What went wrong?

Rating: 2/10 (12 July 2005)

How could anyone base a film on a remarkable sci-fi novel and produce something so dull and boring? It's as if Spielberg and his team were too sure of themselves: "I'm so good and the book is so popular, I could just cough up phlegm and it'll be a blockbuster hit.' The result is a sloppy movie suffering from a severe case of deficient writing and direction.
This film inevitably gets compared to Independence Day, which -despite its stupidity- is fun and enjoyable. The same can't be said of WOTW. It's dark, miserable, boring, has no story or plot to speak of, and is more of an endurance test rather than a fun way to pass two hours.
Spielberg has intentionally set out to make a bleak 'realistic' film. That he succeeds. WOTW is more like a documentary about survival in the bleakest of circumstances but with some of the dullest characters ever put on screen. They are so annoying and unlikable, you never get emotionally entwined with their predicament, and just don't care. When Ray's unbelievable stupid son goes to the tripods to be killed, you can almost hear a sigh of relief from the audience: "one whiny idiot down, two more to go."
But wait, in a brainless Hollywood blockbuster we can't have a main character die, so he miraculously appears at his -perfectly intact- mother's house at the end! This film is littered with such impudence and is an insult to the viewer's intelligence and suggests that the screenwriter has no respect for his audience at all.
Meanwhile, Spielberg resorts to cheap tricks and shock tactics, like the lengthy depiction of the 'blood spraying and harvesting' antics of the aliens and boring character study like that over-long, pointless time-filler basement sequence.
Put these elements together and the result is a bad film that leaves a sour taste in your mouth. It won't stand up to repeat viewings despite the great special effects - about the only thing good about it.
And lastly, this film is not about a 'war of the worlds'. It delivers nothing of the grand spectacle that its title suggests. We instead get about 2 seconds of human army resistance, against 2 hours of alien zapping and family bickering. I guess 'Bad Father And Spoiled Kids Running Away From Aliens' just wouldn't have spelled instant success.
I give the 2 stars for the special effects.