Just rented War of the Worlds. You will spend a more entertaining two and a half hours reading baltar’s review. If you can’t enjoy media properly unless you pay something for it, then kick a couple bucks into his tip jar.
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aop
Jesus. Somebody introduce this Baltar guy to the concept of “suspension of disbelief.” I’ll bet when he saw “Ghostbusters,” he was like, “Jeez, ghosts don’t exist, and even if they did, you couldn’t suck them into a vacuum cleaner. How dumb do they think we are?”
MG
Stick with the original movie. The special effects are laughable today, but they were Academy nominating stuff 50 years ago.
The movie is interesting for comparing its portrayal of human culture with what we see today.
MG
demimondian
Best. Review. Ever.
FDDD and I flew to Hawaii last January, and were rewarded for our persistence with…_Catwoman_. Fortunately, we had the presence of mind to not buy or bring headphones, as a result of which omission, we were permitted to miss out on the movies allegedly unforgettable — and unforgiveable — dialog. We were only forced to experience the final scene, in which Halle Barry sends a note to the male romantic lead with the simple message “I’m sorry.”
I can only say that I hope so.
baltar
Hey, I’ve got lots of “suspension of disbelief” (actually, shouldn’t that be “suspension of belief”? I digress). If it’s got a good story, or good characters, or good acting, or some attempt at any or all of that, I can lose myself in the movie.
“War of the Worlds” just sucked, and since I had nothing else to do, I could relax and count the ways it sucked. It was a very big number…
But, hey, your mileage may vary.
John Cole
That review ruled.
HH
Spielberg (and Cruise) has/have still got it… see Minority Report. And WotW had a couple of good sequences but this was just a bad idea from the word go.
Jon H
“Spielberg (and Cruise) has/have still got it”
What, an infestation of body thetans?
Zifnab
For those who read the book, it kept very strongly to the original plot. So before you start ripping on the movie, I think you should probably whine about how much H.G.Wells sucks at writing.
HH
Minority Report was one of the best films of 2002, period, the overlong running time aside (that seems to be Spielberg’s biggest problem of late… one of the few problems WotW didn’t have though).
Perry Como
The destructo rays had a unique ability to incinerate humans, destroy buildings and vehicles, but left clothing, vegetation and pavement unharmed. Kind of like a neurotic neutron bomb.
jg
I read the book. Can you point me to the pages where he dragged his kids across the london countryside?
Why didn’t the kids just eat whatever food might be in their own house when they got there? Mom and stepdad were going to Boston for the weekend. They cleaned all traces of food from the house?
If you book a Tom Cruise you are contractually obligated to give him scenes to lead. This is how bad unnesessary scenes for lousy actors get written into movies that are supposed to be about aliens.
OCSteve
Saw it this weekend. It may be the lamest remake I have ever seen.
When is Hollywood going to come up with something new? I’m trying to remember the last really original movie I saw… tick … tock ….
OCSteve
One more thought. When I saw the original as a kid it scared the crap out of me. Only 2 other movies ever did that – Jaws and Alien. (I was far from being a kid when I saw Alien and it still scared the crap out of me.)
BIRDZILLA
I saw the origional and it was probibly a lot better i mean the martians looked scary especialy when it touches ANN RONINSON on her shoulder and the ships were shaped like a manta ray and the beam emmiter looked like a cobra the aleins had four long fingers with suction cups at the tips and they had long thin arms but the only way the origional H.G. WELLS novel the oct 30 1938 radio version and the two movies still have in common is that the aleins are wiped out by the germ of the common cold
Bob In Pacifica
The previews for the new “King Kong” look good, but what about the Superman remake? There’s this deep-throated voice saying, “I send my only son, Jal-el, to Earth to help the people.” Did they borrow from another book in the rewrite?
I’ve got “WotW” in my rotation on Netflix. My biggest worry is the “cute kid in danger” syndrome which seems to creep into all these horror vehicles. Stupid kids doing stupid things around monsters. Always happens.
Walker
The voiceover sounds to me like someone channelling Brando from the original.
Otto Man
Sorry, that review was awful. He should stick to encyclopedia entries, because the concept of fiction and the act of imagination seem far beyond him.
Not only was the anal retentive fact-checking of a sci-fi movie over the top, it wasn’t even well done. He thinks that a Shelby Mustang would survive an EMP because it doesn’t have a computer in it, but thinks a metal water pipe and common sink would be rendered useless? Riiiight.
And if he’s going to spend tons of time critiquing the movie’s physics, maybe he should first get a grip about geography. If they’re trying to get from the NY area to Boston and need to cross the Hudson to get there, that means they’re not in NYC itself but rather in an obscure state called New Jersey.
There’s plenty to dislike about the film. Personally, I thought Speilberg’s inability to let anyone in the main family die ridiculous. I mean, not only does the sullen teen son survive, but we also see that Grandma and Grandpa (who we hadn’t even seen yet) also survived, in their perfectly intact townhouse. On that point, I agree.
But it’s a sci-fi movie. Lighten up, Francis.
Tim F.
That was the worst part for me. After everything Cruise had to do to survive, I suppose gramma and grampa just sat in their foyer sipping tea until things settled down. It was also the most insultingly pat dramatic resolution I’ve ever seen.
aop
No, it’s “suspension of disbelief.” It means putting the critical faculties you might employ in everyday life on hold in the service of enjoying a work of art that’s not attempting to be realistic.
And btw, I thought WOTW sucked, too.
JWeidner
I don’t have a source, but I believe that was Brando. My recollection is that they actually shot a lot of footage of Brando on Krypton for the first movie, but it was mostly cut. I think I read somewhere that Singer is using some of that Brando footage (maybe just for voiceover purposes, I don’t know).
Geoduck
With Brando and Superman, what happened, I think, was that he shot stuff for Superman II, but then got into some kind of money squabble with the producers, and so it was all re-shot using the actress who played his wife. Or they were going to use previously-shot footage on Superman II, and Brando balked.
And while it was no masterpiece, I liked War of the Worlds OK. Again, while yes, the son should have died, it should also be pointed out that the whole “protaganist safely reunited with his family” ending was taken straight from Wells’ original novel. I thought that Cruise did a surprisingly good job playing a flawed and unlikeable schlub instead of his usual Alpha Male Hero role. And kudos to Spielberg for not sugar-coating the death and destruction. I say watch both versions of the flick, and enjoy them for what they are.
Vlad
I don’t think it’s fair to blame Wells for the movie, since movies hadn’t even been invented at the time he wrote the book.
I saw it and was disappointed, though the cinematography was pretty nice. There are a bunch of jarring continuity errors, most egregiously the guy with the digital camcorder who films the first machine’s emergence from the ground.
jg
When the power goes out in my house the water keeps running but if the power went out in the whole city would it still keep running?