The Fabric of Time
Time Travel has been a much debated and much written about topic for years. What is it about time travel that is so attractive? Is it because it is an unknown and yet to be discovered frontier? Is it the human desire to change the past? Or is it man's desire to conqueor every aspect of life? According to literature and film it is all of these things. In the current film adaptation of H.G. Wells' The Time Machine the time traveller travels to the past in order to prevent a personal tragedy. When this fails he travels to the future to find out why he failed. Man's insatiable curiosity is displayed in this film as the travellor searches further and further into the future to find his answer. Man is also (as is shown in the time traveller) unhappy with his existence. The ability to travel to the past and change the future appears to be the answer. However as the time travellor discovers, he does not need to change the past in order to enjoy the future. The idea of changing the past is also displayed in the film The Butterfly Effect. In this film, the main character Evan finds he can travel back to the most horrific events of his life and attempt to change them. However he discovers that no matter how many times he tries to change the past nothing goes right. The only way to make things right is to eliminate himself as he was never meant to exist. By doing this the film suggests in an that time is delicate and must not be toyed with. Therefore as well as being a fascinating topic Time Travel is also a dangerous one, for who knows what may happen if one messes with the very fabric of time...
Horrorphile
The original filmed version holds a special place in my heart too. It creeped me out as a young boy.
I often use the term "the fabric of time" ... when I've lost a sock, or pen, or misplaced my mobile phone, I refer to how the fabric of time has opened up and snatched it!
Have you heard of a British TV series from the early 80s (or perhaps it was the late 70s?) called Sapphire & Steel about two time-travelling agents played by David McCallum and Joanna Lumley ... great existential goobedly-gook!