Not classic Spielberg, but good stuff all the same

Rating: 8/10 (8 November 2007)

Whenever Steven Spielberg drifts into ET territory, they're usually of the touchy-feely kind. I was concerned War of the Worlds would wind up that way. But I needn't have. There are no warm, fuzzy, feelgood aliens here. Its kill or be killed. Which is as it should be.
When I learnt Spielberg was planning a remake of H.G. Welles classic tale, I wondered if the film would get the treatment it deserved. I'm pleased to say it has. Spielberg is in grim, dour mode. There's none of the gentility that sometimes undermines his films. War of the Worlds is admittedly hollow, but its very spectacular and thrilling.
Tom Cruise plays Ray Ferrier, the blue-collar dockworker lumbered with the kids while his ex-wife is off to Boston for the weekend. Ray doesn't really get along with son Robbie and daughter Rachel (the great Dakota Fanning), but they have to band together when freak lightning storms around the world signifies the first wave of an alien invasion.
Desperate to be reunited with his ex-wife, Ray takes the kids in tow to Boston. And its a perilous journey. Alien tripods blast the cities. Capsized ferries and various armed conflicts are in they're path. It becomes a desperate struggle just to survive.
War of the Worlds is Spielberg in all out action mode. And that may be the film's flaw. The spectacular action setpieces are the sum of the film's parts. There's nothing really to the film beyond that. But when you've got action scenes as thrilling as these, it almost seems churlish to complain.
The appearance of the first gargantuan alien tripod is positively awe-inspiring. And when it starts blasting buildings and reducing people to ashes, you feel just as numb as Tom Cruise. Seeing such chaos and devastation can't help but recall the dark day of 9/11. Even Dakota Fanning asks at one point "Is it the terrorists?!"
Nobody makes an action film quite like Steven Spielberg. He may often be associated with winsome parables about the strength of the human spirit, but when it comes to action/adventure, he delivers one hell of a roller-coaster ride. In that area, he's an absolute master. And with WOTW, he doesn't disappoint.
One of the great things about WOTW is the way Spielberg plunges us into the action. It comes out of nowhere. It begins with a thin sense of normalcy. Scenes of Ray as the incompetent father figure (classic Spielberg!), awkwardly trying to connect with his estranged children, and then suddenly the invasion pops up unexpectedly. And carries us right along with it.
The spectacles are as thrilling as anything you've seen in Spielberg's Jaws or Jurassic Park. One I'm especially partial to is when Ray & Co are on a ferry trying to cross the Hudson river. An alien tripod suddenly appears from the depths and capsizes the whole thing. Its a scene that has you right on the very edge of your seat.
But Spielberg is a good enough filmmaker to allow things to quieten down for short spaces at a time. Some of the most effective scenes in the film are the more modest ones. Like when little Rachel calmly walks by a river, and sees a string of dead bodies floating downstream.
But still, Spielberg never lets things get quiet for too long. He's always got another cinematic trick up his sleeve. There's a wonderfully sustained scene when Ray and Rachel are trapped in a cellar with an alien scanning device. It resembles a giant anaconda, sensing their presence, slithering in and out, checking every corner. It's so nerve-shredding I almost died of fright.
And yet for all the excitement the film generated, WOTW comes up a bit short in other areas. The plot is wafer thin. It could have been written on one side of A4 in a single afternoon. And that's surprising considering one of the film's screenwriters is the prolific David Koepp.
David Koepp is one of Hollywood's greatly underrated writers. He always crafts intriguing ethical conflicts around sharply defined characters. But that talent seems a little lacking in War of the Worlds. There's nothing particularly exceptional about these people. None of the internal struggles that make Koepp's characters usually so fascinating to behold.
Still, thinly motivated they may be, the characters are given considerable buoyancy by the cast. Tom Cruise tends to work well with Steven Spielberg. The last time they collaborated was on the excellent Minority Report. WOTW isn't as good, but Spielberg draws out another strong, rawly honest performance from Cruise.
Its the superb Dakota Fanning who commands the film. Fanning is a wonderful child actress. Her facial expressions are almost scary in they're maturity. And she brings it to the role of a child who has seen more things in the last few days than any child should have to. Her developing awareness at the chaos in her short life is stunningly portrayed by Fanning.
There's an unusual performance from Tim Robbins as an emotionally scarred survivor. He hides Ray and Rachel from the aliens, but his constant ramblings about they're crumbling society is frankly bizarre. Even a little creepy. Like when he offers to take care of Rachel should something happen to Ray. Its a scene that sits uneasily with the rest of the film. Still, the way he's written out of it is hauntingly effective.
I feel the ending comes too abruptly, and the resolution is unsatisfactory, but that's in keeping with the book. Spielberg inevitably gives in to the sugary stuff when all's said and done, but War of the Worlds is good solid entertainment. It won't go down in history as one of Spielberg's truly great films, and the aliens motivations are maddeningly vague, but just go along for the ride, and you'll be rewarded.