My thoughts on 'War of the Worlds'

Rating: 8/10 (6 July 2005)

Not knowing whether or not you've seen it yet limits me to how much I can say, suffice to say, that the film rates 8 out of 10 for me, quite acceptable entertainment, and where the changes to the story are, in general, are understandable. Not totally happy with the start of the film, i.e. I wouldn't have bothered with showing the title of the film, I would've just gone into the story a small continuity error which surprised me a bit, a scene where daughter to Ray is having a conversation about who is going to make dinner, early in the film, she sits down on the couch and leans back into the arm of the couch, very next scene she is sitting up right, toooo obvious! I know Spielberg was aiming the story mostly at the "human element" in the film, and that's OK, but it would've been a nice to show a little more of our Tripoded aliens blowing up things, even though Spielberg does a pretty good Job at showing us just how menacing these creatures are, a little more devastation would've been nice, perhaps showing us the mayhem being done around the world. I wondered how Ridley Scott would have handled it or James Cameron maybe? But at the end of the day I'm still very glad that Spielberg took the project on, there are more that just one moment in the film that has me going, Spielberg is good at getting the mood and atmosphere just right. I'm certainly looking forward to seeing it again. There were even some scenes that took me by surprise, not by much, but still had its effects! I didn't want to see any religious overtones in this version, and pretty much that's the way it went, however the reference to 'God' in the closing dialog I guess was acceptable. There were definitely some scary moments in the film, the sound is absolutely amazing I think my sub woofer is going to work overtime on this film, that's for sure What else can I say, I reckon Spielberg could have done more to the story, sure it would've added more time to the length of the film but at 116 min I think it goes for, I'm sure Spielberg could've spent more time in adding to the story but still keeping in homage to H.G Wells story line, I agree totally in not referring to them as "Martians" as we all know now that there are no Martians and as Carl Sagan once said, "Humans will be the Martians". I felt the ending was a little shallow, but then we all know the ending, like the Titanic, we all know it sinks, we all know the 'Aliens' succumb to the bacterium that we have come to enjoybut I dunno, a little more embellishment to the ending might have felt likea victory, we defeated them!...we wonmaybe a little cliché, it's not going to go down as one of Spielbergs greatest films partly because it's a remake, but also because, I felt, the film didn't have that Spielberg touch, the love that he can put into his films, in this case, he might as well have enlisted Tober Hooper as the Director! I think you know what I meanstill a bloody good film, directed by somebody else but Spielbergs influence all over it
AnywayI enjoyed it, 8 out of 10 I figure is about right