The great-grandson of celebrated author H.G. Wells, who penned such classics as The Time Machine, The Island of Dr. Moreau and The War of the Worlds, Simon hails from Cambridge, England, where his parents taught at the prestigious university. Wells attended Leicester Polytechnic where he studied audio-visual design.

Following school, he worked for British animator Richard Williams, and worked on a number of different animated commercials. After a few years, the studio closed down and Wells turned to creating storyboards for such feature-length films as Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and the two sequels to Back to the Future.

In the '90s, Wells turned to directing and made his debut with the sequel to An American Tail. Although not as popular as the first film, the sequel did well enough to garner some notice, and future work. The rest of the '90s saw Wells work on other animated features such as Balto (1995) and The Prince of Egypt (1998).

For the start of this millennium, Wells decided to tackle his first live-action film, and chose none other than his own great-grandfather's The Time Machine (2002).

Credit: tribute.ca