... because director Simon Wells didn't have to travel back in time to ruin his great-grandfather's story: he just had to make this movie!
(badum tss)
More seriously, The Time Machine can be judged on two levels.
As science-fiction adventure it's passable, if conventional. Professor Alexander (Guy Pearce) builds a time machine and ends up in a remote future where two races inhabit Earth, the friendly Eloi and the monstrous Morlocks.
As an adaptation, it's disastrous: all social subtext has been completely erased. The Eloi are kind, helpful, loyal, environmental-friendly and graceful, while the Morlocks are a bunch of beastly subterranean cannibals. This robs the movie of any deeper meaning than a typical good versus evil struggle.
Performances are acceptable, but characters are so flat they fail to register. Pearce's Alexander is too anodyne to be interesting; Irons' Morlock leader appears too late to be relevant.
Soundtrack and visual effects are remarkable - too bad they are wasted in service of a banal script.
5,5/10
(badum tss)
More seriously, The Time Machine can be judged on two levels.
As science-fiction adventure it's passable, if conventional. Professor Alexander (Guy Pearce) builds a time machine and ends up in a remote future where two races inhabit Earth, the friendly Eloi and the monstrous Morlocks.
As an adaptation, it's disastrous: all social subtext has been completely erased. The Eloi are kind, helpful, loyal, environmental-friendly and graceful, while the Morlocks are a bunch of beastly subterranean cannibals. This robs the movie of any deeper meaning than a typical good versus evil struggle.
Performances are acceptable, but characters are so flat they fail to register. Pearce's Alexander is too anodyne to be interesting; Irons' Morlock leader appears too late to be relevant.
Soundtrack and visual effects are remarkable - too bad they are wasted in service of a banal script.
5,5/10