two things : some of the technical points are a lot fuzzier than in the book, hence we have to accept a lot more unrealistic questionable points and I do not think H.G. Wells envisaged the idea of teaching the surface species how to fight : they were absolutely non-working and for them fighting was not even a concept they could imagine, invent or learn. In fact, and here the film is short, to fight you need to believe in some higher and stronger force that gives you the objective and energy to fight. This is often some religious representation of the group that justifies, hence sustains fighting against other groups. But this shortcoming reveals a shortcoming in the book : any living species will have a survival instinct and hence fighting will be natural, not something you learn like in the film, not something you ignore like in the book, something you know because of your hormones.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
Rating: 
Summary: A unique sci-fi story turned into a run-of-the-mill film
Review: HG Wells' short novel gives a filmmaker the perfect set-up for a smart science fiction movie. The plot is very thin, allowing the filmmaker to add all kinds of details and characters. But the visual potential is great, something a good director can really sink his teeth into. Unfortunately, Simon Wells blew it. He added characters and plot details, but none of them are compelling. The main character, played by Guy Pearce, is a romantic. He finds the love of his life and loses her, more than once (and more than one woman as well). This romance feels all wrong, like the love story tacked on to so many recent special-effect-heavy films (Gangs of New York, Attack of the Clones, etc.). The visual aspect is good in small parts, but most of the movie looks silly or boring. The urban landscapes (New York in the future and London in the past) are beautifully-built. The laboratory and the time machine itself look good, too. But soon enough, the story moves to a rainforest that looks exactly as you would imagine it. There are no surprises and no creativity. The Morlocks have very little thought put into them, as well. They look like dust-covered Uruk-hai. You know the story is too complex when you need *two* extraneous characters to explain everything (Orlando Jones and Jeremy Irons). The explanations don't help, anyway. Although the plot is simple on paper, on the screen it becomes needlessly complex. This is an inept, confusing, ugly movie. Guy Pearce can carry the film (he's enjoyable to watch), but that's not enough. It's too bad. In better hands, this could have been one of the all-time great science fiction films.
Rating: 
Summary: The Age Of Technology
Review: Here we are in the age of technology; we're smart, we're advanced, and we get machines to do everything for us. The George Foreman grill is a machine that grills our hamburgers for us, and Guy Pearce is a machine that does our acting for us.
Not to worry, though. Not everything is done by machines. The special effects and monsters in The Time Machine, for example, were clearly done by two years olds.
Here in this brilliant age of brilliant minds, we find yet another version of the standard sci-fi movie shown in films like Planet of the Apes (the old version) and Planet of the Apes (the new version). A smart scientist guy goes to the future, hooks up with a girl who doesn't talk very often (if at all), and arrogantly declares that things can change before saving the girl and her species from some sort of monster species of primate. Stick with fantasy. Although sci-fi has dropped to an all-time low in intelligence -- SIGNS!!! Not to mention any names -- fantasy has peaked with the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Rating:
Summary: A Pointless Diversion.
Review: What we have here is a film that is not being about anything - and that in sci-fi, usually the more thoughtful kind of action movie. There's some fun super-techy-future mumbo jumbo, but if there is a larger statement here it's something involving pursuit of love and avoidance of hungry monsters, which seems a little too easy.. The result feels rather like watching a rube-goldberg contraption as it goes through the motions leading to a moment of .. no payoff. Just a fizzle towards the end. The original book actually had a far-left-wing slant which is now far too radioactive for this kind of popcorn matinee. These people should have known what they were getting into and either made the real movie with that plot, or found another larger theme. Saving the would-be girlfriend who only has 15 lines of dialogue and her tribe of clueless meat-puppets does not cut the mustard. This is a non-hunting dog. Don't waste your time.
Rating:
Summary: Not an improvement on the original...
Review: I was very disappointed in this movie as well; the only thing that I enjoyed were the special effects, but it wasn't as good as the original. Maybe they should have left well enough alone.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Review: With all the hype this movie had, it was one of the biggest disappointments ever. Two hours of my life that i wish i had back.
Rating: 
Summary: Patchy version of science fiction classic
Review: This movie takes an unconscionable amount of time to get going and we are well into the movie before we get to the book's most famous creations -the Eloi and the Morlocks .
The early part of the movie sets about establishing a motive for the time travelling-and the movie discards the notion prevalent in the Wells book that intellectual curiousity is at the root of the desire and instead gives Guy Pearce a personal motive ,that of trying to prevent the death of his fiancee .In my view this is both a departure from and a cheapening of the novel which also seriously undermines Wells' philosophy by abandoning the authors explanation for the Eloi and Morlock -they are descendants of the effete aristocracy and the working class respectively-and substitutes an extra terrestrial basis for the divergence. .
Presumably the movie makers did not have confidence in the ability of the juvenile audience at whom they are aiming being able to grasp even rudimentary pollitical theories!
However we are talking about a movie not a book and judged as a simple minded piece of eye chewing gum this is OK once you get past the slow start and things pick up once the Morlocks put in an appearance and terrorise the rather insipid Eloi into whose midst the time traveller has fallen .They are striking creations and it is easy to see where the budget of the movie went.Scenes of them hunting the Eloi are stromgly reminiscent of scenes in Planet of the Apes and I suspect it was that movie rather than the Wells novel that was the inspiration for the movie.
I did not find the movie at all well acted ,Pearce was a tad insipid for my taste and the aupporting cast ,with the exception of Phyllida Law as the housekeeper ,was barely competent.Jeremy Irons had trouble keeping a staright face as the chief Morlock and I only hope for mhis sake that the cheque cleared -what with this and Dungeons and Dragons his reputation as an actor os substance is under threat.
Watch it for the Morlocks.
The rest is woeful
Rating:
Summary: Mediocre
Review: This movie tries to recreate the world of H.G. Well's Time Machine. Guy Pierce starts as the time traveling hero. In the beginning of the movie, he loses his fiance in a tragic mugging, so he tries to use his time machine to bring her back. Unfortunately, he experiences some difficulties and he is tossed into the distant future. There he encounters a peaceful and gentle people. It seemed as if he had found paradise. However, this world has a terrible secret. The bad point of this movie is that the Morlocks are a bit disappointing. They just look a little stupid, like blue monkey puppets, and they don't inspire any fear. They need to be a bit more dreadful. Also the leader of the Morlocks was far too easy to defeat and it was way too easy for the hero to enter the Morlock lair. Also Guy Pierce doesn't come across very well in this movie. The role calls for someone driven by deep emotion, but the expression on his face barely changes at all during the whole movie. Overall, this movie is mediocre.
Rating:
Summary: H.G. Wells' Time Machine?
Review: It would be refreshing to see a movie that honored its literary heritage. This is not that movie. It's surprising how many people think that this production follows the general storyline of "The Time Machine," by H.G. Wells. If anything, it maintains the *skeleton* of the novel's story. And a rotted and broken skeleton at that. It's also ironic that there's a slight resentment toward the movie for 'preaching.' What this movie 'preaches' is paltry compared to Well's indicting social commentary. Make a movie without the Time Traveler having a love interest - how about the genius inventor travels through time solely because of intellectual curiosity rather than sentimentalism? Give subtitles for the Eloi's speech, and let us watch the Time Traveler learn it. Better yet, don't give subtitles *until* the TT learns it. This story was originally meant to primarily convey a social message, not an attempt at a love story set in a sci-fi setting with a dash of, of all things, ethnic mumbo jumbo. Rigidly adhering to the novel might not provide quite enough material for a feature length movie, so why not (as this version did do) expand upon the TT stops throughout time? We don't need new subplots, just brief glimpses into other worlds. Maybe such a movie wouldn't sell. Oh well.
Rating:
Summary: this movie indicates the "Wane of Humanity"
Review: After reading some of the reviews I felt I had to say something. Sci fi is not about special effects, it is about thinking about things in a different way. This movie failed to do that and seemed more like a forced Pollitical Correctness preach peppered with a monster head-bashing fest for distraction much like every other movie these days. So really your just counter dictiong what H. G. Well's original story was all about. Our minds and indeed our crainiums have shrunk in recent years(as medical profiles and IQ tests will show it's a fact) Generation Y is less intelligent(by a margin) than Gen X and so on and thier attention spans is considerably less. Just as Wells predicted. Gen Z(or whatever) will move even closer to the Eloi, which in the book are portraid as pretty weak and dumb(with no common sense either). though most people couldn't handle that in a movie like this.
H. G.'s grandson must have a rebellious streak. With this movie the Drama was severely lacking as well sci-fi being totally out of the picture period. The characters were believable but uninspiring. I don't think the "Time Traveler" should take responsiblity for everything, like the Samantha Mumba character(Weena equivilent) and all the eloi keep preaching to him. That's just another echo of our own modern scociety saying that "My problems are becasue of YOU." It's just plain rude! 800,000 A D will not be a world of nay sayers, becasue no one will know what a time traveler is all about. If I were an Eloi I would be more concerned about saving my skin than preaching the morals of 2002. If you want a good movie skip this garbage and go for the Rod Taylor version. If your a Time Machine Freak, get the Limited ED DVD, but If you want to be truely enlightened, READ THE BOOK!!! Oddly enough my Dad at 63, whose twice my age liked this movie more than I did. But not much more.
| 
