Cheap H.G. Wells - Things to Come (DVD) (Raymond Massey) (William Cameron Menzies) Price

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Customer Reviews of H.G. Wells - Things to Come

A Window into History
Things To Come is a stunning view of a quixotic future, with an apocalyptic End of Days followed by a millenarian Rebirth. The vision of Raymond Massey staring into the night sky as Humanity's seed is flung to the stars, asking "All or nothing. Which shall it be?" is matched in its emotional power only by Edmund Gwenn's "Nobody can predict" closure in Them, and underscores Mankind's impetus to the stars that drives us today. Behind the images, Things To Come provides a wealth of insight into England's intellectual milieu in the 1930s. Massey's horror at the prospect of a new world war, and his companions' disbelief that any power or statesman could contemplate one, reflects the war-weary nature of the British public in 1935 and the country's refusal to acknowledge that Hitler, who had just come to power, had more in mind than mere bluff. "Another speech by him? It's nothing I tell you. Threatened wars never occur." The subsequent locust-like invasion of England by hordes of foreign aircraft flying over the cliffs of Dover was prophetic in that this actually occurred shortly thereafter in 1940. The film is steeped in Marxist ideology, as were English intellectuals at the time. TTC suggests that war is not waged by particular humans but is a function of capitalism, and can only be prevented by a total transformation of society. The futuristic civilization that finally emerges is the ideal of 1930s English socialism. A society of workers is ruled by a committee of technocrats headed by Massey who defends "our Revolution" by forcibly suppressing all independent states (with "peace gas" thus distinguishing those poorly bred Bolsheviks who actually shot people). One almost sympathizes with Cedric Hardwicke when he leads a new revolution against Massey's descendant, except that his own vision is retrograde and even less tolerant than Massey's, if that were possible. One of my top ten, TTC is worth a close study. Far from detracting, the grainy black and white print adds to the impact.

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Eerie, but worthwhile
Okay, enough already about the transfers, let's talk about the film itself.

In a nutshell, this 1936 Brit sci-fi feature deals with war and progress. Everytown (London?) is shown in 1940 about to celebrate Christmas amidst blaring headlines of war (in a nifty bit of symbolism, the children play with war toys around the Christmas tree). Then war hits the city (in an eerily accurate foretelling of the German blitz that DID rock England in 1940). As time goes on, the war drags into decades ending up in a post-apocalyptic society in 1966.

Because of the war, Everytown/London has regressed into a crude, medieval type society without electricity which wastes its resources on senseless wars and is led by a Hitler-type warlord ogre called "The Boss." The world is also famished by a deadly, incurable disease called "Wandering Sickenss" whose victims are shot by the boss (reminds you of Castro's quarantine of AIDS patients). John Cabal (Raymond Massey) is a leader of scientists who return to civilize Everytown/London and establish a scientific technocracy. But the Boss demands the technology to wage more war, which he tells his followers is necessary for the peace (he begins to sound frighteningly like George Bush Jr. during such speeches). Anyway, the Boss and Cabal face off, and I'll leave the rest to your imagination. A moon shot and some anti-progress protesters (simialr to today's anti WTO protesters) play major parts in the latter third of the story.

For those of us who are into history, this film is extremely eerie, yet fascinating and worthwhile to watch. It's scary in that some of what H.G. Wells prophesized did indeed come true in ways that are even more so than what I just mentioned. (Think of some of today's so-called Third World countries whose resources are wasted by boss-like dictators among other things). Basically, this film, despite the overtly speechike dialogue (Raymond Massey's soliloquy about the need for progress near the film's end is a bit hard to take), is an eloquent sermon on the hindrance that war makes on the progress of humanity and the need for education to triumph over ignorance. It would be great for a high school or college history teacher to show and have a discussion with their classes about this film.

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An exceptional period piece
This movie, made between the two World Wars, preserves a complex and varied view of its time. The movie opens on a holiday, with family scenes, caroling, and the rest. The background, however, is a constant threat of war, blared from the news media. In an uncomfortable foreshadowing of 1984, the aggressor is never identified clearly, even when the bombs start to fall.

The next scenes were, I'm sure, as horrific a the director could make them, within the standards of the time. The city, the families in it, and the civilization that it stood for were bombed to the ground and the wreckage gassed. This must have had a special horror at the time. WW-I was still strong in living memory, and the veterans crippled by gas were still alive. But this movie's war went on for decades, long after were no more weapons left to fight it with.

The post-war population was slashed by plague - again, something vivid to people who still remembered the deadly Spanish Flu. Society collapsed into village-states, each governed by the biggest bully around.

New hope for the world came from pure technological optimism, the belief that scientists and engineers could create a moral society in their Buck Rogers laboratories and factories. Don't get me wrong - it is not possible to create a humane society without the labs and factories. We now know that it takes a lot more, as well. The arrogance, techno-tyrrany, and 'weapons of peace' in that new order seemed natural, even proper in that era. They chill a modern viewer, since we now know that a lab coat isn't a mantle of moral authority. That technological utopia was not perfect. It carried its own inherent vices, the easy life and the sense of entitlement to every comfort imaginable.

This movie is a time capsule. It recorded the beliefs and hopes of its age, and plays them back for us 60+ years later. I am boggled by what was then the most advanced thinking; it now seems so naive. We've had a chance to the predictions that came true (mostly, the negative ones) and the predictions that failed miserably in practice (most of the positive ones).

The science fiction aspects of this film will seem hopelessly dated to today's effects-junkies. Even the style of acting will seem stilted. No matter, this one is worth watching and re-watching. It makes me wonder which of today's hopes and fears will come true, and how they'll look half a century from now.