Remake of the H.G. Wells classic, directed by the novelist's great-grandson, Simon Wells, whose allegiance is plainly to his own time and not to his illustrious ancestor. The special effects are perhaps not too excessive (nor too special), as compared with the current norm rather than with the George Pal version of 1960. And although the machine itself — all flash and twirl — bears roughly the same relationship to the forty-years-old model as, say, the alien spacecraft in Close Encounters bears to those in War of the Worlds (another Wells adaptation on which Pal worked), the actual trip through time, from 1899 to 802701, is well handled. But the class-war angle of the novel — the widening divide between bourgeoisie and proletariat — has dated far less badly than might, in a bit more than a century, have been expected (except maybe by Wells himself), and certainly not so badly that it needed to be, as it was here, expurgated altogether. On the contrary, the only reason to avoid it is to avoid stepping on anyone's oversensitive toes. The revised conflict of the future is completely in accord with the PC sentimentalities of the present, whereby the effete Eloi have been converted into a hardy happy breed of noble savages (suntans included), with something of a Native American feel about them, something of a Rain Forest feel, something of a South Seas feel, underscored by the soaring tribal chant on the soundtrack. The predatory Morlocks, meanwhile, rising out of the ground looking like the Living Dead, have something of a Planet of the Apes feel (all the way to their spectacular leaping ability), something of a colonialist-oppressor feel, something of a slave-trader feel. And the Time Traveller (Guy Pearce, an Aussie like Rod Taylor last time out), thrust into the thick of it, transforms himself overnight from the Absent-Minded Professor into Mad Max. A superior intellect will take you only so far; eventually push must come to shove. Samantha Mumba, Orlando Jones, Jeremy Irons. (2002) — Duncan Shepherd
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