H.G. Wells Filmography

The History of Mr. Polly

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Lee Evans, Anne-Marie Duff, Julie Graham

Synopsis: Director Gillies MacKinnin and screenwriter Adrian Hodges team to adapt Victorian author H.G. Wells' intimate drama about a man who has forsaken his dreams to lead a life of suffocating mediocrity. Alfred Polly (Lee Evans) was once a man with truly extraordinary dreams, but unfortunately Alfred Read More

War of the Worlds

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Tom Cruise, Dakota Fanning, Miranda Otto, Justin Chatwin, Tim Robbins

Synopsis: An ordinary man has to protect his children against alien invaders in this science fiction thriller, freely adapted from the classic story by H.G. Wells. Ray Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is a dockworker living in New Jersey, divorced from his first wife Mary Ann (Miranda Otto) and estranged from his two Read More

H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds

Crew: Book Author

H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds

Crew: Book Author

Actors: C. Thomas Howell

The Island of Dr. Moreau

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Marlon Brando, Val Kilmer, David Thewlis, Fairuza Balk, Ron Perlman

Synopsis: On a remote tropical island, Dr. Moreau has appointed himself ruler over a menagerie of genetic mutants fashioned in his gene-splicing chamber of horrors. The products of his misguided attempt to create a more "pure" human species, the man-beasts worship Moreau as their god and "father" and live Read More

The Invisible Man

Crew: Book Author

The Time Machine

Crew: Book Author

Synopsis: A progressive scientist builds a machine that allows him time travel in this adaptation of the classic from H.G. Wells. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide Read More

Empire of the Ants

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Joan Collins, Robert Lansing, John Carson, Albert Salmi, Jacqueline Scott

Synopsis: In the '50s, Bert I. Gordon made a career out of sci-fi movies about gigantic mutated insects (Beginning of the End, Earth vs. the Spider), lizards (King Dinosaur, Serpent Island), and even people (The Amazing Colossal Man), and in 1977, he was still up to his old tricks with this picture, loosely Read More

The Island of Dr. Moreau

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Burt Lancaster, Michael York, Nigel Davenport, Barbara Carrera, Richard Basehart

Synopsis: In The Island of Dr. Moreau, which is based on a novella by H.G. Wells, Braddock (Michael York) is a decent young Englishman who has unaccountably been saved from being thrown overboard from a ship sailing in a remote area of the Pacific by the mysterious Dr. Montgomery (Nigel Davenport). Dr. Read More

The Food of the Gods

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Marjoe Gortner, Pamela Franklin, Ralph Meeker, Ida Lupino, Jon Cypher

Synopsis: Based on a novel by H. G. Wells, a group of bloodthirsty, oversized creatures (including rats, chickens, wasps, and worms) have taken over a remote island after ingesting a mysterious growth known as "Food of the Gods." It is up to an unusual group of people to put an end to this animal threat. Read More

The Invisible Man

Crew: Book Author

Synopsis: This TV-movie update of the old H.G. Wells fantasy novel stars David McCallum as brilliant scientist Daniel Weston. He's so brilliant that he develops an invisibility serum, which he applies to himself. Two inconveniences: Weston must wear a special mask so that his wife (Kathleen Fee) can see Read More

La Merveilleuse Visite

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Gilles Kohler, Deborah Berger, Lucien Barjon, Roland Le Saffre

Synopsis: The last of veteran moviemaker Marcel Carne's theatrical films, La Merveilleuse Visite was a surprisingly restrained film by one of the most colorful filmmakers in France. Jean (Gilles Kiher) stars as an angel who has fallen from heaven and landed in a picturesque French village. Nursed back to Read More

Love and Mr. Lewisham

Crew: Book Author

Synopsis: Originally telecast in 1972, the British miniseries Love and Mr. Lewisham was based on the 1900 novel by H.G. Wells, which served as the author's first "non-science-fiction" work. Apparently autobiographical, the story concerned the romantic travails of a British schoolteacher during the early Read More

Half a Sixpence

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Tommy Steele, Julia Foster, Cyril Ritchard, Grover Dale, Penelope Horner, Elaine Taylor

Synopsis: British musical star Tommy Steele had starred in Half a Sixpence in London and on Broadway, thus he was first choice for this garish film version. Based on the H.G. Wells story Kipps (previously filmed in 1941 with Michael Redgrave), Half a Sixpence tells the tale of a humble London drapery clerk Read More

Village of the Giants

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Tommy Kirk, Johnny Crawford, Beau Bridges, Ronny Howard, Tisha Sterling, Joy Harmon

Synopsis: Based on the same H.G. Wells story as his later Food of the Gods, this silly but good-looking fantasy from Bert I. Gordon is among his more entertaining films. The young Ron Howard plays Genius, who develops a substance which causes animals to grow to monstrous size. After eight kids (led by Beau Read More

The Alfred Hitchcock Hour: The Magic Shop

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Leslie Nielsen, John Megna, David Opatoshu, Peggy McCay, Paul Hartman

Synopsis: Adapted by John Collier from a story by H.G. Wells, this episode is built around the talents of child actor John Megna, best remembered for his role as the Truman Capote counterpart in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird. Obsessed by magic and magicians, Tony Grainger (Megna) begs his father Read More

The First Men in the Moon

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Edward Judd, Lionel Jeffries, Martha Hyer, Erik Chitty, Betty McDowall, Hugh McDermott

Synopsis: First Men in the Moon is an H.G. Welles cinemadaptation from director Nathan Juran. When scientists in the year 1964 are confused by evidence of a long-ago space flight, nonagenarian Arnold Bedford (Edward Judd) explains all. Back in 1899, Bedford, eccentric scientist Joseph Cavor (Lionel Read More

The Time Machine

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Rod Taylor, Alan Young, Yvette Mimieux, Sebastian Cabot, Tom Helmore

Synopsis: In George Pal's version of the H.G. Wells classic, Rod Taylor stars as George, a young scientist fascinated with the concept of time travel. On December 31, 1899, George seats himself in his jerry-built time machine and thrusts himself forward into 1917. A dyed-in-the-wool pacifist, George is Read More

Terror Is a Man

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Francis Lederer, Greta Thyssen, Richard Derr

Synopsis: A man who was the lone survivor of a shipwreck is rescued, only to discover that he's in greater danger than ever before in this horror story inspired by H.G. Wells' The Island of Dr. Moreau. After his ship sinks in the midst of an ocean crossing, William Fitzgerald (Richard Derr) is near Read More

The New Invisible Man

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Arturo de Cordova, Ana Luisa Peluffo, Augusto Benedico

Synopsis: Mexican filmmaker Alfredo B. Crevenna directed this sci-fi thriller loosely based on the classic H.G. Wells novel. Augusto Benedico stars as Luis, a scientist who gives his new invisibility formula to his jailed brother, Carlos (Arturo de Cordova). Carlos escapes and is reunited with his beloved Read More

The Door in the Wall

Crew: Book Author

The War of the Worlds

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Gene Barry, Ann Robinson, Les Tremayne, Lewis Martin, Henry Brandon, Robert Cornthwaite, Sandro Giglio

Synopsis: H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds had been on Paramount Pictures' docket since the silent era, when it was optioned as a potential Cecil B. DeMille production. When Paramount finally got around to a filming the Wells novel, the property was firmly in the hands of special-effects maestro George Pal. Read More

The History of Mr. Polly

Crew: Book Author

Actors: John Mills, Sally Ann Howes, Finlay Currie, Betty Ann Davies, Edward Chapman, Diana Churchill, Megs Jenkins

Synopsis: H. G. Wells' non-fantasy efforts have, with the exception of Kipps, proven traditionally difficult to transfer to film. History of Mr. Polly occasionally suffers from too-close fidelity to its Wellsian source; one wishes that adaptor/director Anthony Pelissier could have "opened up" the story a Read More

The Passionate Friends

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Ann Todd, Claude Rains, Trevor Howard, Betty Ann Davies, Isabel Dean

Synopsis: David Lean directed this romantic drama, scripted by Eric Ambler from a novel by H.G. Wells. Mary Justin (Ann Todd) is married to wealthy financier Howard Justin (Claude Rains), and while their marriage allows her to lead a comfortable lifestyle, there's little excitement in their relationship. Read More

Dead of Night

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Mervyn Johns, Michael Redgrave, Sally Ann Howes, Mary Merrall, Roland Culver

Synopsis: Considered the greatest horror anthology film, the classic British chiller Dead of Night features five stories of supernatural terror from four different directors, yet it ultimately feels like a unified whole. The framing device is simple but unsettling, as a group of strangers find themselves Read More

The Invisible Man's Revenge

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Jon Hall, Alan Curtis, Evelyn Ankers, Leon Errol, John Carradine

Synopsis: The fifth in the Invisible Man series stars Jon Hall as Robert Griffin, a convict who takes the invisibility serum and then goes on a crime spree. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide Read More

Kipps

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Michael Redgrave, Diana Wynyard, Phyllis Calvert, Michael Wilding, Sr., Arthur Riscoe, Max Adrian, Philip Sydney Frost

Synopsis: Carol Reed directed this adaptation of the H.G. Wells novel about a British shopkeeper who inherits money and tries to crash society; it was later the basis of the Tommy Steele musical Half a Sixpence. Michael Redgrave is Arthur Kipps, a nondescript storekeeper who finds himself heir to a large Read More

The Man Who Could Work Miracles

Crew: Book Author, Screenwriter

Actors: Roland Young, Joan Gardner, Ralph Richardson, Ernst Thesiger, Robert Cochran

Synopsis: As a result of a discussion between a trio of gods over the true worthiness of Earth, a retiring British shop assistant is granted miraculous powers in this fantasy based on an H.G. Wells story. Roland Young stars as George McWhirter Fotheringay, whose new powers are virtually limitless; choosing Read More

Things to Come

Crew: Book Author, Screenwriter

Actors: Raymond Massey, Cedric Hardwicke, Edward Chapman, Ralph Richardson, Margaretta Scott, Maurice Braddell, Sophie Stewart

Synopsis: H. G. Wells was both the author of the original source -- an essay, rather than an actual novel, concerning mankind's future -- and the screenplay (in conjunction with Lajos Biro) of this epic science fiction tale, but it was producer Alexander Korda who framed the terms on which it is presented Read More

The Invisible Man

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Claude Rains, Gloria Stuart, Henry Travers, William Harrigan, Una O'Connor

Synopsis: A mysterious stranger, his face swathed in bandages and his eyes obscured by dark spectacles, has taken a room at a cozy inn in the British village of Ipping. Never leaving his quarters, the stranger demands that the staff leave him completely alone. Working unmolested with his test tubes, the Read More

Island of Lost Souls

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Charles Laughton, Bela Lugosi, Richard Arlen, Leila Hyams, Kathleen Burke

Synopsis: This first film version of H.G. Wells' Island of Dr. Moreau stars Charles Laughton as Dr.Moreau, a dedicated but sadly misguided scientist who rules the roost on a remote island. Shipwrecked sailor Edward Parker Richard Arlen finds himself on Moreau's island, agreeing to stick around until another Read More

Marriage

Crew: Short Story Author

Actors: Virginia Valli, Gladys McConnell, Lawford Davidson

Synopsis: Believe it or not: The domestic drama Marriage was based on a story by H.G. Wells. Alan Durant plays scientist R.A.G. Trafford, whose idealism loses him one high-paying job after another. Durant's ambitious wife Marjori (Virginia Valli) talks Trafford into selling his latest revolutionary Read More

The Passionate Friends

Crew: Book Author

Synopsis: This implausible drama finds a jilted suitor getting married to another woman. She agrees to the union in spite of her knowledge that her intended still loves the woman who left him. The one who left marries another man, but her husband remains jealous of the man she jilted and files for divorce. Read More

The Time Machine

Crew: Book Author

Actors: Dick Hill

Synopsis: The DVD Bookshelf release The Time Machine (not to be confused with the 1960 George Pal film or the 2002 movie directed by Simon Wells) features a dramatized reading of the classic science fiction novel by H.G. Wells, accompanied by vivid onscreen illustrations. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide Read More