WAR OF THE WORLDS
 
STARRING: Tom
Cruise, Dakota Fanning, Tim Robbins, Justin Chatwin, Morgan Freeman
2005, 117 minutes, Directed by: Steven Spielberg
 Steven
Spielberg is addicted to the epic. Bigger is better in Spielbergland so it
should come as no surprise that War of the Worlds is an eye-popping
special effects spectacle designed to entertain the masses. It also shouldn’t
surprise anyone that any Spielberg flick with war as a subject is going to put
its main characters into a horrific transformation with few casualties. Sure the
nameless hordes of refugees suffer, but do you expect any of your main cast to
perish in a Spielberg movie? In fact, only in Schindler’s List did we
actually see any children get killed.
But halfway through War of
the Worlds – a fabulously illogical summer popcorn movie – I started to
realize that Spielberg is retreading his own movies. Based on the H.G. Well’s
1898 novel, War of the Worlds has been done as the
infamous Orson Welles narrated radioplay, a 1953 movie, as well as a couple of
direct-to-cable movies, and a short-lived TV series. In this summer of overrated
remakes, Spielberg wears the crown by remaking a sci-fi classic without adding
anything new to his version, except for state of the art effects and Tom Cruise.
There is always something
comfortably or exasperatingly familiar about a Spielberg movie. The throngs of
refugees pressing around a car? Dead bodies floating in the water? We've seen
these exact shots before in his WW2 movies. But Spielberg isn't happy just
referencing himself -- there's an alien probe that looks remarkably like
something from The Abyss and a ferry disaster that also
seems to pay homage to Cameron's Titanic. Echoes of
Jurassic Park abound with the giant stomping aliens
but the possibilities of doing some original re-engineering of this classic tale
– the 2003 Battlestar Galactica comes
to mind - are lost.
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"Compared to Spielberg's older films, this movie is a low effort,
no-brainer . . ." |
The story is now classic.
Martians invade planet Earth with giant tripod machines that can disintegrate
people and crush buildings. And immediately we’re face with logic problems that
Spielberg chooses to ignore. Though the book was written in 1898, we’re now in
the era of Weapons of Mass destruction so it’s pretty odd for an advanced alien
race to have to pick off humans one by one with their ray guns. But forgiving
that conceit, it’s pretty amazing cinema to watch the machines rise from deep
within the earth to begin their destructive advance into a big budget disaster
movie.
Tom Cruise stars as Ray
Ferrier, a working class divorced father who is stuck with his two kids one
fateful weekend. Again, this is a favorite Spielberg theme – the dysfunctional
family forced to bond when faced with diversity. Ray’s teenaged son, Robbie
(Justin Chatwin) is all piss and vinegar while the overrated Dakota Fanning
screams her big eyes out as Ray’s 10-year-old daughter, Rachel. Ray may not be
the greatest pre-invasion dad but when he sees the first alien tripod incinerate
a fleeing crowd (reminiscent of scenes from Schindler’s List and
Empire of the Sun), he commandeers a minivan to race his kids to safety.
Earth’s armed forces, of
course, are useless against the alien onslaught. The only time War of the
Worlds gets interesting is when we watch the panicky Cruise try to keep in
control while he drags his difficult kids to safety. Disappointingly, both son
and daughter are under-written characters. We know little about them except that
they resent their dad. And in the movie’s best scene, Cruise faces off against
Tim Robbin’s survivalist who has become unhinged. But Spielberg’s best movies
like Jaws and Close
Encounters had a number of strong, memorable characters playing off each
other.
When you see who predictably
survives by the end of the movie, you're reminded of Spielberg's gentility and
commitment to the PG-13 rating. War of the Worlds didn’t need Tom Cruise
to be its star, but it’s a fun movie and a reminder that Spielberg invented the
summer blockbuster. War of the Worlds is Spielberg’s classy response to
flicks like Independence Day, but compared to his
older films, this movie is a low effort, no-brainer.
- Harrison Cheung
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