Good Effects, but lacks of any common sense

Rating: 1/10 (10 October 2005)

After that amazing trailer, of perhaps one of the world's most known book about an alien invasion, i was expecting to be thrilled with the coming of War of the Worlds, how little did i knew what was to come. As the movie is based in such a famous book, it is very easy for any remake of it to be successful if you direct one per generation.
The movie starts with the introduction of the original book, just like in the older movie. Not a terribly creative thing to do, considering it was done in the other other movie, but this is how the movie's logic is.
After around brief 20 minutes, and after we are introduced to one of the usual Hollywood plots (they must have a stash of them somewhere around), in which the kids don't get along with the father, we pretty much know what its going to happened. You bet your firstborn child that they'll end up as a united and happy family in the end though, which at the end happens.
After that, all hell breaks loose, martians come in, destroy everything with the dreaded POOF gun (a gun that does exactly that). Cruise escapes from every hazard, and as all Hollywood movies, a simple man like Cruise is able to do extraordinary things, such as destroy a Tripod by himself and get his family alive through all of the invasion (they survive a ferry crash and numerous Tripod encounters, specially Cruise's character Ray, who survives the first encounter without even a scratch, even though everyone around him dies horribly).
Numerous plot holes affect the movie, making it unwatchable for a second time, as we notice how everything in it is very formulaic. Numerous friends of Cruise appear, but they don't really have any importance in the film as a hole, as their appearance doesn't last more than 5 minutes, the first friends of cruise, who are they?... do they matter?: no, because we never see them again. That family that cruise meets before the Ferry, how do they affect the main plot whatsoever?... well, they don't, they are just there to die, nothing more.
Just like the anonymous extras that usually die in every movie, usually at the beginning, just to prove how evil are the evil guys, everything i War of the World follows that same logic.
Right before they get to the ferry, there is an amazing scene in which a mob tries to take the SUV away from them. 5 minutes later, this whole scene makes no real importance, as the ferry was just 1 minute away from there (those cars in the ferry, why didn't an angry mob tried to take them, and what the hell are they doing there??... it makes no logic, and the best logic is just to say JUST BECAUSE... nice work, Steven... you abused Hollywood formulas to an unsuspected level) Robby, Ray's son, wants desperately go to fight the aliens, even though he looks like he's never fired a weapon in his life, he wants to go there badly. Why?, no one knows, but we can assume that in WOTW magical world, you can go to war and not get a scratch, as Robby shows up at the end of the movie, without even a scratch on his face.
The movie seriously lacks of any creative level, as the dreaded POOF gun is nothing but just an average laser, and its not even disturbing how it leaves clothes hanging in the air, its actually kind of funny, but all in all, just not very creative (as it makes the same thing that phasers and blaster and whatever have done for years).
In the end, all those technological aliens die because of germs, something that did made sense back in the time the novel was published, as it was a very creative ending back then. But it looks stupid on this movie, as it makes no sense (they had shields and POOF guns, but no sense whatsoever about germs?). The movie ends badly, as nothing really made sense to begin with, as the passing of the movie is horrible (when it looks like the movie must end, IT ENDS, without any type of prelude to it), and how the movies tries to be dark and gritty... yet it presents one of the most happiest and sappiest endings I've ever seen in my life, its snobbish in this aspect, as it copies the DARK aspect from other dark movies, but it emulates it, superficially, without really understanding it.
It tries to gives us the perspective of a simple man, yet, Spielberg know that this is formulaic impossible to do (as he would made a very complicated movie if he really had proposed to do so, which wouldn't made so much money in the box office, and mainly because it is beyond his skills), so from time to time, Ray conveniently finds people that know it all, and that explain to him whats happening.
It tries so hard to be a breakthrough movie, but nothing here is what so ever creative, and the patience of the viewer quickly runs out after the brief special effect scenes end. Spielberg tries to make special effect scenes shorter, which is the biggest mistake, as this has always been the mayor point of any Spielberg movie.
For a better time, just read the book, which is much better than Spielberg's War of the Worlds. All in all, the movie is painfully too average, it might stand 1 view, but at the second view, the numerous plot holes are just a direct insult to the intelligence (plotholes and formulaic events that can only be made less obvious if you are a chauvinist that actually believes that the movie is "new" in what its doing).
big points for the swelling orchestra music by John Williams, which is just perfect, as always.