The Man Who Could Work Miracles (1936)
Directed by Lothar Mendes, Alexander Korda

Film Review

Immediately after their first collaboration on Things to Come (1936) producer Alexander Korda and visionary writer H.G. Wells teamed up so that Wells could subject cinema audiences to another spirited bout of well-intentioned sermonising.  If Wells had had his way The Man Who Could Work Miracles would have been little more than a dry political tract, with the writer using cinema as just another platform from which to vent his increasing frustration with the way the world was going.  Korda may have been a fervent admirer of Wells but he also had sufficient business sense to prevent him from making a film that no one would want to see.  Under Lothar Mendes' direction, and after several substantial re-writes of Wells's original screenplay, the film ended up as a quaint little comedy - it's far less memorable than Things to Come, but more fun to watch.

Given its premise, it's surprising that The Man Who Could Work Miracles isn't a great deal funnier than it is.  (Just imagine how hilarious it might have been if the Marx Brothers had been involved.)  There are some delightfully funny moments along the way, such as the stand-out sequence where a belligerent army man (Ralph Richardson, looking scarily like Graham Chapman's colonel in Monty Python's Flying Circus) suffers the indignity of having his prized weapons turned into ploughshares, but opportunities for rip-roaring comedy are carelessly missed as the plot wends its course towards a totally predictable outcome.

Wells's concerns about the future of mankind are succinctly expressed but for anyone familiar with the writer's endless tirades against militarism and power getting in the wrong hands the film offers nothing new.  The Man Who Could Work Miracles was not a success when it was first released and it has languished in comparative obscurity since.  On the plus side, the special effects are impressive for a film of this era and there are some enjoyably batty performances (from the likes of Ernest Thesiger and Ralph Richardson).  However, endowed with Wells's pessimistic assessment of human nature, which basically asserts that we are a race of congenitally selfish, morally vacuous heathens who are bound to wipe ourselves out at some point, it's a pretty grim kind of comedy, the kind that is only grudgingly funny.  As a quirky morality play on the dangers of absolute power it is, however, surprisingly effective.

Film Synopsis

Three gods looking down on planet Earth mock the inability of its puny inhabitants to improve their lot.  Believing that mankind is capable of better, one of the gods endows one randomly selected individual with the ability to perform miracles.  The individual in question is George McWhirter Fotheringay, a modest draper's assistant.  At first, Fotheringay does not know what to do with his newfound power.  His employer, Major Grigsby, offers to make him a partner in the firm if he will perform miracles to the company's advantage.  A preacher, Silas Maydig, insists that Fotheringay must only perform miracles that will improve the lot of mankind, such as abolishing war and disease.  Colonel Winstanley is outraged when, at Maydig's prompting, Fotheringay transforms his exhibition of swords into agricultural instruments, so outraged that he sets out to kill the miracle worker.  Realising that everyone is trying to use his powers for their own advantage, Fotheringay makes up his mind to change the world to how he would like it to be - with disastrous consequences...