WAR OF THE WORLDS

By: BRIAN THOMAS
Review Date: Monday, December 19, 2005

No one could have believed that in the first years of the 21st century that a serious big budget alien invasion film from one of cinema's foremost craftsmen was being watched by intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, who quickly, carelessly and with great prejudice drew their plans against it.

Even though this film is a great critical and financial success, and doesn't need my help, I feel a compulsion to defend it. It seems that it's been getting negative responses coming from those you'd expect to appreciate it most: the science fiction fans. Steven Spielberg has crafted an adaptation of H.G. Wells' greatest novel 107 years after it was published, and it's an excellent film, but it seems like a lot of science fiction movie fans aren't particularly taken with it - whether they've seen it or not. Some reject it out of hand because star Tom Cruise has been making a lot of flaky statements in interviews lately, and continues to make an ass of himself in public at every opportunity. They forget that Tom Cruise is an actor, and as such he's obligated to make a lot of flaky statements in interviews. The guy may belong to a crackpot religion, but on the screen he's a solid actor, and he gives a very good performance in WAR OF THE WORLDS.

Cruise plays Ray Ferrier, a New Jersey dock worker and asshole. One of the film's strengths is that it doesn't play the lead as a hero, just a regular slob thrown into an unimaginable situation, suddenly forced to deal with extraterrestrial horrors when he can't even connect with his own kids. Those kids, Rob and Rachel (Justin Chatwin and Dakota Fanning, who also both do fine work), dislike him as much as we do. We're given a very believable portrait of a weekend dad who has earned his divorce, crap-filled house, and general dead end life.


After a massive and strange electrical storm that stops all engines in the area (electric, gas-powered or whatever), a gigantic machine pulls itself out of the ground on three huge tentacles and immediately starts massacring everyone around using incredible weapons. This awesome sequence continues to build in tension and terror for a good 15 minutes as Ray scrambles to get the kids together and escape the slaughter, and this tension stays with the viewer throughout the running time. Wherever they go, the Ferriers are confronted with more of these incomprehensible machines. They have no idea what is happening (sometime later we're given a few scraps of information) to their world. They just know fear and a desire to flee.

I've heard a lot of grumbles that the scope should've been bigger, with scenes in the White House of the president panicking and lots of TV news reports with scientists explaining the Martian plan. That movie is called INDEPENDENCE DAY. Or maybe you'd like some scenes of the Martian commanders looking into view screens and barking orders. That movie is called MARS ATTACKS. They're both fine movies, but we're dealing with an adaptation of Wells here.

Though the characters and location have changed, Spielberg is really more faithful to Wells (with nods to previous adaptations) than anyone is giving him credit, a take on the material that I've yet to see before (two other versions of the story were released on home video in 2005 - one a low budget modern version and the other a 95% faithful period piece, but both fall far short of Spielberg's version). Most of the novel is one man's journey through No Man's Land, trying to survive with civilization shattered. The whole point is that Mankind can NOT beat the Martians. We can not even begin to understand them - sure, we figure humans should have found a buried Martian cylinder sometime in the past (this nod to QUATERMASS & THE PIT is one of the film's flaws), and it's hard for us to accept that the enemy never heard of germs. But then, if you read the novel, there's a point about how the Martians never invented the wheel either (which Spielberg acknowledges, too - note the scene where the Martian is confounded by the bicycle), and their development took a path we've never considered.

I do agree that the Martians, despite their three legs, look a bit too humanoid in the face, unlike Wells' vaguely described tentacled nightmares. But I love the fact that we're not in on their plans, any more than ants are in on our plans when we come in spraying poison. They appear not to make sense because they are NOT us. Their only concern is to get rid of us and make themselves at home as soon as possible. There are a lot of other questions raised by their behavior. Good. Some can be explained with a little thought, but the point is that a New Jersey dock worker wouldn't be sitting in the War Room during an interplanetary invasion (along with a precocious scientist's son with optional pet lemur) while his planet was being overrun. He'd be running, hiding, and trying to protect his kids while attempting to get to a safe place. And going to some pretty desperate lengths, too, as we see in one particularly chilling scene. Wells' whole point was that our society had become a little too secure, and that if we didn't watch out we'd all be caught napping.

If you wanted to improve the movie, you might want to make things a little less bright at the end. I thought the son's fate should have been left unresolved. And it does seem a bit too lucky that Grandpa Clayton Forrester's house (Gene Barry and Ann Robinson do cameos) is in one of the few areas left standing - though even that's not too farfetched, as it would take the machines some time to cover the entire Earth.

No one can fault the technical aspects of the film. It's a terrific giant monster film, if nothing else, with f/x that deserve an Oscar (though KING KONG will give it a run for it's money). It's tough to be really innovative with f/x in the post-CGI era, but Spielberg manages it. Note how the Ferriers' flight from home is accomplished in one long, tense take down the freeway, with all kinds of camera movement combined with tons of destruction and confusion. It's the kind of sequence he pioneered with JURASSIC PARK 2, only expanded and perfected. WAR OF THE WORLDS is a huge epic, the kind of film you'd like to see on a giant IMAX screen, but it's also an intimate and personal film. It's more like SIGNS with a bigger budget or SAVING PRIVATE RYAN with aliens than it is like any other space invader story. This is the kind of movie sci-fi fans should be rallying around, not making whiny little fanboy complaints about.

Something worth complaining about is the absence of DVD extras on the standard disc, which saves a whole second disc of extras for a more expensive special edition. While many other DVDs provide those extras for the same price, this one only has a featurette on the production design, which makes the whole thing seem less special than the film itself deserves.

Copyright © 2005 Brian Thomas, author of the massive book VideoHound's DRAGON: ASIAN ACTION & CULT FLICKS.
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