Where would
you go? How about Skeggie for the Bank Holiday weekend?
 |
|
Great story,
not a bad original film, terrible remake.
Nigel Bell
Former Neighbours
star Guy Pearce is on a bit of a role at the moment.
Earning good
reviews for playing Mr Nasty in the Count of Monte Cristo, he sadly
seems to have made The Time Machine while half asleep.
Considering
it's directed by HG Wells' great-grandson, the story has been dramatically
changed with it's heart and passion ripped out.
The plot
Mathematician Alexander Hartdegen (Pearce) romantically proposes
to his fiancee, only for his wife-to-be to be brutally shot down
in a botched robbery.
 |
| If I hide
in here Kylie and Jason will never find me |
Hartdegen locks
himself away for the next four years and builds a time machine.
He believes
he can go back in time and stop the slaying taking place.
All he succeeds
in doing is seeing his girlfriend killed in a different manner.
So he determines
to head into the future to find out why he can't change the past.
He eventually
goes forward 800,000 years to a time when the Earth has been ravaged
by the disintegration of the moon (caused by inept settlers).
Humans have
evolved into two races - the Eloi, passive, land dwelling - and
the Morlocks, underground creatures who are intelligent and farm
the Eloi for food.
It's up to Hartdegen
to save his new found friends (brother and sister Mumba's) from
the grip of Uber-Morloch Jeremy Irons.
The verdict
This really is a let down. The original George Pal movie from
the 1960's (with Rod Taylor in the starring role) was hardly a classic
but has become something of a cult over time.
 |
| Am I wearing
too much? |
This version
is unlikely to be held in such great esteem.
Its greatest
problem is the acting.
None of the
characters have any soul. Pearce veers from being a buffoon in the
opening scenes to Mr Serious without any conviction.
Mark Addy is
wasted as his friend Philby, adopting a cod-American accent which
doesn't work.
Another wasted
opportunity is the cameo appearance of Alan Young, who played Philby
in the original film.
He appears as
a florist - in profile, so you don't actually see his face.
Jeremy Irons
hams it up - he's Scar from the Lion King again!
The only pairing
which seems natural is pop star Samantha Mumba and her brother Omero.
 |
| Excuse
me Sir, can explain to you and the audience what's happened
since you went forward in time? |
Orlando Jones
pops up (literally) as a hologram library attendant, who's only
function, it seems, is to fill in the gaps as Pearce moves through
time and to be an excuse as to why Mumba's character can speak English.
The Morlocks
veer from being scary to something out of a low-budget Dr Who and
it's amazing how, for a race which lives underground, their eyes
adapt perfectly to sunlight when hunting their prey (an aspect even
the original got right).
As for the time
machine itself, well, being 2002 it has to be bigger and brighter
than the original but that doesn't add any value.
In it's defence,
the special effects are good, but it's not enough to raise a poor
film.
If only they
could go back in time and start again.
|
