Things to Come (1936)

Director:

William Cameron Menzies

Writers:

H.G. Wells (novel)
H.G. Wells (screenplay)

Release Date:

31 March 1936 (Denmark)

Genre:

Sci-Fi

Tagline:

What will the next hundred years bring to mankind?

Plot:

A story of 100 years: a decades-long second world war leaves plague and anarchy, then a rational state rebuilds civilization and tries space travel.

Plot Keywords:

Technology Gone Amok | Science Runs Amok | WWII | Technology | 1960s

Cast

Raymond Massey	...	John Cabal / Oswald Cabal
Edward Chapman	...	Pippa Passworthy / Raymond Passworthy
Ralph Richardson	...	The Boss
Margaretta Scott	...	Roxana / Rowena (as Margueretta Scott)
Cedric Hardwicke	...	Theotocopulos
Maurice Braddell	...	Dr. Harding
Sophie Stewart	...	Mrs. Cabal
Derrick De Marney	...	Richard Gordon (as Derrick de Marney)
Ann Todd	...	Mary Gordon
Pearl Argyle	...	Catherine Cabal
Kenneth Villiers	...	Maurice Passworthy
Ivan Brandt	...	Morden Mitani
Anne McLaren	...	The Child
Patricia Hilliard	...	Janet Gordon
Charles Carson	...	Great Grandfather

Also Known As:

H.G. Wells' Things to Come (UK) (complete title)
The Hundred Years to Come (UK) (working title)
The Shape of Things to Come (UK) (working title)
Whither Mankind (UK) (working title)

Runtime:

100 min | UK:117 min | Canada:91 min (VHS version) | UK:108 min (premiere cut) | UK:113 min (original version) | USA:92 min (cut version)

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System Noiseless Recording)

Certification:

Finland:K-16 | UK:PG

Filming Locations:

Denham Studios, Denham, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

London Film Productions

Trivia:

Music recorded at The Scala Theatre, Charlotte Street, London, England UK

Goofs:

Continuity: During the bombing of Everytown, a man in a top hat follows several people across the hood of a car in an attempt to escape. There are footprints clearly all over the hood. A later scene shows more people using the same car, But this time the hood is clean.

Quotes:

Roxana: I don't suppose any man has ever understood any woman since the beginning of things. You don't understand our imaginations.

Movie Connections:

Featured in SPFX: The Empire Strikes Back (1980) (TV)

Soundtrack:

Melodrama - Attack

Art Deco Science Fiction

There are some film classics that we have almost lost. I don't mean the might-have-beens, like the von Stroheims or Laughton's "I Claudius," but films that were released and quite successful and are now in grave need of rescue. The hallmark of such films is the terrible quality of the available prints, perhaps because a title went into public domain and was abandoned by the studio or because the original "lavender" has disintegrated. "My Man Godfrey" and "Nothing Sacred" come to mind. And, of course, "Things to Come".

If the abstractions of the art deco aesthetic could be reified into a story, "Things to Come" might be the result. If the Chrysler Building really were a rocket ship and could fly past the the moon and stars and comets of art deco friezes...if we could look into those naive mindsets, whose visions of man's destiny were being energized by the discoveries of relativity, atomic energy and deep space...we might indeed embrace the images of "Things to Come".

Some of the scenes may strike us a corny - as might those of Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" - but they are no cornier in their context than those in "2001, a Space Odyssey" or, for that matter, "Starship Troopers". Here is an honest attempt to project the world into the future, not some silly cowboys-in-space flick.

"Things to Come" makes only a couple of demands: first, that we ditch our smug sophistication and presentist prejudices; second, that we have the discipline to see past the print quality. It may take repeated viewings, as it did with me, but in the end you will be rewarded by a unique odyssey, not into our future but into the future of history.