Movie Review for Time Machine, The

Summary: Scientist and inventor Alexander Hartdegen is determined to prove that time travel is possible. His determination is turned to desperation by a personal tragedy that now drives him to want to change the past. Testing his theories with a time machine of his own invention, Hartdegen is hurtled 800,000 years into the future. There he finds a post-apocalyptic world where he discovers that mankind has been divided into the hunter... and the hunted.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Kamal 'The Diva' Larsuel of 3BlackChicks Review (7/0)
            After 30 minutes you'll pray for your own Time Machine so you go back to 5 minutes before you dec...

By Scott Weinberg of Apollo Guide (7/0)
            It’s rare to see a movie that takes such a speedy swan dive from “promising” to “interesting” to ...

By Eleanor Ringel Gillespie of Atlanta Journal-Constitution (7/0)
            Seems more like the next Star Trek movie, with Patrick Stewart doing the time warp.

By Marc Savlov of Austin Chronicle (7/0)
            A zippy 96 minutes of mediocre special effects, hoary dialogue, fluxing accents, and -- worst of ...

By Richard Luck of BBC (7/0)
            Wells' movie is more content to rip off Tomb Raider than remain faithful to his great-grandfather...

By Roger Ebert of Chicago Sun-Times (7/0)
            The Time Machine is a witless recycling of the H.G. Wells story from 1895, with the absurdity int...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Michael Wilmington of Chicago Tribune (7/0)
            One of those staggeringly well-produced, joylessly extravagant pictures that keep whooshing you f...

By David Sterritt of Christian Science Monitor (7/0)
            If you want a movie time trip, the 1960 version is a far smoother ride.

By Margaret A. McGurk of Cincinnati Enquirer (7/0)
            This film is more interested in the flash and dazzle that emits from imaging computers than the i...

By Paul Tatara of CNN.com (7/0)
            ... surprisingly inert for a movie in which the main character travels back and forth between epo...

By Mark Palermo of Coast (Halifax, Nova Scotia) (7/0)
            A catatonic B-schlock-Indiana Jones-video game (trust me, the result is less interesting than it ...

By Jeffrey M. Anderson of Combustible Celluloid (7/0)
            Stripped of all the ingenuity and observations that made the original story worthwhile.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Harvey S. Karten of Compuserve (7/0)
            Like heading for a three weeks' vacation in Paris but winding up in Passaic, New Jersey instead.

By Larry Carroll of Countingdown.com (7/0)
            While comparisons are inevitable, if you go into the 2002 film willing to look at it on its own m...

By Bob Aulert of culturevulture.net (7/0)
            little to recommend it beyond ... special effects technology.

By Steven D. Greydanus of Decent Films Guide (7/0)
            Pitiful entertainment, succeeding neither as spectacle, as action-adventure, or as love story.

By Mark Bourne of DVDJournal.com (7/0)
            Dishwater: 10, Wells: 0

By John J. Puccio of DVDTown.com (7/0)
            ...a spectacular disappointment and a colossal waste of...time.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Brian Mckay of eFilmCritic.com (7/0)
            If I had a time machine that could take me back only four hours, I'd take my nine dollars, find t...

By Collin Souter of eFilmCritic.com (7/0)
            “The Time Machine” is a movie that has no interest in itself. It doesn’t believe in itself, it ha...

By Erik Childress of eFilmCritic.com (7/0)
            This modern version practices what it preaches by taking its theme of forgetting the past by negl...

By Emanuel Levy of EmanuelLevy.Com (7/0)
            This remake of the 1960 sci-fi feature (based on Wells famous novel) fails to take advantage of t...

By Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly (7/0)
            The urgency is gone, replaced by much high-toned silliness, especially when Jeremy Irons shows up...

By Eric D. Snider of EricDSnider.com (7/0)
            A few pieces of the film buzz and whir; very little of it actually clicks. The thing just never g...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Eugene Novikov of Film Blather (7/0)
            This is a movie both efficient and vast, both ambitious and conventional, both funny and believab...

By Doris Toumarkine of Film Journal International (7/0)
            The filmmakers needed more emphasis on the storytelling and less on the glamorous machine that th...

By John R. McEwen of Film Quips Online (7/0)
            ...The computer-generated wizardry is certainly present and accounted for, even if the opportunit...

By Christopher Null of filmcritic.com (7/0)
            The good news is that this journey might span 800,000 years, but it will only suck 90 minutes out...

By Victoria Alexander of FilmsInReview.com (7/0)
            The Time Machine is a loopy love story with good special effects but a storyline that's logically...

By Rob Vaux of Flipside Movie Emporium (7/0)
            This new Time Machine is hardly perfect… yet it proves surprisingly serviceable. Even at its wors...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Rick Groen of Globe and Mail (7/0)
            Watchable if never exciting, competent yet hardly exceptional, the picture is content to assume i...

By Eric Lurio of Greenwich Village Gazette (7/0)
            It's worth a bargain matinee or a future rental as it's a pleasant waste of time, however ...

By Ross Anthony of Hollywood Report Card (7/0)
            A great idea, good send off with bold intentions, that doesn't quite mature; that said, you proba...

By Kirk Honeycutt of Hollywood Reporter (7/0)
            While clever and fast-paced, a truncated ending makes this feel like a film that suffers perhaps ...

By Bruce Westbrook of Houston Chronicle (7/0)
            The far future may be awesome to consider, but from period detail to matters of the heart, this f...

By Gary Brown of Houston Community Newspapers (7/0)
            Little of the novel's social commentary permeates the film's 96 minutes, which proves to be nothi...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Steve Rhodes of Internet Reviews (7/0)
            Diehard fans of the original film may be angry that anyone would dare mess with their movie, but ...

By JoBlo of JoBlo's Movie Emporium (7/0)
            It isn't long before you realize that you're watching an actual cinematic debacle materialize on ...

By Bob Bloom of Journal and Courier (Lafayette, IN) (7/0)
            Overall, the movie lacks warmth and heart.

By Alex Sandell of Juicy Cerebellum (7/0)
            Nothing is as interesting as it could have been, had some real effort been put into the picture.

By Robert Roten of Laramie Movie Scope (7/0)
            It is an imaginative adventure yarn with good cinematography, great production design and excelle...

By Kenneth Turan of Los Angeles Times (7/0)
            If Welles was unhappy at the prospect of the human race splitting in two, he probably wouldn't be...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Mark Dujsik of Mark Reviews Movies (7/0)
            The movie simply meanders along, making things up as it goes, and it shows.

By Gemma Tarlach of Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (7/0)
            The question hanging over The Time Machine is not, as the main character suggests, 'what if?' but...

By Marty Mapes of Movie Habit (7/0)
            A great sense of adventure, good-looking special effects, and enough plot holes to sink the movie

By Kevin A. Ranson of MovieCrypt.com (7/0)
            While this remake of the H.G. Wells' classic novel and 1960 film is indeed a stunning achievement...

By Michael Dequina of Mr. Brown's Movies (7/0)
            All dressed up as some sort of popcorn blockbuster, but it has no idea how to go about getting it...

By Jim Chastain of Norman Transcript (7/0)
            I think The Time Machine will hold your interest. But I had the sense they were just whetting my...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Edward Johnson-Ott of NUVO Newsweekly (7/0)
            Everything feels rushed. Instead of drinking in the futuristic wonders, we are shooed forward lik...

By Frank Swietek of One Guy's Opinion (7/0)
            A charmingly old-fashioned adventure yarn,...but spruced up with state-of-the-art special effects...

By Wesley Lovell of Oscar Guy (7/0)
            Entertaining, but missing a suitable point.

By Dennis Schwartz of Ozus' World Movie Reviews (7/0)
            New Yorkers always seem to find the oddest places to dwell...

By Jeanne Aufmuth of Palo Alto Weekly (7/0)
            A preposterous action-adventure that smacks heavily of the laborious "The Mummy".

By Cynthia Fuchs of Philadelphia City Paper (7/0)
            The new film version of The Time Machine is misconceived from jump.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Jon Popick of Planet Sick-Boy (7/0)
            There aren't enough expensive special effects in the world to make up for a good story. They had...

By James Kendrick of Q Network Film Desk (7/0)
            full of wondrous images and nothing coherent to say about them

By Mary Kalin-Casey of Reel.com (7/0)
            ... a waste of time.

By Laura Clifford of Reeling Reviews (7/0)
            That Jeremy Irons’ character should set one to thinking of “Battlefield Earth’s” Travolta is not ...

By Robin Clifford of Reeling Reviews (7/0)
            ...wears its admiration to the George Pal film prominently on its sleeve.

By Betty Jo Tucker of ReelTalk Movie Reviews (7/0)
            I love the opening scenes of a wintry New York City in 1899. Cinematic poetry showcases the city'...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By James Berardinelli of ReelViews (7/0)
            The Time Machine is stupid -- too stupid for the impressive special effects or the competently di...

By Charles Taylor of Salon.com (7/0)
            ... an agreeable time-wasting device -- but George Pal's low-tech 1960 version still rules the ep...

By Jean Lowerison of San Diego Metropolitan (7/0)
            This is a film to look at, not to feel --or care much-- about. It comes down to little more than ...

By James O'Ehley of Sci-Fi Movie Page (5/2)
            Here Wells' story has been stripped of whatever intelligence even the 1960 movie had.

By Jim Judy of Screen It! (7/0)
            Although it's decent for a while, many viewers will long for their turn in the machine to either ...

By William Arnold of Seattle Post-Intelligencer (7/0)
            Overall, the special effects are impressive, especially the time machine itself ...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Moira MacDonald of Seattle Times (7/0)
            ... unlike the shiny machine at its center, its timing is off, and it never quite soars.

By Ed Gonzalez of Slant Magazine (7/0)
            More tragic than the uneven mix of jokes and schlock is the brevity of Irons' cameo role.

By Rob Blackwelder of SPLICEDWire (7/0)
            ...enough of an intellectual popcorn delight that it's stimulating and entertaining in spite of i...

By Paul Salfen of Supercala.com (7/0)
            A so-so film version of the great book that looks good, but just isn't very satisfying.

By Tony Toscano of Talking Pictures (U.S.) (7/0)
            A very average science fiction film.

By Frank Lovece of TV Guide's Movie Guide (7/0)
            The usually charismatic Pearce, however, shows all the emotional range of a rock, making it all t...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Ian Waldron-Mantgani of UK Critic (7/0)
            The secrets of time travel will have been discovered, indulged in and rejected as boring before I...

By Mike Clark of USA Today (7/0)
            Simon Wells, whose other films include the animated The Prince of Egypt and Balto, manages to gut...

By Jeffrey Chen of Window to the Movies (7/0)
            This new movie is an eye-candy spectacular but it's seriously lacking in the meaning department.

By Michael Tunison of Boxoffice Magazine (3/4) No reference
            ... with the gifted Pearce on hand to keep things on semi-stable ground dramatically, this retool...

By Pablo Villaca of Cinema em Cena (3/4) No reference
            Apesar de seus graves problemas, o filme consegue entreter.

By Dan Fazio of Citysearch (3/4) No reference
            The film feels rushed throughout, and especially during its overly action-packed finale.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Jeff Vice of Deseret News, Salt Lake City (6/1) No reference
            Being author Wells' great-grandson, you'd think filmmaker Simon Wells would have more reverence f...

By Susan Stark of Detroit News (3/4) No reference
            It will delight newcomers to the story and those who know it from bygone days.

By Sean O'Connell of Eclipse Magazine (3/4) No reference
            Everything Stephen Sommers' Mummy franchise or Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes wanted to be.

By Adam Nayman of eye WEEKLY (6/1) No reference
            It's passable big-budget trash, with a few diverting moments and a refreshing clarity in the desi...

By Walter Chaw of Film Freak Central (3/4) No reference
            It isn't that The Time Machine is incoherent, it's that the film aspires after several rewrites t...

By Chris Gore of Film Threat (3/4) No reference
            I found myself glancing at my timepiece about every ten minutes of the interminable 96-minute run...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By MaryAnn Johanson of Flick Filosopher (3/4) No reference
            I got yer time machine right here. See, you buy a ticket to this new Guy Pearce movie, and 90 min...

By Donald Munro of Fresno Bee (3/4) No reference
            ... a listless, plodding, mumble of a film that gets so bogged down in special effects that it ne...

By Bruce Kirkland of Jam! Movies (3/4) No reference
            Personally, I'd like to time travel back myself and get those 95 minutes returned. I wouldn't was...

By Drew McAnulty of Jam! Movies (3/4) No reference
            ... Wells the director has created little more than a weak love story with some action thrown in ...

By Louis B. Hobson of Jam! Movies (3/4) No reference
            It's great scary fun but hardly true to the sentiments or spirit of its source material.

By Marshall Fine of Journal News (Westchester, NY) (3/4) No reference
            Everything about this film feels borrowed and recycled.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By James Sanford of Kalamazoo Gazette (6/1) No reference
            In the year 802,701, mankind has split into two races, animal life is nowhere to be found, the Ea...

By Robert W. Butler of Kansas City Star (3/4) No reference
            There's some enjoyment to be had if you can concentrate on individual moments and ideas. But when...

By Manohla Dargis of L.A. Weekly (3/4) No reference
            In the new film, it's personal tragedy that provokes the journey, not social upheaval or even sci...

By Bob Strauss of Los Angeles Daily News (3/4) No reference
            ... there's a choppy, surface-effect feeling to the whole enterprise.

By Jeff Strickler of Minneapolis Star Tribune (3/4) No reference
            If H.G. Wells had a time machine and could take a look at his kin's reworked version, what would ...

By Nell Minow of Movie Mom at Yahoo! Movies (6/1) No reference
            A showy and entertaining story about an idea everyone has dreamed of – having power over time.

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Michael Elliott of Movie Parables (3/4) No reference
            Wells (and Verbanski)... straddle between two genres and ultimately satisfy fans of neither.

By Mark Ramsey of MovieJuice! (3/4) No reference
            How come getting the CGI right is so damned important, but the filmmakers go Ed Wood when it come...

By James Rocchi of Netflix (3/4) No reference
            Modern take on H.G. Wells's sci-fi classic has great special effects but isn't especially affecti...

By Jonathan Foreman of New York Post (3/4) No reference
            Everything else that the filmmakers have done in their thoughtless, lazy way to 'improve' the ori...

By John Anderson of Newsday (3/4) No reference
            Not exactly H.G. Wells, but sturdy and effective.

By Shawn Levy of Oregonian (3/4) No reference
            ... while there are some glittery bits in it, the film is frustrating, cluttered, inelegant and g...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Roger Moore of Orlando Sentinel (3/4) No reference
            The worst news isn't that this Time Machine is lacking in humanity. It's that screenwriter John L...

By Steve Schneider of Orlando Weekly (3/4) No reference
            Less dizzying than just dizzy, the jaunt is practically over before it begins.

By Jack Garner of Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (6/1) No reference
            Though [Wells'] Time Machine changes locales and romantic temperament, it takes full advantage of...

By Joe Baltake of Sacramento Bee (3/4) No reference
            It's doubtful there will be a Time Machine 2 in our movie future.

By Sean Means of Salt Lake Tribune (3/4) No reference
            [The filmmakers are] so hung up on other versions of The Time Machine that they never give this o...

By David Elliott of San Diego Union-Tribune (3/4) No reference
            ... a far smarter remake of Wells than the 1996 Island of Dr. Moreau, a ludicrous giggle party fo...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Todd Anthony of South Florida Sun-Sentinel (3/4) No reference
            A disappointing new adaptation of H.G. Wells' sci-fi classic The Time Machine joins the growing l...

By Dustin Putman of TheMovieBoy.com (3/4) No reference
            Isn't a complete home run, but...is that rare special effects-laden feature that actually uses it...

By Desson Thomson of Washington Post (3/4) No reference
            Amazingly stilted before accelerating into its exciting finish.

By Michael Szymanski of Zap2it.com (6/1) No reference
            . It's a brilliant revision of the book and it offers a motivation for the invention that's lacki...

By Yazmin Ghonaim of Cinephiles (6/1) Not Reachable
            Neglects the author's fundamental vision.

By Rene Rodriguez of Miami Herald (6/1) Not Reachable
            The Time Machine isn't so much an adaptation of H.G. Wells' seminal novel as it is an appropriati...

                         Reviews of Time Machine, The
By Gary Thompson of Philadelphia Daily News (3/4) Not Reachable
            For every cheesy scene, though, there is a really cool bit -- the movie's conception of a future-...

By Chris Hewitt (St. Paul) of St. Paul Pioneer Press (3/4) Not Reachable
            Time Machine never lives up to the promise of its first half-hour.

Movie Distributors
DreamWorks SKG

Production Companies
material
Parkes/MacDonald Productions
Talking Rings Entertainment

Movie Studios
Warner Bros. Pictures
DreamWorks SKG