Subject: Review: Time Machine, The (2002)

From: Dennis Schwartz <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 2002 19:37:52 -0000

TIME MACHINE, THE (director: Simon Wells; screenwriters: John Logan, based on
the novel by H. G. Wells; cinematographer: Donald M. McAlpine; editor: Wayne
Wahrman; music: Klaus Badelt; cast: Guy Pearce (Alexander Hartdegen), Samantha
Mumba (Mara), Jeremy Irons (Über-Morlock), Orlando Jones (Vox), Mark Addy (David
Philby), Sienna Guillory (Emma), Phyllida Law (Mrs. Watchit), Omero Mumba
(Kalen), Alan Young (Flower Store Worker); Runtime: 96; DreamWorks Pictures;
2001-Australia) 

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz 

"The Time Machine" is a strangely unaffecting telling of the H.G. Wells novel
from 1895. It is told in a different manner than the novel and in a different
setting. There's some fun to be had in its second half, which reminds me of an
old-fashioned clean as a whistle adventure/romance story. The film takes place
in Manhattan instead of London. It stars Guy Pearce as the brilliant young
mathematician and Columbia professor, Alexander Hartdegen, who hopes to use the
unknown patent clerk Einstein's early science theories to build a time machine.
Alex is in love with the beautiful blonde Emma (Sienna Guillory), but on the
very night when he proposes marriage in Central Park, a mugger kills her, and he
plans for the next four years to travel back in time in his new machine and
alter history. His close friend David Philby sighs with disapproval that his
eccentric and curious mate can't stop feeling sorry for himself and get out
more. Alex's fusspot loyal housekeeper, Mrs. Watchit, agrees with Philby. She
will later wonder when her master disappears, what became of that silly lad. 

At least, this sci-fi film is more devilish than the 1960 George Pal version.
The director, Simon Wells--he's the great-grandson of H.G., and is recognized
for his animation work--keeps things moving by being silly when the story
finally gets rolling and does a nice job using computer-graphics for the film's
visual effects. As for John Logan's script, it never seems to evoke emotion from
the characters and allows the film to fall prey as a mostly visual effects film.

Attractive pop singer Samantha Mumba, who is  part Irish and Zambian, plays the
Eloi heroine Mara the star will fall in love with; while her young brother Omero
Mumba plays Kalen. He's her son in the film. 

The time machine is made up of whirling spheres enclosing a Victorian club
chair. Golden brass gauges spin to record the current date. A joystick controls
speed and direction. The time machine is also uniquely designed so that it will
always land near Times Square. There Alex gets out of his shiny golden
contraption in the years 2030 and 2037 and no one stares, except for him gaping
at the incredulous NYC of the near future. Not much of a fantasy so far, and he
can't change things that happened in the past. But that changes on his next trip
to some 800,000 years into the distant future. 

Alex lands in the same NYC place, but it is devastated because the moon fell off
the earth. 
The pacifist jungle-clad Eloi, the evolution of the new homo sapiens, are
tan-skinned in complexion due to years of racial mixing. They dwell in pods
affixed to mountains, which they get to by climbing up high rope ladders (New
Yorkers always seem to find the oddest places to live in). The Eloi suffer as
prey to the giant cannibalistic monsters called Morlocks, led by the
Über-Morlock (Jeremy Irons), who come up from the underground to hunt them down
for food. Alex fights back when his love interest Mara is kidnapped by them and
taken to their underground fortress, where she's imprisoned for breeding
purposes. 

Irons gives the film some flashes of life as he plays the über- creature with
some despotic panache. Other than his lively villain, this film offers no other
appealing performances. But There's a cute bit about a holographic figure played
by Orlando Jones. He is a fountain of information, as he's "a compendium of all
human knowledge" in the 2030 library -- a bouquet thrown to the merits of
artificial intelligence. But this flick is sanitized without Wells' warning to
the gods of science that they don't have all the answers or his socialist
messages to the capitalists about the unequal society they have created. 

REVIEWED ON 3/14/2002     GRADE: C 

Dennis Schwartz: "Ozus' World Movie Reviews" 

http://www.sover.net/~ozus 

[email-masked] 

© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED   DENNIS SCHWARTZ

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X-RT-RatingText: C