War Of The World Doesn't Look Like One

Rating: 4/10 (12 July 2005)

Wasted some bucks just to sit on premier class to watch this movie after hefty persuasion from friends, let me pinpoint several criteria that the movie should not be rated good.
Based on the title "War of the World", most people would imagine a war that is happening around the world, across every country, from east to west. After watching, I seen only helpless civilians walking on the same direction in most of the movie length. Then, some US soldiers arrived and waged war with the aliens. There are two scenes of war between the US soldiers and the aliens only. One is during the time when Robbie wanted to look how's the battle like when Ray trying to stop him. Second part is when Ray reached Boston, and AN alien invaded nearby the tunnel (there's only one alien against SOME soldiers?).
So, where are the scene of war between Russian soldiers versus the aliens, or China, or Japan, or Europe? Isn't it suppose to be war of the world? Instead of supposedly watching thousands of soldiers against hundreds (thousands, how I wished) aliens, there are only tiny numbers of human soldiers struggling hard to fight off the aliens.
Another odd thing, Boston's buildings are seen untouched, unlike the neighborhood where Ray was staying which has turned nothing but rubble. And, if you would think logically, Ray and his daughter was still few meters away, and the mother just opened the house door calmly and confidently and immediately rushed out to hug her daughter. Previously, we have seen Ray and the rest were hiding as deep as possible within the house, the basement.
The aliens turned weak just because of bacteria. It's a surprise if these I-see-it-as-ordinary germs able to spread that fast across the states that all aliens were actually infected, like pandemic (or should say, epidemic, because all I see the war was happened in the same region seen in the movie, not across the world).
And something has been annoying me. The nuisance of loud frequent panic breath. Though panic in this situation is natural and human would have fast beating heart and loud noise of releasing breath, but throughout the movie, it's VERY loud, especially during silent moment. Audio engineers should have aware on adjusting volume level of panic breath.
The scriptwriter should have done a lot better in the storyline. Nevertheless, Steven Spielberg's directing should be praised. I like the scene where the soldiers battling against the aliens when few copters released rockets towards the aliens (the scene were shot from land angle).