gadgetry, Cliché'd plot, Mutilated Characters, Fair Special Effects

Rating: 6/10 (4 July 2005)

*** Spoiler Warning *** So I had everything done for the weekend and an afternoon to kill, I figured I'd gamble that the crowds had abated nip on down to catch a matinée showing.
I appreciated the opening and closing narration by Morgan Freeman, but the obvious CGI water drops were a bit tacky. Why not just shoot an actual leaf with water on it? That theme of overdoing CGI was persistent throughout the film, Alien warships too gadgetry, though overall appearance was good, I wondered why they looked like they all had a giant car headlight on the front.
The energy shields were rather idiotic, the tension would have been better served if a few were shown going down, as in the original book, but they still succeeded by their overwhelming might. I didn't appreciate the Astronomer/Curate/Artilleryman combined character who looked like some sort of child molester. What was up with that? People around me laughed quite a bit, like where there's a convenient path to drive through every time they needed one and various script holes, like why are these craft planted under the cities and only now the aliens arrive? That one's a real head scratcher.
The general feeling was the film suddenly stopped with the only living family left in Boston intact. I thought the "disfunctional-family-united-by-common-cause" was really a bit of a stretch. Most characters were fairly shallow, which was a real shame considering the material this originated with, but seems par for the course these days. But people will call pretty much anything a blockbuster now, including the truly regrettable Cat In The Hat.
Not the best of Steven Spielbergs work, but not his worst either. I'm not in any particular hurry to see this again. Undoubtedly this film will serve as some inspiration for others to check out the 1950's classic. Hopefully many will sit down and read H. G. Wells' book which inspired all this.
Also, do give a look at the other War Of The Worlds, directed by Timothy Hines, which was released earlier this year on DVD and attempts to tell the story in its original setting on a much smaller budget.