Published: December 15, 2006 12:00 am            

'Time' and 'Time' again: Movies invite comparison

Is "The Time Machine" from 1960 closer to the classic novel by H.G. Wells or is "The Time Machine" from 2002 a better fit?

Director George Pal had only $750,000 to make "The Time Machine" in 1960, a pretty low budget even then. The end result looks like it cost millions though, thanks to the creative Oscar-winning special effects by

Gene Warren and Tim Baar. The flowers and fruit ripening (all hand-painted shots), the lava flow that destroys London (made out of oatmeal and food coloring), and the sun and moon spinning by the lab window still look great today. Sadly, the performances don't quite stand the test. And there are a lot of bad wigs.

Our story begins on New Year's Eve, 1899, at the home of eccentric inventor George Wells (Rod Taylor). To impress his friends, Wells shows them a tiny prototype of something he's been working on ? a time machine.

He tells them he plans to travel to the future to find answers to mankind's suffering.

His friends think he's nuts until Wells demonstrates the little machine actually works. Thrilled by the prospect of what it could do for the war effort, they leave in high spirits, unaware they'll never see Wells or his little machine again. That's because Wells has already made a bigger model and he's going to test it tonight.

Wells leaves 1899 that very evening. He travels through two world wars and a nuclear attack, stopping long enough along the way to figure out this future doesn't hold the answers he seeks. So he goes farther -- 800,000 years farther -- and finds paradise. The food is plentiful, the sun is always out, and there are lots of dumb, pretty people called Eloi who wear bad blond wigs and do absolutely nothing all day long. Fortunately for Wells, the English language hasn't changed a bit. Unfortunately, the Eloi are too dumb to carry on a conversation. Still, one of them, a lovely young miss with the hideous name of Weena (Yvette Mimeux, in her film debut), takes a shine to the rugged Wells, who's pretty interested in Weena himself.

Life is good in the future -- until the other half of what's left of humanity, the cannibalistic Morlocks, show up hungry.

H.G. Wells's great-grandson Simon is given credit for directing the 2002 version of "The Time Machine," but poor Simon was too wiped out to actually finish the movie. With 18 shooting days left, Gore Verbinski stepped in for the exhausted Simon, wrapping up a movie that most critics slammed.

While this "Time Machine" also begins in 1899, we're now in New York, and Wells has been replaced with the brilliant mathematician Alexander Hartgarden (Guy Pearce). On the night Alexander proposes to his beloved Emma (Sienna Guillory), she is tragically killed. Distraught, Alexander locks himself in his lab until he perfects a time machine that can take him back to save Emma. He succeeds, only to see her die a different way.

Doubly distraught, Alexander travels forward in time to 802,701, hoping for answers on how to beat the system and save Emma. Although he doesn't find any answers, he does meet a pretty Eloi named Mara (Samantha Mumba) and locks horns with an evil albino Morlock (Jeremy Irons) who has a brain so big it grows down his spine. It's all pretty silly but still a lot of fun.

So which is better? Actually, they're both fabulous in their own way if you don't take them too seriously. By the way, screen vet Alan Young, who has a supporting part in the original, has a bit as a florist in the remake.

You can find both versions of "The Time Machine" at Hastings. Check 'em out!

        

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