Boy was this DULL

Rating: 5/10 (9 July 2005)

Unnecessary remake of the 1953 sc-fi classic.
PLOT SPOILER AHEAD! Aliens invade Earth but this time they're already INSIDE the Earth. It seems they planted their machines in there when Earth was uninhabited...and decided to attack later. That's just STUPID! Why not just colonize the planet BEFORE it was inhabited---why wait till later? That makes no sense. PLOT SPOILER END!
The main plot has Tom Cruise as a divorced father of 2. He's trying to get his two kids back to their mother who's visiting Boston. He has to get them from NJ to MA with aliens attacking.
I don't like Spielberg and I HATE Cruise--but I thought this might work. They did another sci-fi movie a few years ago (Minority Report) which wasn't bad. Well--THIS is bad! Yeah the special effects are great--but I've seen all this before. I'm bored silly with perfect looking CGI effects. They don't thrill me anymore--I need a story too.
Unfortunately this is a predictable, Spielberg type heart warming story (actually my heart didn't warm but my stomach lurched!). I've seen these characters before. Acting doesn't help. Cruise is just OK in the lead. His son was lousy. Only incredible little Dakota Fanning gave out a GREAT performance. She's only 11 and she can out act Tom Cruise (no big feat I admit). Tim Robbins pops up adding nothing to the story. And Morgan Freeman narrates in an eerie fashion.
Frankly I was bored and looking at my watch constantly. It all leads up to a happy conclusion that had me gasping (in disbelief). The ending is SO stupid!!!! If I hadn't disliked the film before THAT would have done it for me! I give this a 5--only for Dakota Fanning. Otherwise this is boring and pointless. Stick with the original. Gene Barry from the original does a (very) brief appearance here at the end.