#660: MENZIES, William Cameron: Things To Come (1936)

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MENZIES, William Cameron (United Kingdom)
Things To Come [1936]
Spine #660
Blu-ray


A landmark collaboration between writer H. G. Wells, producer Alexander Korda, and designer and director William Cameron Menzies, Things to Come is a science fiction film like no other, a prescient political work that predicts a century of turmoil and progress. Skipping through time, Things to Come bears witness to world war, disease, dictatorship, and, finally, utopia. Conceived, written, and overseen by Wells himself as an adaptation of his own work, this megabudget production, the most ambitious ever from Korda's London Films, is a triumph of imagination and technical audacity.

97 minutes
Black & White
Monaural
1:37:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2013
Director


William Cameron Menzies was 40 when he directed Things to Come.

The Film

Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

The Booklet

Twenty-four page booklet featuring an essay by critic Geoffrey O’Brien.

Commentary

Featuring film historian and writer David Kalat.

Interview

With writer and cultural historian Christopher Frayling on the film’s design.

Visual essay

By film historian Bruce Eder on Arthur Bliss’s musical score.

Unused special effects

Footage by artist László Moholy-Nagy, along with a video installation piece by Jan Tichy incorporating that footage.

Audio recording

From 1936 of a reading from H.G. Wells’s writing about the Wandering Sickness, the plague in Things to Come.

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

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