[Czilla9000]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wakeride74 It's "War Of The Worlds" so I'd imagine that the jest of the movie is in the title. Alien planet attacks Earth, Earth rallies together to defend. Doesn't seem to be room for a great deal of depth (with exception to battle strategies). So I guess the blunt question is was it a good war/save the world from ending movie?? How does it compare to other apocalyptic movies??

The depressing thing is that the people do not rally together to save earth (except for an outgunned army). Instead, the civilian people tear each other to pieces trying save their own you-know-what.

Also, we are never made aware of any battle strategy. The military seems to be conducting suicide missions in desparation, trying to buy the average folk time to escape by sacrificing themselves.

One of the key decisions Spielberg makes is to have it only be about a family trying to survive. There are no scenes with generals or politicians plotting. Tom Cruise is trying to save his family, not the world.

There is a thinking element to the film, but not as much as Batman. We witness anarchy and darwinism overtake reason.

 

[ooheadsoo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlanY I'm not sure the advance publicity was very effective for this movie. None of the movie trailers actually show the aliens or any of the big special effects... this gives it a sort of "made for TV movie" feel (where they show mostly people because they can't afford heavy special effects). I understand the idea behind this... I suppose they want to create suspense that gets people into the theatre, but from the movie trailers you'd have no idea this was one of the summer's big budget thriller movies. My guess is that it will flop unless it gets really good word of mouth, just because the advertising sucks.

I doubt if predator or alien showed the monster in the trailer, or if they did, only briefly as a teaser. Jurrassic Park didn't show the t-rex in the trailer. They never show the big baddie if it's supposed to be anticipated. Plus, everyone knows the original, so they want to keep the new designs under wraps so that there isn't prejudgement.

 

[AlanY]

I see what you're saying. But the trailers to WOTW have a "TV afterschool special" quality to them because they leave so much out. We see Cruise playing baseball with his kids, a bunch of people looking tense, people fleeing, an accident on a ferry with a few seconds showing tentacles, but nothing really blockbuster-ish. I honestly didn't know this was the biggest budget movie of the summer until I read the reviews. Did anyone really find the trailers exciting?

 

[bundee1]

Read the book. Im in the middle of it right now and its told in flashbacks by a guy who survived the attack. Its funny how the regular folk are portrayed. Poor and ignorant people carting their stuff off on horses and the martians outsmarting and overpowering the aliens time after time. We were doomed from the start. I think this movie is going to be truer to the book.

 

[jefemeister]

just got back from the movies. I haven't read the book or seen the original film, but what a piece of garbage. It wasn't even entertaining except for a few cool special effect landscape shots.

 

[pne]

saw it today as well. lots of fancy effects, but not very well done. I agree batman begins beats this one for summer blockbuster

 

[overlunge]

Have yet to read the original novel, but saw the movie last night. Man, that has to be one of the worst/over hyped movie I have seen.

Some really good cinematography, special effects, and few scenes does put you in the dreaded feeling of facing the end-of-the-world.

But few things that really bugs me:

1) Rachel, (Ray's daughter) was extremely irritating, the excessive screaming was just un-called for.

2) So the big bad aliens came out of the ground and started to evapourate running peoples then harvest them? What's up with that?

3) You are TOLD by the narrator that why the aliens goes poop at the END of the movie. You (at least me) weren't even get a chance to find out for yourself.

I hope someone who's read the novel can shed some light on the short coming of the movie.

Overlunge

 

[AlanY]

I haven't seen the movie yet, but the book has a very abrupt, unexpected ending.

 

[blessingx]

I haven't seen it yet, but everything I've read "non-stop dread", "the anti-Jurrasic Park" and maybe most telling "very 9/11", leads me to believe (at least in intent) it has little to do with "Batman Begins" and that fact that it's being compared here may be at least a sizable hint at the problem. It still may suck, but I have a feeling it doesn't suck in the way people are implying. If it makes money it will be a 'Summer Blockbuster' (it was released during the summer and was a cash cow), and has a large budget, special effects, etc., but this isn't really another "Independence Day", "Armageddon", "Spiderman" or even the very cleverly written "Batman Begins" is it? Seems he's shooting a bit outside the catagory, no? But again I haven't seen it yet.

And if anyone is curious about the Orson Welles radio play...

http://www.mercurytheatre.info/ [slow download]

 

[jefemeister]

POTENTIAL SPOILERS!

there's a few major problems with it in my eye. One, Spielberg focuses on one family and how they are able to "outrun" the aliens. But the family is completely uninteresting, annoying, and very cliche. Not the best thing to put the entire focus of a movie on. And that little girl is a good actor, but I'd rather drive for two hours in the car with my screaming two year old niece than listen to Ms. Fanning do it in full THX surround at 100dB everytime she turns around. Two, nothing is explained and there isn't even an attempt. What's all that red crap everywhere? Blood and guts? No, I find out later it's some kind of vine the aliens are laying down to make Earth look more like Mars. A friend at work had to clue me in on that today. Guess what, no mention of Mars either. Three, totally unbelieveable situations and scenarios that no one even makes an attempt at justifying. Four, the entire ending. I'm happy that Spielberg tried to do something different. Some folks are saying its because he's always so cutting edge. I think he just plain missed the ball on this one.

 

[pne]

*******************spoilers**********************





i agree. no explaination on the red vines, no organization of the plot. the narrator only appeared at the very beginning and end of the story, no explanation of how the son survived. why would the machines vaporize people if they would need to harvest them later? how on earth did a pregnant woman, and two elderly people and their house survive the carnage when the cities were completely destroyed and people were fighting for their lives? Rachel's character was very very annoying, not very believable. The viewers left completey in the dark about the ending, with the only forshadowing I can think of is rachel's splinter scene. anticlimatic for me, but special effects were quite well done.

 

[Aman]

**SPOILER ALERT**

This is a common thing for Speilberg to do -- he "appologizes" for anything sad happening in the plot.

The END of the movie was just stupid - he re-unites with his idiot son at the end of the film? That's ridiculous, if the movie isn't ridiculous and idiotic enough, that's the icing on the cake.

Basically, we have a really poor sense of direction, some very invinsible and elite characters, generally poor construction of characters (not to mention generic and cliched), and some parts were plain stupid. Him singing that lulabi was one of the worst moments I've ever experienced in movie history. Oh yeah, and did I mention that Tom Cruise is a complete dick? He and Speilberg managed to completely ruin the fantastic franchise of War of the Worlds.

What did I like about the film? I actually thought that it was a VERY frantic, chaotic, and emotionally-frightening movie when the aliens were shown attacking the masses of people. The saws in the water, the terror among all of the peoples' eyes - these were good parts of the movie. However, it shows that they basically focused on the action scenes over anything else. The film had surprisingly little depth to it.

But what the hell - it was an awful movie. 2/10

 

[Patrickhat2001]

I saw it yesterday and wasn't impressed. The design of the tripods was great and the destruction in cgi action sequences very convincing (I loved seeing the tripods take down buildings), but for the most part the story, characters, camerawork and, yes, even the action sequences just weren't very fleshed out or polished. This film felt rushed and very half-hearted in almost every aspect. Besides a few good scenes, this movie was a big let down.

--Spoiler alert--

The reason the aliens came out and started vaporizing people at the beginning was to establish their dominance--strike fear into the humans so they'd be less likely to fight back, if even they could (although, perhaps, they went a bit overboard here). After this they started their harvesting; turning the remaining humans into fertilizer (the red viney stuff) but for what purpose we never get to see.

 

[LobsterSan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wakeride74 It's "War Of The Worlds" so I'd imagine that the jest of the movie is in the title. Alien planet attacks Earth, Earth rallies together to defend. Doesn't seem to be room for a great deal of depth (with exception to battle strategies). So I guess the blunt question is was it a good war/save the world from ending movie?? How does it compare to other apocalyptic movies??

Quote:

Originally Posted by Czilla9000 The depressing thing is that the people do not rally together to save earth (except for an outgunned army). Instead, the civilian people tear each other to pieces trying save their own you-know-what. Also, we are never made aware of any battle strategy. The military seems to be conducting suicide missions in desparation, trying to buy the average folk time to escape by sacrificing themselves.

***** SPOILER ALERT ******




Actually, the story is supposed to focus on the helplessness of the humans in the situation. There is no room for strategy because everything we can conceivably try ends up failing. It wan't supposed to end up being a typical "biggest heart wins" or the "clever humans find a weakness" type movie. It's supposed to be about complete and utter despair, and the reversal of fortune that can come about when the most powerful and egotistic species on Earth takes things for granted. For all our efforts, we end up relying on the help of another of Earth's "lesser" species to save our asses. And we can all then eat a big piece of humble pie.

However, one problem I had with Spielberg's WOTW was that towards the end of the movie, the utter despair gives way to hope... and it should really be the other way around until the very last moment. Right before the aliens begin toppling over from illness, we see Ray (Tom Cruise) successfully take down a tripod via grenade ingestion and then we see the US military bazooka another tripod down. This was unnecessary for the central theme of the story, and in my opinion it muddled the movie and brought it down to the level of an average thriller/panic/sci-fi catastrophe movie. In my mind, we should be at the very end of our wits with no hope of survival before we are granted a second chance from our microbial friends.

I quite enjoyed the first third of the movie. The arrival sequence was great, as was the transition from the stresses of everyday life to the all-out chaos of death and annhialation. I could feel the fear onscreen, and the fear permeated my imagination and had me gripped. For its brilliance, I forgot about the inconsistencies that others pointed out in the IMDB forums. That's suspension of disbelief. The opening attack sequence is somewhat akin to the grittiness that we saw in Saving Private Ryan's opening sequence.

However, the rest of the movie tended to fall a bit flat. The plotholes became larger and the intensity and immediacy was a bit lost. Then came the bizarre family reunion which I had at first thought a dream sequence for its surreal and improbable nature.

The movie was fairly enjoyable, though I much preferred the first half moreso than the second. Overall, I'd give it a 6/10 -- enjoyable, but not great.

 

[jefemeister]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LobsterSan ***** SPOILER ALERT ****** ...Right before the aliens begin toppling over from illness, we see Ray (Tom Cruise) successfully take down a tripod via grenade ingestion and then we see the US military bazooka another tripod down. This was unnecessary for the central theme of the story, and in my opinion it muddled the movie and brought it down to the level of an average thriller/panic/sci-fi catastrophe movie...

Additional Spoilers!!!

Excellent point, and this may be the reason I truely didn't like the ending without even realizing it. It did suck that the kid comes back despite basically being nuked, and it sucks that the kids' parents are all dressed up in their Sunday best in their perfect little brownstone despite Boston being oblitereated. But the pint you mention is the point of largest confusion for me. After Tom blows up the one tripod, we start seeing all of them slowly dying. I was wondering is it was an ID4 type situation where Tom blew up thier ability to communicate or something. Wrong, it was the microbes. But then, as you also mention, all the tripod's force fields fall and the military can start taking them out. And this is the exact point that Tom and Dakoda magically appear in Boston. It's definitely an unusual sequencing especially given that nothing is explained. But you're definitely right in that Spielberg totally flipped the meaning of the whole movie. It's also interesting that he focuses on Tom and his family struggl;ing to survive through adveristy when it seems the point of the book was to show the futileness of that strategy. And I didn't even miss not seeing tons of action and fight scenes, but to tack on like 30 seconds of random destruction of the aliens and then close it up with the microbes thing was kind of frustrating.