George Pal’s film version brings H.G. Wells' original story to life with a good combination of suspense, action and effective special effects.
Directed by George Pal
Screenplay by David Duncan
Based on The Time Machine,1895 novel by H. G. Wells
Produced by George Pal
Narrated by Rod Taylor
Cinematography: Paul C. Vogel
Edited by George Tomasini
Music by Russell Garcia
Production companies: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Galaxy Films
Distributed by Loew's
Running time: 103 minutes
Budget: $827,000 - 829,000
Box office: $2.61 million
Cast
Rod Taylor as H. George Wells
Alan Young as David Filby/James Filby
Yvette Mimieux as Weena
Sebastian Cabot as Dr. Philip Hillyer
Tom Helmore as Anthony Bridewell
Whit Bissell as Walter Kemp
Doris Lloyd as Mrs. Watchett
Paul Frees as voice of the Rings
Trailer
A man’s quest for a future Utopian society.
The means: travelling forward in time in a machine.
The Journey: different time periods leading to increasing disillusionment.
Final destination: a civilisation several thousand years into the future divided into cannibalistic subterranean and docile gentle surface dwellers.
But is there any escape from the one constant that might transcend time itself: human nature in all its facets?
Read on for more.....
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PART ONE:
HAPPY NEW YEAR 1900
“That's exactly what I have - All the time in the world!...”
Out of the dark void flows the dimension of time itself in the form of familiar objects crafted by the ingenuity of humankind to mark, measure, quantify and tabulate its seemingly inexorable passage: sundials, hour-glass, water clocks, chiming mechanical clocks and the seemingly eternal and comfortingly familiar presence of Big Ben with the reassuring sound of the tolling of its bell.
The sounds marking the passage of time rise to a crescendo before coming to an abrupt halt as we shift to the other three dimensions that also formed after the Big Bang that ushered in our universe and through which we conduct our day-to-day affairs within the strict confines of the four dimensional parameters.
January 5, 1900, a new century. It is the end of the Victorian and the beginning of the Edwardian era – a time of great advancements in scientific discoveries, engineering marvels, empire-building and the ‘heroic’ age of exploration. And yet, for all the advancements there is inevitably a price to be paid as is the case in any era…..
It is a time in which life moves at a pace still dictated by the horse-power of real horses and the leg power of cyclists which the lonely figure of David Filby manages to dodge and avoid as he makes his way to the front door of a cottage. It's wintertime and Filby draws his coat firmly around himself and knocks on the front door.
His knock is answered by Mrs. Watchett, the house-keeper. Upon entering, he hurriedly makes his way toward the library where three men are seated impatiently awaiting the arrival of their host. The silence is punctuated by the cacophonous ticking of innumerable timepieces situated about the room.
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Dr. Philip Hillyer, a portly no-nonsense man who does not appreciate a lack of punctuality and views it as being unacceptable conduct and is “outright rude of the man!” In fact, to his way of thinking, “it’'s not the behaviour of a gentleman.”
Anthony Bridewell, a fashionable man of means who spends his time being acquainted with the bottoms of whiskey and wine glasses. Although an amiable fellow, he is of a class whose life amounts to little more than a dissolute waste of time without much purpose.
Walter Kemp, a middle aged practical man who has a strong dislike of having his time wasted. George’s non-attendance is to him “a confounded waste of time!” and that he has “any number of more important things to do.”
As the clocks continue ticking marking the passage of time with a mechanical consensus, the atmosphere of impatience and discomfort increases and still the unoccupied chair remains vacant. As the time reaches the hour of eight, Grandfather clock and its smaller brethren suddenly proclaim the arrival of the appointed hour. Time marches on irrespective of what anyone can and cannot do. In this shrine to time, the men’s host seems to pay little head to Time’s dictates. Very unusual for someone who is “usually very prompt, precise and punctual.”
The guests have been invited to dinner by their friend and host George, the owner of the cottage. He asked them to arrive at 8:00 p.m. and it is that time now. However, as we have seen, George himself has yet to arrive. Remove the element of certainty and predictability and see how disconcerting it can be. The men are less than happy about being kept waiting except for Filby who is far more patient, tolerant and understanding and concludes that George has “undoubtedly been detained, that's all.”
Shortly after 8.00 pm George’s house-keeper Mrs. Watchett, enters the room and hands a note to Filby. She informs the men that George has been missing for several days and that she’s hardly caught a glimpse of him lately and that “he never leaves th laboratory and comes out only to nibble at his meals.” The note states that George thought he might be late, and if that was the case, then they could start dinner without him.
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The man staggers closer and manages to take a seat at the table. In the light it can be seen that it is the men’s friend and host, George. His clothing is tattered and filthy and his face bares the marks of bruises and lacerations. Wanting food and drink before providing answers to any queries from the others, Bridewell is on hand with a glass of wine which George drains with alacrity. George follows this up with a request that would cause any vegetarian to shudder with horror: “Meat...I'm hungry for meat!”
Soon it is time for George to tell the others what had happened. Despite his fatigue he is quite keen to relate his tale to them which began when they were all together five days previously, “the last day of Eighteen Hundred Ninety Nine.”
Between a tick and a tock of a pendulum clock memory melts and dissolves the present and transports us back in time…..
“Why is it that we usually ignore the fourth dimension? Because we have no freedom to move in it…...when it comes to Time, we are prisoners”
The image of an ebony box atop a table begins to emerge and resolve itself. It is the “result of two years' labor” and has barely been completed before the beginning of the new century. In the library, all four men consider the box before them.
When informed that the object in question “has to do with time,” Hillyer’s mind naturally and predictably turns towards the likelihood of its being a practical device such as a “reliable timepiece” that can be utilized by the nation’s military. Filby, however knows better and leaves the way open for George to explain what he means when he refers to time.
When speaking of time, George is referring to the fourth dimension, the other three being height, length and breadth which one can move through. These dimensions form the parameters that our universe has bestowed upon us. Humanity, however has yet to figure out a way to travel through the fourth dimension of time and that is what George has been working on: the invention of a device that will allow him to do so.
George goes on to explain that “for an object to exist at all, it must exist in the fourth dimension....and that fourth dimension is duration....Time.” Th problem however, is that unlike the other three dimensions “we usually ignore the fourth dimension because we have no freedom to move in it…..we are prisoners.“ ”
Meeting with scepticism from the others, George resorts to providing them with “a demonstration of the possibility of movement in the fourth dimension.”
Despite his friends’ scepticism, some interesting objections are indeed raised;
Bridewell: “If you start floating around in the future, aren't you likely to mess things up for the rest of us?” Perhaps that could also be asked about time-travelling into the past and inadvertently altering the future with potentially dire consequences?
Hillyer: He is positively certain that “the future is already there. It's irrevocable and cannot be changed.” Is that true? Can the future be affected or indeed changed by the decisions we make now? Or if the future is pre-determined or pre-ordained, then what is the point of our existence? Could knowing what may happen in the future help us change it for the better by acting differently in the present? Or will whatever we decide to do now simply result in the same inevitable future outcome?
George opens a box on the table to reveal a scale model of his machine. It is a thing of beauty consisting of a seat, a control panel with a lever in front, and a rotating disk in back, surrounded by a brass railing. It is a product of craftsmanship from a by-gone era. No mass-produced futuristic ugly angular concept device here!
“Happy New Year…..Goodbye, George….Happy Twentieth Century”
As the on-lookers try to recover their composure, the question arises as to what to do with “such a contraption?” For George it is simple, he intends to take a journey into the future while accepting the associated risks. However, his demonstration is met with disbelief and is put down to being some kind of clever conjuring trick. Rather than wasting his time on such nonsense, it is put to George that with wars being fought elsewhere in the Empire, Britain could use inventors like him.
When even Filby seems to acknowledge Dr. Hillyer’s seemingly sensible and practical point of view, George with an air of disappointment and resignation closes the lid of the machine model’s box with a decisive snap as if a final decision has been made in his mind.
After donning their hats, capes and coat, George's friends take their leave and exit the house, wishing George a happy new century.
“Why this preoccupation with Time?”
George re-enters the cottage after closing the front door, leans his back against it and thinks to himself in silent contemplation. Here stands a man who feels himself to be both out of place and out of time, ahead of a world that is just not ready to accept the seemingly impossible. George suddenly catches sight of a nearby newspaper with a headline proclaiming another victory by the Boer Army.
So this is what stirs the imagination and fires the hearts and minds of humanity in this day and age: the beating of war drums and the blaring of military bugles as nations march blindly off off to war. It is in this destructive capacity that a man of his talents would best be appreciated!
With clear-eyed resolution George proceeds to do his own marching toward a different destination. Fired with anger, he begins in the library at his writing desk but before he can do anything he stops upon hearing his name being softly spoken. He then looks behind him and notices Filby sitting in a chair with his back turned to him near the fireplace.
Filby has deliberately remained behind out of concern for his friend who has been “behaving oddly for over a month” and seems to have changed enormously. A very Edwardian way of asking someone, “are you OK?” Filby goes on to enquire of George why it is he is so pre-occupied with time. George replies that he doesn’t care much for the time he was born into in that it seems that “people aren't dying fast enough these days” and that science is called upon to “invent new, more efficient weapons to depopulate the earth.”
Filby feels that all we can do under the circumstances is deal with what we are confronted with and if George believes that he doesn’t’ have to, then what? Escape into the past and become a Greek, a Roman or one of the Pharaohs?
George says he prefers the future. Confronted with the seriousness of his friend’s intentions and his determination, Filby questions the authenticity of the earlier experiment with the model time machine asserting that “there are a number of ways of doing that trick.” Even if it were possible to travel through time, Fllby states that he would have “no desire to tempt the laws of Providence” and that such matters are “not for man to trifle with.” According to Filby, it would be better that such a machine as the one proposed and built by George be destroyed before it winds up destroying him.
Sensing the worst and fearing for his friend, Filby invites George to come and spend New Years with him and his wife and their baby. George however, declines the offer stating that he'd rather spend New Years alone. Still under a ill-feeling akin to a premonition, Filby asks George to promise him he won't leave the house tonight. George promises he won't walk out the door which under the rules of space-time he is about to circumvent and re-write, it is a promise he can technically keep. Then he invites Filby to come and bring the other three men over for dinner on Friday, January 5, 1900, five days from now.
After Filby departs, George proceeds to the writing desk with the intention of writing the note that will be read five days later. Mrs. Watchett enters with his smoking jacket and they both wish each other a happy new year. After Mrs. Watchett leaves, George in a somewhat symbolic act looks at the old calendar that reads: "December 3l. 1899," rips the final sheet from the pad, which is then replaced with the new 1900 one. The new century calendar symbolically highlights what George is about to do. After writing the note, George inserts it into an envelope and places it on the mantle-piece where it can be easily noticed. He then rises and moves in the direction through the three dimensions of space toward a destination that can only be arrived at via the fourth dimension……
“In the year 2525, if man is still alive
If woman can survive, they may find……”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
PART TWO:
20th CENTURY JOY-RIDE
“In the year 3535
Ain't gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lie
Everything you think, do and say
Is in the pill you took today….”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“ And yet by my watch which was in the machine with me, only a few seconds had passed”
George unlocks the door to his laboratory which has the appearance of once having been a greenhouse complete with a glass skylight. Our attention is soon monopolized by the presence of a full-sized duplicate of the miniature time machine model that has already sallied forth on its rendezvous with the distant future.
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It’s creator’s expert eye suddenly discerns an imperfection that must be corrected and so George quickly detaches a crystalline lever from the machine and sets about polishing its rough edges with a polishing buffer.
You ain't gonna need your teeth
Won't need your eyes
You won't find a thing to chew
Nobody's gonna look at you”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
Infused with new-found confidence, George pushes the handle forward a little bit further this time. Watching more carefully as time passes, he notices that the candle rapidly burns down until it is extinguished. The clock’s hands spin around the dial while the sun performs an ever increasingly rapid procession along the heavens. A normally sedate snail seems to have discovered a new sense of urgency in its life as it races across the floor. Flowers majestically open and close with the coming and going daylight. From George’s point of view within the confines of his machine, only a few seconds have passed.
Meanwhile, across the street at a department store, Goerge catches sight of a female mannequin in the window. George then pushes the lever forward a little more, and time outside the machine accelerates. Successive days pass by rapidly almost melding into a continuous flowing river of time.
It is now the summer of 1900, as George slows the machine and daylight is once again distinguishable from darkness. Across the street the mannequin in the store window is attired in a different style of clothes. As George continues his journey into the future, he is struck by the changing fashions as modelled by what will become that one unchanging constant, that anchor to the past that seems to be continuously receding into a vortex of unending change. The faster that Goerge traverses time, it is the very seasons themselves that rapidly flash by……..until suddenly the light is blotted out with the unexpected boarding up of the laboratory’s windows. The machine has been brought to a stop: September 1917…...
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"In the year 5555
Your arms hangin’ limp at your sides
Your legs got nothin' to do
Some machine's doin' that for you"
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
With the world outside completely obscured from view, George disembarks from the machine and slowly makes his way though what was once his laboratory and home. Here he is disconcertedly confronted by the inevitable process of entropy wrought on all things by the passage of time. His laboratory and the rest of the house is dirty, dust laden and festooned with cobwebs, the result of having been abandoned for years. It is as if time has stood still, an impression highlighted by the fact that all the clocks within have now fallen silent.
After kicking aside the boards covering the front door, George makes his way to the outside of the house, the garden of which is overgrown with weeds which further reinforces the impression of abandonment and neglect. The sundial rests out of its proper alignment which George, the presumed master of time tries to correct. A wooden fence now encircles the house and George, the literal breaker of obstacles and barriers exits through a gap he creates and steps on to the street. As he walks onto the road, he is startled by an automobile, something which he has never encountered before.
A man wearing a soldier's uniform exits the car and begins to ascend the steps of a store. George is thrilled to see what he believes to be his old friend Filby (minus his moustache). It doesn’t take long for the young soldier to realise that George has confused him with his father. This man is David Filby’s son, James Filby, who was an infant back in 1900. George is shattered to learn that David Filby had been killed in World War I,The Great War or the war to end all wars. A vital link to his own time now no longer exists. George learns from James that he (“some inventor”) as the owner of the house across the street had disappeared around the turn of the century. As executor of George’s estate, David Filby “refused to liquidate it” believing that George would return to claim it some day. The house had also acquired a reputation as being haunted.
James is dumb-founded to learn that George is unaware that England has been at war with Germany since 1914! After saying farewell to James, who is concerned for this stranger with the strange attire, the despondent and dejected George feeling like a ghost himself returns to the site of his own house to continue his journey through time…..
“In the year 6565
You won't need no husband, won't need no wife
You'll pick your son, pick your daughter too
From the bottom of a long glass tube”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
Having returned to the time machine, his remaining means of control, George journeys into the future once more. He soon begins to gain more experience in handling the Machine and finds that he is “able to see the changing world in a series of glimpses.” Of particular interest is the ever fluctuating hemlines of women’s dresses as displayed by the eternally present and ageless mannequin. His house further suffers the ravages of time as he proceeds through the 1920s and 1930s. Suddenly, in 1940 the laboratory along with the machine starts to judder and shake. Concerned that the machine might be malfunctioning, George brings it to a halt in June 1940. The disturbance is the result of aircraft dropping bombs, anti-aircraft batteries responding and fires burning, all the result of another war, a new war. George deduces that “there must have been an interval of peace in between these wars” and yet nothing seems to have been learned apart from preparing “even more effective means of destroying one another.”
George presses on into the future to see the outcome, only to witness his laboratory catching fire before abruptly disappearing. His house has been destroyed by a German bomb, but George now in the open, remains safe within the time machine.
“In the year 7510
If God's a coming, He oughta make it by then
Maybe He'll look around Himself and say
Guess it's time for the judgement day”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“If the button is pushed,
You won't find a thing to chew
Nobody's gonna look at you”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“ ....to see flowers closing their eyes for the night, changes that normally took hours, occurring in seconds, was beautiful”
Meanwhile, across the street at a department store, Goerge catches sight of a female mannequin in the window. George then pushes the lever forward a little more, and time outside the machine accelerates. Successive days pass by rapidly almost melding into a continuous flowing river of time.
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Your arms hangin’ limp at your sides
Your legs got nothin' to do
Some machine's doin' that for you"
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“ Who are you, sir?”
“Just a stranger who once knew your father”
With the world outside completely obscured from view, George disembarks from the machine and slowly makes his way though what was once his laboratory and home. Here he is disconcertedly confronted by the inevitable process of entropy wrought on all things by the passage of time. His laboratory and the rest of the house is dirty, dust laden and festooned with cobwebs, the result of having been abandoned for years. It is as if time has stood still, an impression highlighted by the fact that all the clocks within have now fallen silent.
After kicking aside the boards covering the front door, George makes his way to the outside of the house, the garden of which is overgrown with weeds which further reinforces the impression of abandonment and neglect. The sundial rests out of its proper alignment which George, the presumed master of time tries to correct. A wooden fence now encircles the house and George, the literal breaker of obstacles and barriers exits through a gap he creates and steps on to the street. As he walks onto the road, he is startled by an automobile, something which he has never encountered before.
James is dumb-founded to learn that George is unaware that England has been at war with Germany since 1914! After saying farewell to James, who is concerned for this stranger with the strange attire, the despondent and dejected George feeling like a ghost himself returns to the site of his own house to continue his journey through time…..
“In the year 6565
You won't need no husband, won't need no wife
You'll pick your son, pick your daughter too
From the bottom of a long glass tube”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“It didn't seem possible they could go on fighting all these years and still have the means of fighting”
Having returned to the time machine, his remaining means of control, George journeys into the future once more. He soon begins to gain more experience in handling the Machine and finds that he is “able to see the changing world in a series of glimpses.” Of particular interest is the ever fluctuating hemlines of women’s dresses as displayed by the eternally present and ageless mannequin. His house further suffers the ravages of time as he proceeds through the 1920s and 1930s. Suddenly, in 1940 the laboratory along with the machine starts to judder and shake. Concerned that the machine might be malfunctioning, George brings it to a halt in June 1940. The disturbance is the result of aircraft dropping bombs, anti-aircraft batteries responding and fires burning, all the result of another war, a new war. George deduces that “there must have been an interval of peace in between these wars” and yet nothing seems to have been learned apart from preparing “even more effective means of destroying one another.”
George presses on into the future to see the outcome, only to witness his laboratory catching fire before abruptly disappearing. His house has been destroyed by a German bomb, but George now in the open, remains safe within the time machine.
“In the year 7510
If God's a coming, He oughta make it by then
Maybe He'll look around Himself and say
Guess it's time for the judgement day”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“The labour of centuries gone in an instant”
“If the button is pushed,
there's no runnin' away,
There'll be no one to save
There'll be no one to save
with the world in a grave…”
(Eve Of Destruction
by Barry McGuire)
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(Eve Of Destruction
by Barry McGuire)
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A odd disconcerting sound causes George to bring the machine to a stop in August of 1966. The sounds are the wailing of air-raid sirens. Getting out of the machine, George looks around and discovers that the ground formally occupied by his house is now the site of an urban park. George soon comes across a plaque which contains the inscription: "This park is dedicated by James Filby to his father's devotion for his friend George." Meanwhile, around him there is great commotion and tumult as people hurriedly make their way to air-raid shelters, urged on by uniformed wardens. In this world of futuristic sky-scrapered and mono-railed modernity, George is completely disoriented and perplexed.
As the last of the citizenty disappear into their subterranean burrows, George catches site of a considerably aged James Filby exiting his store wearing a silver uniform and clutching a white helmet. Far from wanting to hang around and engage in pleasant conversation, James is intent on getting into the shelters as fast as his arthritic limbs will convey him “before the mushrooms start sprouting.” Of course, this doesn’t make any sense to George any more than the terms ‘World Wide Web’ or ‘Streaming’ or ‘Woke’ would to someone in the 1950s or 1960s.
Suddenly, it begins to dawn on James that George somehow looks familiar. George explains to him that they had last spoken in that very same place back 49 years earlier in 1917. James recognizes him as the same man he had spoken to but before he can discover how George seems not to have aged in all that time, the incessant wail of the air-raid sirens starts up again cutting their reunion short. The sirens warn of the approaching nuclear bomb and James scurries off toward the shelter.
Without a meaningful frame of reference or shared experience, George full of confused thoughts and feelings makes his way back to his time machine. At that moment the bomb detonates causing buildings in the city to burst into flame and disintegrate- a city constructed over a period of two thousand years destroyed in mere seconds. The nuclear explosion results in a major geological disturbance, the creation of a volcano that unleashes a sea of lava that destroys anything in its path. A fortunately uninjured George who having been knocked down by the shock wave blast, has just borne witness to this holocaust. All he can do is jump back into the time machine and escape from the earth’s rage-filled roar and the oaths and obscenities issuing from long cruel deep wounds inflicted humanity’s knives of greed and hate.
As our Time Traveller makes his escape away from the 20th Century and further into the future, will he find anything left that signified that humanity had once existed on this planet? Some plaque perhaps with an inscription:
As the last of the citizenty disappear into their subterranean burrows, George catches site of a considerably aged James Filby exiting his store wearing a silver uniform and clutching a white helmet. Far from wanting to hang around and engage in pleasant conversation, James is intent on getting into the shelters as fast as his arthritic limbs will convey him “before the mushrooms start sprouting.” Of course, this doesn’t make any sense to George any more than the terms ‘World Wide Web’ or ‘Streaming’ or ‘Woke’ would to someone in the 1950s or 1960s.
Suddenly, it begins to dawn on James that George somehow looks familiar. George explains to him that they had last spoken in that very same place back 49 years earlier in 1917. James recognizes him as the same man he had spoken to but before he can discover how George seems not to have aged in all that time, the incessant wail of the air-raid sirens starts up again cutting their reunion short. The sirens warn of the approaching nuclear bomb and James scurries off toward the shelter.
Without a meaningful frame of reference or shared experience, George full of confused thoughts and feelings makes his way back to his time machine. At that moment the bomb detonates causing buildings in the city to burst into flame and disintegrate- a city constructed over a period of two thousand years destroyed in mere seconds. The nuclear explosion results in a major geological disturbance, the creation of a volcano that unleashes a sea of lava that destroys anything in its path. A fortunately uninjured George who having been knocked down by the shock wave blast, has just borne witness to this holocaust. All he can do is jump back into the time machine and escape from the earth’s rage-filled roar and the oaths and obscenities issuing from long cruel deep wounds inflicted humanity’s knives of greed and hate.
“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away. “
(Ozymandias
by Percy Bysshe Shelley)
Part Three:
Centuries And Eons Of Darkness
“In the year 8510
God is gonna shake His mighty head
He'll either say I'm pleased where man has been
Or tear it down, and start again”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“Had man finally learned to control both the elements and themselves?”
Before George and his machine can be engulfed by the flow of red hot lava, he pushes the lever forward to its furthest position. Amid the sound of high-pitched humming, the oncoming lava seems to leap forward and transform into a red haze that permeates the machine’s interior.
“And how many years must a mountain exist
Before it is washed to the sea?”
(Blowin' In The Wind
by Bob Dylan)
Over the course of thousands of years, the rock eventually erodes and to his relief George once again finds himself free and out in the open. At first, he has the impression of a bleak and desolate landscape with no hint of humanity’s presence. He watches as trees “spring up like plumes of green smoke.” The unchanging colour of the landscape suggests that there are no longer changing seasons.
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Part Four:
802701
Paradise Unattained
“In the year 9595
I'm kinda wonderin' if man is gonna be alive
He's taken everything this old earth can give
And he ain't put back nothing”
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
“I hoped to learn a great deal.
I hoped to take back the knowledge,
the advancement, mankind made.
Instead what do I find?”
Has George at last arrived at a point in time when “the earth stayed green” and there was no more winter or wars and when “man finally learned to control both the elements and themselves?" With only one way to find out, he pulls hard on the lever and the humming sound diminishes. However, he stops too fast, and as a result the machine begins to spin around and fall over on its side. Feeling a bit rattled but otherwise unhurt, George man-handles the machine to its upright position before setting out to explore the future world of 802,701.
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The whole landscape seems to consist of one vast garden minus any weeds and more importantly for George, devoid of any human life. Does this ‘Paradise’ belong now only to you, George? If that is so, then it is definitely no Paradise at all. As George passes through the forest, he stumbles upon an immense domed structure. Although indicative of an advanced civilization, it is quite clearly in a neglected and ruined state. Vines have long since begun their destructive work on the weathered stonework, perhaps even centuries ago. Upon entering the building, it is apparent that it is still in use as the doors function, and there are low tables, chairs and plates evidently awaiting use by the currently absent inhabitants of this time period. George picks up one of the plates and pounds a tabletop with it while calling out, “Anyone here?” The echoes of the clanging sound produced by the plate and his own voice only serve to highlight the all pervasive and uncanny stillness of the vast structure.
Continuing to walk through the forest with bewilderment and dread his only companions, George suddenly hears the sweet reassuring sound of human voices in the distance. In a clearing in the forest by a river, he spots a group of young rather slightly framed people enjoying a pool formed by the river. Their simple attire and blonde hair gives them an almost identical or uniform appearance. What is also striking about them is their carefree laughter and playful activity. So George, is this the future you hoped for, “to bask in the sunlight, bathe in the clear streams and eat the fruits of earth with all knowledge of work and hardship forgotten?” Paradise on earth? “ Well, and why not?” you think to yourself.
Suddenly a scream rips through George’s contemplation of this idyllic scene. It is coming from a young woman in distress who is caught by the river’s current and is in imminent danger of drowning. Even more shocking is the reaction of the onlookers who make no attempt to help her and merely continue to watch on as the woman screams out piteously. Spurred into action, George bursts into the clearing and urges the others present to take action, but to no avail. He then dives into the river and rescues the woman just before she is swept from the rock she had been desperately clinging to.
After setting the young woman safely on the ground nearby, George covers her with his jacket and asks her if she is alright. To his surprise, she simply rises and without uttering a word calmly walks away without any sign of fear or gratitude.
Adding to George’s confusion, the unconcerned gathering of young people , move off almost as one body from the area and walk past him as if he was a regular familiar feature of the landscape. As the sun begins to set, George follows them to the domed structure he had left earlier. He does not enter with this chattering sea of indifference but instead sits on the stairs. The young woman he saved comes back through the doors carrying his jacket and sits down next to George and talks with him. She is very beautiful, softly spoken and very childlike in her speech and demeanour.
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George is about to have his chance to learn all about this future civilzsation when he discovers that the Eloi have books. One of the young men leads George to where books are located. However, George discovers to his horror and bitter disappointment that the collective knowledge and heart and soul of human civilization lies moldering to dust stored on rotting shelves at the rear of a room. Culture and the foundations of civilization have simply been left to rot and be reduced to powdery dust. This is part of Paradise? At what a cost to all that would make life worthwhile!
Having learned all he needs to know about this civilization from the ever falling and swirling dust of the books, an appalled and disgusted George makes up his mind to return immediately to his own time. Back he intends to go through the “thousands of years of building and rebuilding, creating and re-creating. ……..a million yesterdays of sensitive men dying for their dreams” just so that these Eloi of the future “can swim and dance and play.” George would rather live and die among real men with their dreams and struggles despite his knowledge of the seeming futility of those dreams and struggles in the face of a “hopeless future.” And so the Eloi look on without emotion as George exits the domed building….except for Weena, this time no longer indifferent.
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George tells Weena about the time period he came from. There is now rather ironically, a sense of nostalgia in his voice as he points out where the house, laboratory and library once stood in the area now occupied by the stone monument eight hundred thousand later. The nostalgia turns to grim disappointment as George explains how he “hoped to learn a great deal” and then “to take back the knowledge, the advancement, mankind made,” but instead found “the human race reduced to living vegetables!”
While he is talking, one of the indistinct figures that George saw earlier emerges from the bushes, reaches out and grabs Weena. George runs after Weena and rescues her from a creature called a Morlock. Settled near the fire, Weenag gazes into the flames with fascination then slowly she raises her hand and reaches out to grasp the flame. It turns out that she has never even seen fire before, the knowledge of which along with the wheel was “the first thing which separated man from the rest of the mammals.”
Despite so many of the distinctly human traits apparently having been lost, George realizes that Weena, despite being safe within the domed building did decide to face the dangers of the night to warn him. By doing so, Weena displayed “the one characteristic which distinguished man from the animal kingdom…... the spirit of self sacrifice. “
It also seems that the Eloi merely live in an eternal sense of the present in that they have no concept of past and future. For George, it is as if he has landed in one of mankind’s Dark Ages and that all that is needed is for someone to show the Eloi the way out. If George is the one to kindle that hidden spark within even one of the Eloi
then his coming to the future will have some meaning.
The next morning, unable to open the doors to the stone building, George discovers several holes resembling well entrances in an open area. These holes are not natural, they have been constructed. A pounding rhythmic mechanical noise can be discerned emanating from the darkness below. Weena is aware that the holes are an entrance to the subterranean world of the Morlocks. She learned this from some talking rings. George asks her to show him the rings that talk, and she obligingly leads him back to another area that once served as a museum, but like the books it has been left to atrophy and decay with the passage of time and from disuse.
It tells of a rime of war between the East and West, which after 326 years finally came to an end. With nothing left to fight with, so few left to fight and with the atmosphere depleted of oxygen and polluted with germs, the human race was doomed to extinction.
A second ring tells of a decision being made to divide humanity into two groups: those who chose to take refuge in great caverns far below the earth’s surface while the rest taking their chances on the surface. These sets of events and the resultant decisions that were made have led to the creation of the world of the Eloi and Morlocks.
George reasons from what he has just heard that over the course of time “the Morlocks had become the masters and the Eloi their servants. The Morlocks fed and bred the Eloi like cattle and took them below when they reached maturity, which explains why there are no older people among them.
With Weena following, George returns to the open area with the holes and begins to climb down inside one of the well-like structures. It is his only means of finding a way of reaching his Time Machine and finding out what happened to those Eloi who have been taken below. Fearing that George will not come back, Weena in an act of child-like consideration and affection gives him a blossom which he places into his pocket.
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Frustrated with the Eloi’s lack of concern for those who who enter the building and are never seen again, and determined to save Weena, George returns to the area with the holes and climbs down one of them. The Eloi on the surface approach, gather around the entrance in a semi-circle and look down as he makes his descent.
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Part 5:
Subterranean Chamber of Horrors
“Abandon all hope you who enter here.”
(Dante Alighieri, Inferno)
Once underground, George finds some wood to make a torch, but he doesn't light it just yet. While he explores the underground chambers and takes note of the machinery, he is being observed by figures in the background – the dreaded Morlocks. Upon entering the next chamber, George stumbles across human skeletons, and their disposition can only mean one thing: the Morlocks have reverted to cannibalism and their food source are the Eloi!
Now that the underworld of the Morlocks was gone, what now? Certainly the life of leisure for the Eloi is no more along with the centuries of fear. Now they will have the task of starting over in which they will no doubt be forced to work to survive.
“ Another night was coming, but this night no Eloi needed to fear.” But what of you, George? Without your Time Machine, you are imprisoned in a world in which you do not belong, a feeling you know only too well.
Here you sit at the same pool where you first saved Weena's life, toying with the blossom Weena gave you earlier. And she sits nearby and you have to tell her that you are sorry that you have to stay because you cannot go back to your own time and tell people “about the happiness and sorrow the future has in store for them,” whether or not they could learn from it. Let’s face it George, you wanted originally to flee from that feeling of being out of time and out of place in your own world. However, you now realize that in this future time you had once longed to see for yourself, you just don’t don't fit here any more than Weena would in your time.
This charming interlude is suddenly interrupted by the excited voices of other Eloi, who point toward the damaged stone building. As George and Weena, along with a group of Eloi appraoch the building, they notice that the doors are now wide open and that the Time Machine lies enticingly just inside. Filled with joy, George moves toward the open doorway and further inside just beyond to where his machine sits. Weena starts to follow, but her years of conditioning and force of habit force her to halt before the threshold.
After George briefly examines his machine, he proceeds to fit the control lever into place. Suddenly darkness descends as the doors of the stone building close with a with a sound of clanging finality. To her horror, Weena sees the doors close, runs up to them and vainly pounds her fists on the unyielding metal. At the same time, George rushes to his side of the doors and struggles to open them. Once again he and Weena find themselves separated by a barrier.
Part 6:
“He has all the time in the world!”
......Except of course that George is a Time Traveller who has mastered movement through the fourth dimension and is at this and other innumerable moments careening back through Time: fire, sunshine, darkness, lava prison, crimson illumination, daylight, lava withdrawing into wounds inthe earth, ruins springing into structures, collapsing mushroom clouds, flashes of light shrinking to singularities. sun and moon madly chasing each other before tiring and slowing down…..until the time comes to pull the lever and come to a halt.
January 5, 1900, the night George had invited his friends over to dinner. The only discernible change is that he and his machine are outside in the garden now and not in the laboratory. It is 8.00pm and a bruised and battered George gains access to his house via a bit of breaking and entry.
After stumbling into his house, he meets with his friends and relates his story to them. At the end of his tale they still remain incredulous and sceptical. Hillyer believes that George’s story is “ridiculous! Simply preposterous!” while Bridewell thinks it is the “best adventure yarn” he’s heard for years. But how to make them understand? Ah, yes! The little blossom that’s nestled in George's pocket. Perhaps his friend Filby can try and match it to any species known now and ex[lain how George could have come by it in the middle of winter. What, you don’t know, Filby?
Well, George your friends are getting ready to leave so it’s time to say farewell to them. Perhaps your good friend Filby can sense the note of finality in your voice and suspects that you’ll not be seeing each other again. The others might not believe your story, but Filby? What impels him to return to the house to check on you after the others have departed in the carriage?
Filby arrives at the inescapable conclusion that your story was indeed true and that you had built your Time Machine in the laboratory, and used it to travel through time but not through space. Upon your return, the machine materialised in the garden, due to the Morlocks 800.000 years in the future having moved it into their stone monument. When you returned, you had dragged the machine back to its original location so that when you return to the future, you would find yourself outside the stone building with Weena and the Eloi and avoid being imprisoned behind the metal doors.
Having put the pieces of the puzzle together, Filby returns to the parlor with Mrs Watchett. He believes that George would probably have taken something with him into the future rather than depart without a plan in mind. In confirmation he discovers that three books are missing from the shelves. Ah, but which books? What books would you take to help build a new society? ‘ History’ to learn from and understand one’s past and origins? Principles of ‘science’ and ‘engineering’ for practical applications of knowledge? Works of’ literature’ for the cultivation of the heart, soul and human emotions? ‘Philosophy,’ ‘ethics’ and ‘religion’ for moral development and reasoning?
Will George ever return? A rather mute point considering that he above all others has all the time in the world………...
“Now it's been ten thousand years
Man has cried a billion tears
For what, he never knew,
Now man's reign is through
But through eternal night,
But through eternal night,
The twinkling of starlight
So very far away,
Maybe it's only yesterday
In the year 2525, if man is still alive
If woman can survive, they may find"
In the year 2525, if man is still alive
If woman can survive, they may find"
(In the Year 2525 ‘Exordium & Terminus’
by Zager and Evans)
Points Of Interest
The Time Machine (H. G. Wells' The Time Machine)1960 is based on the 1895 novella of the same name by H. G. Wells. The film received the Academy Award for Best Special Effects for its time-lapse photographic effects and was nominated for the 1961 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation. The Time Machine had a budget of under $1 million and ended up earning $1,610,000 in the United States and Canada and $1 million elsewhere, turning a profit of $245,000.
The name of the film's main character "George" links him with both with George Pal and the great pioneering science fiction writer. Herbert George Wells. In H.G. Wells' original story, the protagonist is referred to only as the "Time Traveller."
Pal originally considered casting a middle-aged British actor like David Niven or James Mason in the role of George but later reconsidered in favour of the younger Australian actor Rod Taylor who would come across as being a more athletic and idealistic character. It was Taylor's first lead role in a feature film but we have previously seen him in another science fiction film, World Without End (1956)
Taylor convincingly portrays a disillusioned, idealistic adventurer who feels that he is both out of time and out of place and who seeks to escape from a world that seems to revel in the dark side of human nature, where scientific endeavour is devoted to finding ever increasing means of causing death and destruction.
Taylor’s character expresses the need and desire of many people and indeed the ultimate end aim of many ideologies to find something akin to a utopia where human beings can live in peace and harmony with one another and with nature. When George makes a sudden stop in the far future, it seems to him that in this “vast garden” nature appears to have regained control of the landscape.
Yvette Mimieux was cast in the role of Weena despite having no previous acting experience. Mimieux lied about her age to Pal, stating she was 18 despite being only 17 when filming began. She turned 18 during the film’s shooting and was not legally supposed to work a full shooting schedule, but did so anyway. By the end of the shoot some of her earliest scenes were re-shot since her acting ability gradually improved as her confidence in acting grew.
Yvette Mimieux, despite her lack of acting experience, was perfect for the role of Weena. Of course, these days there’ll be those who’ll babble on about her being merely a Utopian fantasy figure for male viewers, who is in constant need of rescuing, screams a lot and is just a stereotypical love-interest for the male protagonist. Blah, blah, blah.. Well, guess what? Mimieux is playing an Eloi character who would be displaying little more than bovine-like innocence. And yes, her character did gradually evolve and was an essential impetus for the George character giving him a reason to have hope.
The Time Machine prop was designed by MGM art director Bill Ferrari and built by Wah Chang. The large clockwork disk rotated at various speeds to indicate movement through time. A brass plate on the time machine's instrument display panel displays the inventor’s name as "H. George Wells.” George Pal wanted the disk on the machine to spin clockwise for travel into the future and counter-clockwise for travel into the past, however, it was deemed too expensive and time-consuming to add the reversing feature.
Some of the costumes and sets were re-used from Forbidden Planet (1956), such as the Civil Defence air raid officer uniform, which was originally the C-57-D crew uniform, and the large acrylic dome in the talking rings room, originally from the C-57-D's control bridge.
The effect featuring fruit and leaves growing on a tree limb at an accelerated rate as George moves forward in time was achieved by having a painting on a canvas photographed with a locked-off camera. One frame at a time would be photographed as the artist applied the progressive growth of the fruit and leaves in more and more detail.
The scenes depicting lava overrunning the streets of London was achieved by using a miniature replica set and fermented oatmeal as the lava substitute.
With many ideologies and visions of the future, problems often arise as a result of the process involved with the means employed to achieve particular ends. In the film, the apparent Paradise or Utopian future has come at a cost in that the Eloi appear to have lost the attributes of initiative, compassion, individuality and curiosity that their ancestors displayed. Progress and human evolution has been replaced by stagnation and devolution and human history and legacy has been reduced to the dust of disintegrating pages of crumbling unread books. Beneath this false Eden lies a hell in the form of cannibalistic Morlocks who shun the light and utilise the Eloi as we with farm cattle.
Much of future outcome for Humanity appears to have been the result of our dark side involving conflict, warfare and self-destructive tendencies. In H’G’ Wells’ original story, humanity’s development into two distinct ‘races’ was more the result of the logical outcome of the processes to arise from the Industrial Revolution and class system. Eventually, it was the working classes and those who operated the machinery of industry and served the interests of the ruling classes that eventually retreated to the bowels of the earth with their machines, while the rather useless wealthy aristocratic and capitalist classes eventually formed the surface-dwelling Eloi. In a twist of irony, those who had previously been exploited had thousands of years into the future become the exploiters.
Instead of adopting H.G. Well’s social-political and economic underpinnings of his original story, Pal made use of the Cold-War geo-political climate and concerns of the mid-20th century to help explain the shape of things to come in humanity’s distant future. And so we have nuclear wars, air-raid sirens and all-clear announcements and generations of conditioning.
The question as to whether or not we can change our own destiny, or even alter the course of history is perhaps all too briefly touched on in the film. The danger though lies in the temptation to over-emphasise such cerebral matters at the expense of entertainment and telling a good story. Thankfully, Pal’s film does not do this as some modern sci-fi films tend to do in addition to all the politically correct social engineering woke rubbish that is often squeezed in.
Much of the science touched on in the film even to this day remains in the realm of speculation, theory and mathematical modelling. Take the idea of four dimensions They constitute what we are aware of in our universe. But there is no law stipulating that 'four' is all the number of dimensions we can possibly have. Some people have postulated there may be as many as 11 dimensions and that there may be other universes with multiple dimensions. Wo knows? No-one!
Will we ever be able to time travel? Many people will say absolutely not and that it is a preposterous idea. The laws of physics prevent it, they'll say Well, go outside at night and look up at the stars. Even better, use a telescope and you’ll see stars and galaxies, the light from which would have taken hundreds and thousands of light years to reach us, Yes, you will have been looking into the past.
Time travelling to the past? In a universe with a closed geometry, you could conceivably move off in a straight line and eventually will arrive back at the point you started from and under certain conditions you could conceivably arrive at a point before you started.
Time travelling to the future? Let’s hop over to Einstein. Assuming you have infinite energy, keep accelerating away from the earth closer and closer to the speed of light. From your point of view aboard your light ship, time for the people back on earth would appear to have sped up. From the point of view of the folks back on Earth, time aboard your ship would appear to have slowed down. By the time you get back to earth, your friends and family may no longer be around while to any Eloi who’s left, you would appear to have aged hardly at all. To any Morlock, you’d make a tasty entree.
Changing the future and our destiny? Paradoxes abound here. If you go back in time and kill Adolf Hitler or better still, prevent his parents from ever meeting, would you then prevent him from being born, becoming Fuehrer of Germany and starting the Second World War? Or would you just be creating an alternate time line in which events play themselves out differently while the original time line would still play itself out? Good grief, what if you went back in time and managed to prevent your own parents from meeting? Do we in perhaps live in some kind of Multiverse with an infinite number of possible timelines and outcomes as suggested by proponents of String theory?
UFOs / UAPs? In any consideration of anomalous happenings in our skies and under our seas, discussion inevitably turns to whether or not such phenomena are the product of an alien or extra-terrestrial intelligence. Could it be that we are looking in the wrong direction? What if such phenomena are in fact devices that originate in another dimension which we cannot perceive or even from a future time period? If that is the case, then perhaps we are being observed and monitored possibly with the intention of manipulating events, people and even natural phenomena with a view to achieving desired future results as part of some experiment. Whether true or not, it would sure make a grand speculative scenario for a budding sci-fi novelist or film maker.
A Tribute To George Pal Link
Full Film Link
Merry Christmas to all
and a very happy New Year!
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1950 Time Machine Radio Play Adaptation
HG Wells The Time Machine Ebook
Full Film Audio Described Version
(for low vision & visually impaired)
Free Ebook
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