On ITV last night, the recent remake; nowhere near as good as the original but still fascinating, particularly in the light of the PAST thread here.

Can we change the future?

HG Wells' message was basically "No we can't" and I think he was right. We can never know how our sometimes well meaning efforts (stop global warming) can eventually lead to disaster. And perhaps that's the way it was going anyway.

I am virtually certain in billions of years Earth will be a frozen, barren planet like Mars, or the moon, or Pluto... and Venus will be a healthy living planet like Earth is now, with a young student squeaking "Streets full of people all alone..." never guessing he was soon to star in Vile Pervert: The Musical.

And billions of years after that, when Mercury has become Earth and died, and the sun has gone out, another star in another part of the universe will explode, become a sun and create Earth on a planet far, far away...

I think it is incredible how we are still obsessed with his original idea. Sci Fi, never mind reality would not work without it.

A friend of mine told me that he had such an original Sc Fi story for a book that he was going to write that he would not even tell me what it was.
Eventually he said to me that he didn`t have time to write it, so he gave me the plot outline to write it for him.

"Errrmm, sorry my friend ", I said, "you need to refer to Phillip K Dick for the ending of this story!"
I cannot imagine a new sci fi idea ever being created, H G Wells, Arthur C Clarke and the aforementioned author pretty much used them all up, oddly enough creating bibles for all that sci fi cinema, t v and novels have to use a check list to write a story to.
I`d love to credit Gene Roddenbury with the "beaming down " idea, but it was featured way back in the 50`s in the sci fi comics of the time.

I love H.G.Wells, not only for the fact that he had such a brilliant vision but also for his ability to understand and relate to the frustrated dreams of the ordinary person. The History of Mr. Polly is my favourite book of his for that very reason. His early non sci-fi works are massively underrated in my opinion.

I disagree. In the original 'The Time Machine' film, the future is indeed changed in that George successfully helps the Eloi free themselves from the Morlocks and become more than just passive fodder, thus altering their future. I didn't make it to the end of this dumbed-down remake as it wasn't a patch on the original and changed huge chunks of the book.

In my opinion it would be possible to change the future, although one can debate the extent. If I travelled back in time and bumped off Henry VIII before he became king the whole of UK history would be different.

Yes Mart, and it's the same with music:
"Futuristic" / electronic music today sounds just like it did in the 50s (Stockhausen, BBC Radiphonic Workshop, etc.) or the early 70s (Kraftwerk).

What an ironic thought D Jones. We cannot "de-invent" a musical idea any more than we can do the same with a Sci Fi idea that has actually never happened and probably never will!

the re-make is pretty chronic really when special effects can now be done on computer. Must have been a low budget.

Odd that the 2 main versions both had Aussie actors but Rod Taylor in the first one was so much better ( whatever happened to him ?)

I think we are already visited by time travellers..prove me wrong !

veritas wrote:
the re-make is pretty chronic really when special effects can now be done on computer. Must have been a low budget.

Odd that the 2 main versions both had Aussie actors but Rod Taylor in the first one was so much better ( whatever happened to him ?)

I think we are already visited by time travellers..prove me wrong !
Our friend Wikipedia on Rob Taylor

I would love to prove you either right or wrong Veritas but I swear that the swines brain washed me!

Mart wrote:
I would love to prove you either right or wrong Veritas but I swear that the swines brain washed me!
The master of brainwashing is David Icke (Aliens told me so) - don't be fooled!