Let's count how faithful this remake was to the book. They both had time machines. They both had Morlocks. And . . . well, that's about it.
All right, you don't have to make a movie match its source material exactly (but why make people think it does, other than false advertising?). However, if you're going to change things, you should at least try to improve matters.
The movie fails. The story is one cliche after another, played as though the writers had never read anything about time travel (it's clear the writers never read Wells -- it's a joke that he's credited). It plods along, the 90 minutes seeming like several weeks.
And it's filled with howlers. 800,000 years and people still speak in contemporary English? Because they read it from the ruins of old buildings (and happened to understand a vocabulary of words that would never be on the buildings in the first place)? Why not just call Mara "Tiffany" and make it more ridiculous?
As for the end, it's impossible to figure out exactly what happened, or why it occurred. What ended up killing the Morlocks? Why? A good writer would have established that this would work ("Don't touch that! It will blow us to atoms!"). I guess they thought the flashy effects would be enough to fool the audience.
Speaking of effects, why are the time travel effects so wimpy? I could understand the reluctance of of matching the effects of the 1960 movie, but they don't even try. We see very little to indicate the passage of time, just a generic blue-white glow.
The story builds no suspense. The time paradox idea is handled terribly: why exactly does the girlfriend have to die a second time? How did his going back in time cause it? If he tried again, why wouldn't that work? The Morlock attack is purely by-the-numbers, as is Jeremy Irons' performance as the head Morlock.
What a waste.
All right, you don't have to make a movie match its source material exactly (but why make people think it does, other than false advertising?). However, if you're going to change things, you should at least try to improve matters.
The movie fails. The story is one cliche after another, played as though the writers had never read anything about time travel (it's clear the writers never read Wells -- it's a joke that he's credited). It plods along, the 90 minutes seeming like several weeks.
And it's filled with howlers. 800,000 years and people still speak in contemporary English? Because they read it from the ruins of old buildings (and happened to understand a vocabulary of words that would never be on the buildings in the first place)? Why not just call Mara "Tiffany" and make it more ridiculous?
As for the end, it's impossible to figure out exactly what happened, or why it occurred. What ended up killing the Morlocks? Why? A good writer would have established that this would work ("Don't touch that! It will blow us to atoms!"). I guess they thought the flashy effects would be enough to fool the audience.
Speaking of effects, why are the time travel effects so wimpy? I could understand the reluctance of of matching the effects of the 1960 movie, but they don't even try. We see very little to indicate the passage of time, just a generic blue-white glow.
The story builds no suspense. The time paradox idea is handled terribly: why exactly does the girlfriend have to die a second time? How did his going back in time cause it? If he tried again, why wouldn't that work? The Morlock attack is purely by-the-numbers, as is Jeremy Irons' performance as the head Morlock.
What a waste.