ManWithPez

The All Morlock version of Westside Story (When you're a Morlock, you're a Morlock all the way!)

I’m a huge fan of time travel movies, as you’ll discover if you hang around this site this month.  Why this month?  That will become apparent in the next movie review.  For now (heh), however, let’s kick off with one of the first and the best, 1960s The Time Machine.

I like my movies to be entertaining, and on occasion, a little charm will go a long way with me.  This movie has both traits in abundance.  Mostly through the performance of Rod Taylor, no matter how much he happens to resemble a very serious Robin Williams.  George (Taylor) builds himself one of the coolest time machines ever, and shows it off to his buddies, one of whom, named Filby (played by Mr. Ed’s Alan Young) warns him that is not up to man to tamper with such things.  He agrees to meet his friends at his house in one week, the date being New Year’s 1899, after he’s tooled around the space-time void for a bit.  George, though warned by Filby that perhaps he’s making a mistake, takes the machine for a stroll anyways.

And, what a stroll.  Using the mannequin across the street as a device to show how much time has passed by the ever changing women’s fashion is a masterstroke, but this movie takes very few missteps.  Then again, it shows 1966 as a skyscraper covered Metropolis that will soon fall to an atomic war.  Also, this is where George meets up with Filby’s son a second time after he meets him as an infant before his travels and again in World War I.  Myself, after viewing three world wars, would have hung it up and headed back for the house. (Then again, George never leaves his house.  His machine moves through time, not space, so he is stationary throughout.)  George however, keeps pressing the issue because he desperately wants to know if mankind can ever get over itself and stop killing one another.

As lava encases the time machine while it’s travelling, George must keep going to escape being entombed in rock, and the machine takes him to the far flung future of the year 800,000 and some odd.  Here’s where it starts to get interesting, as George is introduced to the peace loving, though incredibly stupid, Eloi.  As George watches one of them almost drown because they don’t possess the ability to save one another, he’s flung into despair again.  It only gets worse when he discovers that the Eloi have a purpose, and that purpose points straight at the other inhabitants of the future, the Morlocks.  Now, to keep from giving anything away (though, come on, the movie’s 49 years old at this point) I won’t tell you what the purpose is, but, it’s horrible, and if you’ve not seen this movie, you really, really should.

It’s a classic piece of science fiction, in it’s best vein, and that’s thoughtful.  Though you’re watching a film that’s almost 50 years old, it still has the ability to break your heart a little, and certainly to make you think.  Not so much that you won’t be entertained.  Also, this movie has one kickass film score!  Check it out!

Also, the Morlocks are some of the most frightening things ever created!  I still have nightmares about them!

So, read a book (this book, actually!), stay smart…make certain your children stay smart, and everything, according to HG Wells and George Pal will be just fine.

Tags: Review, Science Fiction

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009 at 1:09 pm and is filed under Movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.