Things to Come (1936)

User Rating:

6.8/10   

Director:

William Cameron Menzies

Writers:

H.G. Wells (novel)
H.G. Wells (screenplay)

Release Date:

31 March 1936 (Denmark)

Genre:

Sci-Fi

Tagline:

What will the next hundred years bring to mankind?

Plot:

A story of 100 years: a decades-long second world war leaves plague and anarchy, then a rational state rebuilds civilization and tries space travel.

Plot Keywords:

Plague | Progress | 1940s | Aviation | Utopia Quest

Cast

Raymond Massey	...	John Cabal / Oswald Cabal
Edward Chapman	...	Pippa Passworthy / Raymond Passworthy
Ralph Richardson	...	Rudolph - The Boss
Margaretta Scott	...	Roxana / Rowena (as Margueretta Scott)
Cedric Hardwicke	...	Theotocopulos
Maurice Braddell	...	Dr. Harding
Sophie Stewart	...	Mrs. Cabal
Derrick De Marney	...	Richard Gordon (as Derrick de Marney)
Ann Todd	...	Mary Gordon
Pearl Argyle	...	Catherine Cabal
Kenneth Villiers	...	Maurice Passworthy
Ivan Brandt	...	Morden Mitani
Anne McLaren	...	The Child
Patricia Hilliard	...	Janet Gordon
Charles Carson	...	Great Grandfather

Also Known As:

H.G. Wells' Things to Come (UK) (complete title)
The Hundred Years to Come (UK) (working title)
The Shape of Things to Come (UK) (working title)
Whither Mankind (UK) (working title)

Runtime:

100 min | UK:117 min | Canada:91 min (VHS version) | UK:108 min (premiere cut) | UK:113 min (original version) | USA:92 min (cut version)

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System Noiseless Recording)

Certification:

Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | UK:PG

Filming Locations:

Denham Studios, Denham, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

London Film Productions

Trivia:

The date on the newspaper in the scene in 1966 when the war ends is 21st September 1966--which would have been the 100th birthday of H.G. Wells.

Goofs:

Audio/visual unsynchronized: Near the end of the film, we hear the helicopter's rotor slowing almost to a stop while it's still descending at constant speed.

Quotes:

Roxana: I don't suppose any man has ever understood any woman since the beginning of things. You don't understand our imaginations.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Smiley Face (2007)

Soundtrack:

The world in ruins

Often Lyrical, Logical and Beautiful On its Own Terms; a Classic of Ideas

This early sci-fi masterwork by Herbert George Wells with music by Arthur Bliss is a powerful piece of film-making. Adapted from Wells' somewhat different work by the author, it presents a look at the human future with the subject of periods of war as versus periods of 'peace'. The structure is that after a contrasted-pair of episodes of normalcy and gathering clouds of war, the script allows the war to happen. Two families, the Cabells and the Passworthys disagree about what may happen; Passworthy takes a hopeful view of civilization's "automatic" progress; Cabell is the thinker, the doubter. Their city Everytown--obviously London-- becomes wrecked by a war featuring tanks, a magnificent war march by Bliss, and the end of civilization. The second portion finds people living in the wreckage of what had been the city under a "Boss", played with bravura by Ralph Richardson, whose woman, lovely Margaretta Scott, is as fascinating a dreamer as he is a concrete-bound dictator type. He is trying to rebuild old WWI airplanes so he can attack a nearby hill tribe to complete his petty kingdom; a young scientist complains about having his work continually interrupted demands for planes--etc.--everlastingly; this is Wells' comment on war versus progress. The survivors are subject to a plague called "The Wandering Sickness" also. Enter a modern flying machine piloted by the Cabell of the first section of the film, now part of Wings Over the World, an International Scientists' Coalition, who are planning to end warfare forever. This flight-suited modernist has fascinating conversations with the Boss and his woman, their attraction being evident; then Boss sends up his aircraft against them, the Scientists come with huge numbers of planes and drop the "Gas of Peace" onto the ruins of Everytown. Only the Boss dies, fighting too hard against the pacifying. The film then shows ore being mined and by slow steps being made into the girders of a magnificent new futuristic city of towers. In section three, a future Cabell argues with a future Passworthy over the morality of human science. Passworthy wonders if they have a right to send men to the Moon; Cabell champions man's right to advancement and the need to expand his horizons. The son of Passworthy and Cabell's daughter, are the astronauts being sent. Theotocopulos, a religious-minded Luddite, makes a fiery speech on a huge screen in the city's Forum and leads an attack on the 'space gun' that is to fire the new rocket free of Earth's gravity. The climax of the plot is the firing of the space gun successfully; the denouement and ending is a speech by Cabell praising worth and science that is universally considered to be the most profound defense of the mind ever penned. "It is all the universe--or nothing!" Cabell tells Passworthy. "Which shall it be?" As Cabell, Raymond Massey gives perhaps his greatest screen performance; he is thoughtful, compassionate, and reasonable, a true scientist. As the rabble-rouser who wants to end the Age of Science, Cedric Hardwicke is perfect and powerful. Edward Chapman playing Passworthy does admirably impersonating the voice of convention and fear. The storyline is logical, frequently beautiful and always interesting. Given the near-extinction of mankind, the idea of a civilization run by rebuilder scientists is rendered plausible and credible to the viewer. This is a triumph for the director, William Cameron Menzies, for Bliss and for all concerned. Listen to the dialogue with someone you love; within its constructed limits, this is a thinking man's drama debating two possible human futures--progress or its reactionary opposite.