Goofs

When the atomic bomb explodes in 1966 London, all the buildings, cars, etc., are instantly incinerated; but in close-up George is shown lying flat on perfect, unburned green grass, unscathed, and the time machine is equally undamaged, sitting undisturbed beside blossoming, untouched foliage.

When George is first traveling in to the future, Mrs. Watchett is in a fast-motion walk down the street; she looks in a shop and walks away. But at that point, George was already traveling through time at a lot faster rate (at least 1 day per second).

The sundial in George's yard changes locations, and is missing in the final scene.

When George is the near the Morlock statue, he looks up and the sky is nearly dark as it would be at sunset. He sees movement in the bushes and pulls Weena out. At that moment, the sky is seen again, and it is bright as it would be in broad daylight.

When George arrives at the Pyramid, before walking off, he takes the crystal control lever and puts it in his front pants pocket, creating a large protrusion. The protrusion disappears until it's time to restart the machine.

When George's friends leave his house after the demonstration of the miniature time machine on December 31, 1899, it's a few minutes before 6:00 by all the clocks in George's house. (Most noticeably, the clock on the table that George leans on by the window as his friends put on their coats.) His friends leave and get into a carriage in broad daylight, but it is pitch dark in London at both 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. on New Year's Eve.

After the 1966 atomic explosion there is a volcanic eruption. There have never been volcanoes in the British isles since they are nowhere near a tectonic plate boundary. Therefore an atomic explosion would not cause an eruption.

In the opening clock montage, the hands of Big Ben are shown in an impossible position. The minute hand is on the half hour yet the hour hand is directly over the seven. It should be midway between the seven and eight.

In 1940, when George is racing through WWII, his house is completely destroyed by a bomb, but the bushes outside his window remain green and untouched.

When George arrives in London in 1966, all the vehicles are left-hand drive. British vehicles are right-hand drive. This is due to the fact that the live action scenes were filmed in Culver City, California.

Wells travels 800,801 years into the future, yet he and the Eloi speak the same English. Studies at several universities have shown that language evolves at such a rate that people separated by less than 1,000 years could not understand each other. However, this was obviously done to make the film easier to watch and understand.

During the fight with the Morlocks in the cave, George tells Weena to get the torch, and she picks it up. Earlier, it was established that she did not know what fire was, and even had she learned what it was, she would not know what a torch was.

However, it appears that she has good cognitive reasoning. She wonders what he means, looks around, discovers something with fire on it and deduces that it is indeed the torch he is talking about since it is the only thing out of the ordinary on the ground.

When George suddenly stops the time machine in year 802701, the machine spins out of control throwing him out onto the ground. As George lies unconscious, what appears to be "dry ice" can be seen dropped from above.

It is actually hailstones.

Weena can be seen to be wearing shoes when climbing up the Morlock Chimney and as she gets out. In fact, all of the Eloi are wearing footwear of some kind.

There's enough dirt and dust on the stairs outside the dome for George to write in with his finger, but not a single footprint is visible. This is because George was purposely applying friction to write the names.

In the great hall whenever George is inside, parallel and perpendicular white lines are seen painted on the floor. The table arrangements do not conform to any arrangement that fits these lines. This is because the set was constructed over a studio parking lot and they did not put down a floor covering. The revealing parking lines are simply ignored. This info came from a special effects veteran who was on the set during the filming of these scenes.

When George begins his traveling through time, the rate at which the sun and stars move shows he is watching the passage of a day in less than a minute of his own time. However, without changing the rate of travel, he sees people moving around in front of the shops across the street, staying there - at his current rate - for hours.

When George is in the laboratory and is starting his voyage, the sun and moon are seen to race across the sky through the overhead windows as they display the rapid passage of time. These windows also contain the winter frost around the edges of the panes of glass from the January 1900 winter. But throughout the rapidly changing years and seasons, the frost remains in place, not melting and reappearing each winter as it should.

When George restarts the machine after looking at the mannequin and saying "Good heavens, that's a dress?", he is traveling slow enough to be able to see the store owner changing the mannequin's clothes, yet the light outside the store is shown flashing on and off several times, indicating that several days are passing.

As the mountain surrounding George wears away, the rest of the landscape remains unchanged.

In the opening shot of the street outside George's house, the post-box bears the initials G.R. British Royal Mail post-boxes bear the initials of the reigning monarch at the time they were installed. G.R. indicates King George V, who did not become monarch until 1910 - some 10 years after the scene is set.

When showing Sun/moon crossing sky in every second or so, there is a moment showing circular star trails in the same location. However, the center of circular star trails is always the North or Pole star; Polaris. But unlike the film depicts, the Sun/moon never crosses the North / Pole star portion of sky.

When the time machine starts buffeting due to the bombing in 1940, the exact date when he stops is June 19, 1940. The Battle of Britain didn't start until July and London wasn't bombed until September 1940.

During New Years Eve of 1899, Filby mentions that the miniature time machine's disappearance could be replicated by magicians in the Hippodrome. The Hippodrome didn't open until the following year.

When George arrives in 1966, he hears the sound of an air-raid siren and decides to stop and investigate. However it takes him several days to bring the machine to a stop, and the siren can be heard continually for about three days.

After the Eloi are called into the Morlock's cave and the large steel doors close, George turns around and yells, "Well, what happens to them?" but his lips say, "Well, where did they go?"

All the cars shown in 1966 London are American models, complete with left-side steering wheels.

When George discovers that the Morlocks have moved his time machine, it is late afternoon or twilight on the same day he arrived. The light-fearing Morlocks would not have come outside to move the machine until after dark.

When George stops the machine for the first time, the candle burned down to about half of its size, which took according to his observations 98 minutes. But as the trip continues it takes seven more hours for it to burn down completely.

The time traveler asks an Eloi about government and laws and is told, "We have no government. We have no laws." There is no way the Eloi would even know what the words "government" and "laws" would mean. (For that matter, it's not clear how they even know how to speak, let alone speak English.)

When George enters the laboratory for the first time, he shuts the door and locks it. Rod Taylor must have cut his finger on the lock because as he approaches the Time Machine and touches the brass rail at the control panel he leaves a streak of real blood.

The Eloi are portrayed as an emotionless, unsympathetic people, but during the dining scene there is much giggling and conversation buzz in the hall.

The date indicators, which show the month in green, the numerical day in yellow, and the year in red, are all illuminated. Yet George, when trapped in the mountain, lights a match so he can see what the date is.

After the last Eloi climb out of the chimney to the surface, George says "Alright. Gather all the dead wood" to put in the chimney. The characters begin moving to pick up the wood after he says "Alright" and before he tells them what to do.

The 20th century began on January 1, 1901, not January 1, 1900 as some characters state.