Change Your Image
artnamy
Reviews
The Time Machine (2002)
Try the George Pal version
I went to see The Time Machine (2002) at the local 14-plex.
I must say that the ORIGINAL Time Machine (1960) is one of my favorite films, especially science fiction. So I AM comparing the two - by default if not by design. It is impossible for me not to.
The sound was great - but the film itself was really disappointing. Guy Pearce kind of stumbles through this DARK picture. Orlando Jones is totally wasted as a hologram at the NYC Public Library. Changing the setting from London to New York City got rid of the British/H.G.Welles ambiance in the original film - the turn of the century NYC scenes are slow and dull, thought this film flies by at 96 minutes. Another half hour should have been added at least to bring the Welles classic to life. Time travel certainly opens up plot development - why do you think Star Trek has used it so often?
The film reminded me of two recent pictures - A Beautiful Mind and the remake of Planet of the Apes. I enjoyed both but both were unsatisfying by the end. So it goes with Time Machine. You never seem to know what is going on in this film, past, present, or future. The plot goes up several dark alleys before deciding to abruptly go south.
There is little sense of going through time, despite the incredible special effects from Lucas/ILM. The film, as do so many today, gives off a 2000 version of the 1890's and it smells fake. The pacing of this film is so fast that it must have been made for the MTV generation.
The original film is very slowly paced, but when time travel occurs it shifts into high gear and makes you believe - even with 40 year old SFX. Of course, these effects were George Pal's and he was a genius.
Perhaps these are only the thoughts of a person who prefers uncut, widescreen, and classic films as compared to today's Ridley Scott/ Michael Mann pacing - the frantic and the furious. The Time Machine 2002 makes you feel like you HAVE traveled in time - about 45 minutes into the future when the credits roll.
Voyna i mir (1965)
the very best!
The best film ever made, ESPECIALLY when taking into account all the logistics - the Soviet Government as a film studio?? (sort of makes sense, after you picture Leonid Brezhnev as Louis B. Mayer), and the world's most infamous LONG novel turned into a megamotion picture.
It probably hasn't been seen in the US on a broad scale since ABC had the good sense to run it as a four part late-night special in early 1973 (anyone else remember)?
Not even subtitles - for those of us who are not true foreign film buffs, I mean - can hurt this film. Bondarchuk's amazing direction, as well as his acting, is breathtaking. The Russian people have been celebrated as lovers of great writing and the subject at hand, "War and Peace", becomes a poem at the conclusion.
Truly magnificent from every level - as a period piece, a psychological drama, a war movie, a love story, a history...Tolstoy would be universally acclaimed ahead of Shakespeare if he (Tolstoy) had the good sense to be from England...
Don't miss it. How the Soviet Government, at the height of the Cold War, could finance and produce a masterpiece like this is one of the great mysteries of the 20th century. Give Bondarchuk the credit.