Comments on: War of the Worlds (2005)

By: War of the Worlds (2005) - External reviews

War of the Worlds (2005) - External reviews — Sun, 15 Jul 2007 12:41:18 +0000

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By: The Pan Handler

The Pan Handler — Mon, 01 Aug 2005 19:33:45 +0000

This movie kicked ass.
I loved it.
Every bit of it.
Tom Cruise is a dick.
Aliens kick everyone’s ass.
Cruise and family scramble clumsily and selfishly to survive.
Tim Robbins seems to represent some comradery and shelter but turns out to be a nutcase, stretching what Cruise must do to survive even further.
Cruise has closest close call of all.
Cruise, and the world, get lucky.
The plot made perfect sense to me. The movie moved quickly and the terror came unrlentingly. I was on the edge of my seat through it all.

By: John Marcotte

John Marcotte — Fri, 15 Jul 2005 22:15:46 +0000

I wans’t trying to prove you “wrong,” per se. I just thought you did a pretty good job of summing up the reasons I didn’t like the movie.

To paraphrase Ebert, “I give it a marginal thumbs down.” There was enough good in there that I understand why some people were willing to overlook its flaws.

The gravatar is one-time signup. You don’t have to remember a user-name and password.

By: Swede

Swede — Fri, 15 Jul 2005 21:54:45 +0000

Had I known we were arguing I would have squeezed in some personal attacks. I wasn’t saying this is a good movie, I just didn’t mind it’s flaws as much as you did. I went for the action and special effects, not the story they were supposed to be a backdrop to. And parts were really great. The spectacle alone was worth the price of admission. I don’t need anybody to tell me it’s alright to like this movie.

Anyway, I’ll pass on the gravitar for now. I use three or four different computers, none of which are mine, so the last thing I need is another username and password to memorize.

By: John Marcotte

John Marcotte — Fri, 15 Jul 2005 05:57:27 +0000

After reading comment #3 from the defense, the prosecution rests, your honor.

Swede, you getting a gravatar? You post here enough.

By: swede

swede — Fri, 15 Jul 2005 01:27:20 +0000

I can appreciate that but these characters were so negative that I didn’t care whether the aliens turned them into dust and redvines. I was kinda hoping they would. I think sticking to the book was a mistake. It must have become clear early on that major revisions would have made a better movie.

By: John Marcotte

John Marcotte — Thu, 14 Jul 2005 21:30:46 +0000

It’s beyond Spielberg’s ability to make a truly awful movie. But if you follow the plot of the book, which Spielberg did, there is no way to make the film about fighting aliens.

They catch the sniffles and die. There is no “Earth fights back” moment. So you have to come up with something else for your plot.

When the novel was written in the late 1800s, the idea of an alien invasion alone was so new that it was enough for the book to explore that concept.

We’ve gone through thousands of virtual alien invasions since then. We need something more.

By: Swede

Swede — Thu, 14 Jul 2005 21:21:55 +0000

It wasn’t that bad. I agree it had a major need for focus. I would have rather watched a movie about aliens than a character study featuring a dysfunctional family (because nobody ever did that one before) but I guess there’s no accounting for taste. The scene with Tim Robbins fit in so poorly that I totally forgot he was even in this movie until you mentioned it.

But I liked this movie, on the whole. I liked the feel that everything was at stake but nothing could be done to prevent a total loss. I think the excessive character development was an unnecessary distraction. I came for lasers and gore, goddammit. Don’t give me an after school special about a brooding teenager and a little girl who never gets tired of crying.