Great effects, but...

Rating: 3/10 (29 January 2006)

This rendition of War of the Worlds is very much a disappointment. It has excellent special effects, and the cinematography is exceptional, but the problem is the story, and the complete failure of the movie to stay within the 'believable sci-fi' realm.
Although well acted, the movie spends too much time ensuring that we 'really care' about the characters. However the primary characters are uninteresting and frankly, difficult to tolerate so we wind up less concerned with them - meaning they simply become the vehicle by which we will follow the sci-fi and effects stuff.
But this is exactly where the movie falls totally apart. So much so that you have to wonder if the writer is not now doing ski brochures in Northern Alaska. For example, in the scene where Tom Cruise, the Dad, begs his son not to run toward the alien machines,we watch the entire gang of Army guys get blown to bits, and then a huge alien machine come up over the hill. This is the very direction the son has just gone running in. Surely, he got fried. But no, we are to be insulted by this movie where later, not only does the son reappear without a scratch, he somehow managed to get to Boston long before Tom Cruise. The point? If aliens attack, run at them. Terrible writing.
We are also asked to extend our 'believability' in realms no good sci-fi would go. For example, when Cruise and family find themselves boarding a ferry in upstate New York, in winter no less, you can be sure the family is going to wind up swimming. Which of course they do. Oddly, all of them are frolicking around in the water, fully dressed, and swimming like Olympic champions. Did anyone inform the writer that water of any kind in upstate New York, in Winter, is either rock solid, or at least, enough to freeze you in seconds...
Just when you think things cannot get any worse, we are drawn into the realm that simply spoils any alien-from-space movie. You know, these creatures have the technology to fly 2000 Gazillion miles, all to get to Earth and be stupid. For example, we learn mid-movie that the aliens actually like to suck blood. We learn this when a long tentacle emerges from the huge alien machine, reaches way down to the ground, and pierces a human, sucking his blood. Okay, nice effect - a little edgy - but nice effect. Problem is that in the very next scene, Tom Cruise and daughter are picked up, not pierced, by one of these tentacles and put in a basket of many other humans that the alien machine carries along underneath itself. I wont spoil what happens next for those who have not seen the movie, but it leaves one asking why the aliens invented handy tentacles, and then needed a lunch basket. The answer of course, is in what Cruise does in the basket.
And that is the problem here - the effects, and the writing are all to 'setup' more effects. From 747's that drop out of the sky and yet don't injure anyone 10 feet away from them, to Tim Robbins appearing, and acting very well - however, seeming as though somehow Cruise and Robbins were making two different movies on the same set... This version of War of the Worlds is only an eyeball-feast, and if you get the DVD, be assured you will fast-forwarding through about 70% of it. It does not hold up very well even in the first viewing, and subsequent viewings are only for the effects. By that time, you know the reason they are there, and don't care to be insulted anymore.
That is very disappointing from the man who gave us many other good sci-fi flicks, and okay, one total flop (AI). But sadly, in a list of his best sci-fi flicks, this one would be just above AI. Nice eye candy with a story that gets in the way, and writing that presumes we have the intellect of Penguins.