The Time Machine
The Time Machine is a 1960 science fiction film based on the 1865 H.G. Wells novel of the same name. The film was directed by George Pal, who also directed the famed 1953 version of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds. The Time Machine was renowned in its time for its usage of special effects and picked up an Academy Award for Special Effects in 1961. Among its more notable effects is the usage of time lapse photography to illustrate the world changing at a breakneck speed according to the point of view of the time traveller. The Time Machine was remade in 2002 by H.G. Wells’ great-grandson in a film that starred Guy Pearce and Jeremy Irons.
The Time Machine stars Rod Taylor, also known from the Hitchcock classic The Birds, as George, a Victorian era Englishman with an interest in time travel. He spends time working on a time machine in his home and discusses the possibilities of time travel with his sceptical friends, who appear to humour him up until he shows them a miniature model of the time machine and has it disappear in front of them. George’s friends dismiss this disappearance as a parlour trick and depart, only to have George, frustrated, get into his full-scale time machine and blast off through time. George departs through time, stopping at each major World War on the way, until he eventually reaches the year 802701.
Upon landing in the year 802701, George discovers the Eloi, a race of blond white individuals. He meets Weena, played by Yvette Mimieux, and soon discovers that the Eloi are largely apathetic. They have no knowledge of history or books, and very little curiosity. Instead, the Eloi merely sit around and stare off into space like a bunch of hippies. Frustrated as all hell this time, George decides to get back on his time machine and get out of this terrible time. Instead, he finds that it has been stolen by the enemy of the Eloi, the terrifying Muppet creatures, the Morlocks. The Morlocks are cannibalistic and feast on the apathetic Eloi, who think there’s nothing they can do about it. When the Morlocks take Weena, George springs into action worthy of Indiana Jones and takes out the Morlocks, getting his time machine back in the process. It’s quite a sight.
Thinking about the film in the context of its time, The Time Machine is an impressive little science-fiction swashbuckler story. Rod Taylor is the perfect chiselled-jaw hero, full of guts and bravado and not much else, two-fisting his way through countless Morlocks with fists of fury and fire. In today’s time, The Time Machine will likely lose a few steps and descends into camp value for the most part, which in my view is not a necessarily bad thing. The Time Machine, to me, represents one of those cases of really good quality camp. The Morlock fights are ridiculously over the top and meandering, almost like a bunch of kids playing around on a jungle gym complete with body slams and tackles. It’s a ludicrous and maddening sight, to say the least. Yet something in the way Taylor throws himself into these sequences with his stone-faced resolve makes it encouraging in its silliness.
The Time Machine is also interesting because of the view of the future. There are no flying machines or ridiculous elements of the future. Rather, the frightening nature of the future in H.G. Wells’ imagination lays within the idea that the people are apathetic to most everything. As the Morlocks’ signal goes off, the Eloi mindlessly walk through to their slaughter without a thought in their heads. They do this simply because they do this, it is what they know. When George arrives and witnesses this calamity for the future, his desire is to get back to the present and try to stop it from happening. His gutsy but ignorant resolve is contrast in the face of the Eloi’s notions of quitting, as George refuses to resign himself to fate and the Eloi have done nothing but for several thousands of years.
The Time Machine works as both a campy science-fiction adventure story and a frightening glimpse into the nature of apathy. It isn’t particularly well-acted and nothing stands out about the direction. The special effects, especially the time lapse photography as George embarks on his journey, are quite good. The Morlocks themselves are downright silly in any time frame, but the fight between George and the foul beasts remains highly entertaining and funny regardless of what year the audience may find themselves living in. I recommend The Time Machine for its fun adventure and its compelling plot points.
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