The Time Machine (2002 film)

''The Time Machine'' is a 2002 American science fiction film loosely adapted by John Logan from the 1895 novel of the same name by H. G. Wells and the screenplay of the 1960 film of the same name by David Duncan. Arnold Leibovit served as executive producer and Simon Wells, the great-grandson of the original author, served as director. The film stars Guy Pearce, Orlando Jones, Samantha Mumba, Mark Addy, and Jeremy Irons, and includes a cameo by Alan Young, who also appeared in the 1960 film adaptation. The film is set in New York City instead of London, and contains new story elements not present in the original novel nor the 1960 film adaptation, including a romantic backstory, a new scenario about how civilization was destroyed, and several new characters such as an artificially intelligent hologram and a Morlock leader.

The film received mixed reviews and grossed $123 million worldwide. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Makeup (John M. Elliot Jr. and Barbara Lorenz) at the 75th Academy Awards, but lost to ''Frida''.

Plot

In 1899, Dr. Alexander Hartdegen is an inventor teaching at Columbia University in New York City. Unlike his friend David Philby, Alexander would rather do pure research than work in the world of business. After a mugger kills his fiancée Emma, he devotes himself to building a time machine that will allow him to travel back in time to save her. When he completes the machine four years later, he travels back to 1899 and prevents her murder, only to see her killed again when a horseless carriage frightens the horses of a horse-drawn vehicle.

Alexander realizes that any attempt to save Emma will result in her death through other circumstances. He travels to 2030 to discover whether science has been able to solve his question of how to change the past. At the New York Public Library, a holographic librarian called Vox 114 insists time travel to the past is impossible. Alexander travels to 2037, when the accidental destruction of the Moon by lunar colonists has begun rendering the Earth virtually uninhabitable. While restarting the time machine to avoid debris, he is knocked unconscious and travels forward to the date 16 July 802701 before reawakening.

The human race has reverted to a primitive lifestyle and the Earth has healed. Some survivors, called "Eloi", live on the sides of cliffs of what was once Manhattan. Alexander is nursed back to health by a virtuous young woman named Mara, one of the few Eloi who speak English. He observes the broken moon and realises that maybe his teachings led to this future. One night, Alexander and Mara's younger brother, Kalen, dream of a frightening, jagged-toothed face and a creature calling their name. Alexander informs Mara of the dream and she tells him they all have that dream, and she notices that his watch is missing. The next day, the Eloi are attacked and Mara is dragged underground by ape-like monsters. The creatures are called "Morlocks" and they hunt the Eloi for food. In order to rescue Mara, Kalen leads Alexander to Vox 114, which is still functional after 800,000 years.

After learning from Vox how to find the Morlocks, Alexander enters their underground lair through an opening that resembles the face in his nightmare. He is captured and thrown into an area where Mara sits in a cage. Alexander meets an intelligent, humanoid Über-Morlock, who explains that Morlocks are the evolutionary descendants of the humans who went underground after the Moon broke apart, while the Eloi are evolved from those who remained on the surface. The Über-Morlocks are a caste of telepaths who rule the other Morlocks, and use the Eloi as breeding vessels for their Morlock offspring.

The Über-Morlock explains that Alexander cannot alter Emma's fate; her death is what drove him to build the time machine in the first place, therefore saving her would be a virtual impossibility due to temporal paradox. The Über-Morlock shows Alexander and tells him to go home, having given him the answer he had been searching for. Alexander gets into the machine but pulls the Über-Morlock in with him, carrying them into the future as they fight. The Über-Morlock dies by rapidly aging when Alexander pushes him outside of the machine's temporal bubble. Alexander stops in 635,427,810, revealing a harsh, rust-colored sky over a wasteland of Morlock caves.

Accepting that he cannot save Emma, Alexander travels back to rescue Mara. After freeing her, he starts the time machine and jams its gears, creating a violent distortion in time. Pursued by the Morlocks, Alexander and Mara escape to the surface as the time distortion explodes, killing the Morlocks and destroying their caves along with the time machine. Alexander begins a new life with Mara and the Eloi, while Vox 114 helps him educate them.

In 1903, Philby and Mrs. Watchit, Alexander's housekeeper, are in his laboratory discussing his absence. Philby tells Mrs. Watchit he is glad that Alexander has gone to a place where he can find peace, then tells her that he would like to hire her as a housekeeper, which she accepts until Alexander returns. Mrs. Watchit bids Alexander farewell and Philby leaves, looking toward the laboratory affectionately, then throws his bowler hat away in tribute to Alexander's objection to conformity.

Cast

* Guy Pearce as Dr. Alexander Hartdegen, associate professor of applied mechanics and engineering at Columbia University. In the novel, the time traveler's name isn't given.
* Samantha Mumba as Mara, a virtuous Eloi woman who befriends Alexander and eventually becomes his love interest.
* Orlando Jones as Vox 114, a holographic