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BFI Film Classics
Things to Come
Each volume in the "BFI Film Classics" series features a brief production history, detailed filmography, notes and bibliography. This text explores the influence of modern art and design in William Cameron Menzie's 1930s vision of the future, "Things to Come".
83 pages, Paperback
First published July 27, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
September 19, 2019
This is a really fun and cool book, well-researched and witty, about the making of the famous/"cult" 1936 British sci-film "Things to Come" which was based on an H.G. Wells novel called "The Shape of Things to Come." It's a great read for anyone interested in finding out the details of how the film came together- the collaboration between the Korda brothers and Wells, as well as the other creative people who worked on the project. It includes excerpts from memoirs/autobiographies of various people, such as lead actor Raymond Massey, on the making of the film.
The film itself is, as many critics agree, strong at first, but then seems somewhat challenged with respect to continuity - perhaps that is because about 10 minutes were cut after it was first released. There was a great deal of effort put into this film from noted designers, such as Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and the future city is impressive, but as a film story, it still mostly has characters walking around on sets as if in a play, it seems a filming of a play rather than taking advantage of the unique potentials of film itself. It does contain powerful montage sequences, the music is impressive, and many of the messages are noble, but in the end, it is just unbelievable and rather stiff - perhaps it would have to seem dated to present-day audiences. However, it does represent a step forward in the evolution of sci-fi films and special effects in general: the grim opening sequences especially are very impressive with the destruction of Everytown being unfortunately prescient given the actual Blitz in England a few short years later. The depiction of the utter breakdown of society in England in the post-war period is quite dreary and frightening.
I'd recommend the book - which is quick to read - to anyone interested in sci-fi films, HG Wells, this film itself, the Korda bothers, director Cameron-Menzies, etc.
Here are some quotes:
"... Wells' "Things to Come" - a polemic in favor of world economic planning and a Nw World Order where destructive trade wars and financial conflict would become things of the past."
"...Chaplin was at that time putting the finishing touches to "Modern Times," his satire on automation and the American system of manufacture - both of which were models for Wells' vision of the future."
"Cinema, [Wells said]... - echoing, perhaps unconsciously, the famous words of Lenin - had 'the possibility of becoming the greatest art form that has ever existed.'"
"...Wells...[in] his original treatment... wrote..: "The interest of this latter part brings the drama of creative effort versus the resistances of jealousy, indolence and sentimentality, to a culmination. This fourth part must carry an effective answer to the question 'And after all, when you have united the world, is it going to be any different from what it is today?' The answer is Yes. The spirit will be different.""
"[Wells]...didn't want zombie-like ranks of operatives shuffling to work in shifts of ten hours; he didn't want the hustle and chaos of contemporary New York writ large; he didn't want buildings which went upwards and a city sectored into workers' dwellings and Roman-style catacombs (down below), the consumer base (street level), and pleasure gardens for the bosses (up above); he didn't want housing for the poor and houses for the rich; he didn't want the vertical social stratification of today projected into the future..."
"'Book the Second - The Days after Tomorrow: the age of frustration' concerns the outbreak of the Second World War in 1940 - the result of economic nationalism, rearmament with the latest weapons (especially gas bombs), increasing intolerance, casino capitalism and the failure of global talks - and its rapid spread across Europe and the Japanese sector, followed nine years later by a world epidemic of 'the wandering sickness' and the rise of petty warlord states run by gangster-politicians..."
"In ['Book the Third - the World Renascence: the birth of the modern state'] ... Wells combined two of his great passions: airplanes and their pilots as key images of modernity, and the role of Iraqi scientists and philosophers in medieval times - when Europe was still struggling out of the dark ages."
"'Book the Fifth - the Modern State in control of life,' the shortest section of "The Shape of Things to Come," describes how the planet becomes one world in the post-Dictatorship era from 2059 to 2106: 'racial prejudice is replaced by racial understanding', Basic English becomes the universal language, religions are 'watered own to modernity', genetic engineering produces new foodstuffs and plants (and is forbidden to be used on human beings), a new system of distribution is introduced - based on the model of the department store - and the "Science of Significs' as applied to linguistics, together with Social Psychology, become the organizing intellectual systems."
"[Wells:] "Industrial enterprises that formerly befouled the world with smoke, refuse and cinder-heaps, are now cleaner in their habits than a well-trained cat...""
"In this adaptation process, the prophet chose to jettison some of his more radical themes - the critique of competitive capitalism and liberal democracy, the attack on organized religion, the destruction of nationalism - and all his discussions of revolutionary strategy and tactics. He retained and even expanded the debate about gender roles in the future world...but this was cut out of the finished film for reasons of length..."
"By way of revenge perhaps, [Wells, who became disillusioned with the project and later disappointed with the result] ... wrote a long short story in 1936-7 called "Star Begotten - a biological fantasia," about the effect of cosmic rays from Mars as earthly geniuses. As part of the extensive dialogue, he had one of his characters bitterly admit: 'World peace is assumed, but the atmosphere of security simply makes [the people of the future] rather aimless, fattish and out of training. They are collectively up to nothing - or they are off in a sort of collective hysteria to conquer the moon or some remote nonsense like that. Imaginative starvation. They have apparently made no advances whatever in subtlety, delicacy, simplicity. Rather the reverse. They never say a witty thing; they never do a charming act. The general effect is of very pink, rather absurdly dressed celluloid dolls living on tabloids in a glass lavatory.'"
The film itself is, as many critics agree, strong at first, but then seems somewhat challenged with respect to continuity - perhaps that is because about 10 minutes were cut after it was first released. There was a great deal of effort put into this film from noted designers, such as Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and the future city is impressive, but as a film story, it still mostly has characters walking around on sets as if in a play, it seems a filming of a play rather than taking advantage of the unique potentials of film itself. It does contain powerful montage sequences, the music is impressive, and many of the messages are noble, but in the end, it is just unbelievable and rather stiff - perhaps it would have to seem dated to present-day audiences. However, it does represent a step forward in the evolution of sci-fi films and special effects in general: the grim opening sequences especially are very impressive with the destruction of Everytown being unfortunately prescient given the actual Blitz in England a few short years later. The depiction of the utter breakdown of society in England in the post-war period is quite dreary and frightening.
I'd recommend the book - which is quick to read - to anyone interested in sci-fi films, HG Wells, this film itself, the Korda bothers, director Cameron-Menzies, etc.
Here are some quotes:
"... Wells' "Things to Come" - a polemic in favor of world economic planning and a Nw World Order where destructive trade wars and financial conflict would become things of the past."
"...Chaplin was at that time putting the finishing touches to "Modern Times," his satire on automation and the American system of manufacture - both of which were models for Wells' vision of the future."
"Cinema, [Wells said]... - echoing, perhaps unconsciously, the famous words of Lenin - had 'the possibility of becoming the greatest art form that has ever existed.'"
"...Wells...[in] his original treatment... wrote..: "The interest of this latter part brings the drama of creative effort versus the resistances of jealousy, indolence and sentimentality, to a culmination. This fourth part must carry an effective answer to the question 'And after all, when you have united the world, is it going to be any different from what it is today?' The answer is Yes. The spirit will be different.""
"[Wells]...didn't want zombie-like ranks of operatives shuffling to work in shifts of ten hours; he didn't want the hustle and chaos of contemporary New York writ large; he didn't want buildings which went upwards and a city sectored into workers' dwellings and Roman-style catacombs (down below), the consumer base (street level), and pleasure gardens for the bosses (up above); he didn't want housing for the poor and houses for the rich; he didn't want the vertical social stratification of today projected into the future..."
"'Book the Second - The Days after Tomorrow: the age of frustration' concerns the outbreak of the Second World War in 1940 - the result of economic nationalism, rearmament with the latest weapons (especially gas bombs), increasing intolerance, casino capitalism and the failure of global talks - and its rapid spread across Europe and the Japanese sector, followed nine years later by a world epidemic of 'the wandering sickness' and the rise of petty warlord states run by gangster-politicians..."
"In ['Book the Third - the World Renascence: the birth of the modern state'] ... Wells combined two of his great passions: airplanes and their pilots as key images of modernity, and the role of Iraqi scientists and philosophers in medieval times - when Europe was still struggling out of the dark ages."
"'Book the Fifth - the Modern State in control of life,' the shortest section of "The Shape of Things to Come," describes how the planet becomes one world in the post-Dictatorship era from 2059 to 2106: 'racial prejudice is replaced by racial understanding', Basic English becomes the universal language, religions are 'watered own to modernity', genetic engineering produces new foodstuffs and plants (and is forbidden to be used on human beings), a new system of distribution is introduced - based on the model of the department store - and the "Science of Significs' as applied to linguistics, together with Social Psychology, become the organizing intellectual systems."
"[Wells:] "Industrial enterprises that formerly befouled the world with smoke, refuse and cinder-heaps, are now cleaner in their habits than a well-trained cat...""
"In this adaptation process, the prophet chose to jettison some of his more radical themes - the critique of competitive capitalism and liberal democracy, the attack on organized religion, the destruction of nationalism - and all his discussions of revolutionary strategy and tactics. He retained and even expanded the debate about gender roles in the future world...but this was cut out of the finished film for reasons of length..."
"By way of revenge perhaps, [Wells, who became disillusioned with the project and later disappointed with the result] ... wrote a long short story in 1936-7 called "Star Begotten - a biological fantasia," about the effect of cosmic rays from Mars as earthly geniuses. As part of the extensive dialogue, he had one of his characters bitterly admit: 'World peace is assumed, but the atmosphere of security simply makes [the people of the future] rather aimless, fattish and out of training. They are collectively up to nothing - or they are off in a sort of collective hysteria to conquer the moon or some remote nonsense like that. Imaginative starvation. They have apparently made no advances whatever in subtlety, delicacy, simplicity. Rather the reverse. They never say a witty thing; they never do a charming act. The general effect is of very pink, rather absurdly dressed celluloid dolls living on tabloids in a glass lavatory.'"
June 21, 2017
Another great entry in the BFI Film Classics series. Christopher Frayling explores one of the lesser-known science fiction classics - at least in mainstream culture - H.G. Wells' vision of the future, Things to Come. Frayling focuses much of his attention on the artistic elements of the film, including the score, set design, and cinematography, as well as H.G. Wells' passion for the project and obsession over controlling as much of it as possible - to an extent that is reminiscent of Orson Welles' Citizen Kane. Frayling guides the reader masterfully through each stop of the production, up to and including the aftermath, with an attention to detail worthy of the BFI series.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews