Questions I have about the movie

Rating: Null/10 (5 July 2005)

Having read the HG Wells novel, I enjoyed the movie and the subtle references to the book and the novel and the double entedre to his previous movies IE the alien playing with bike( in the book the martians did not invent the wheel and the bike being so important to ET) but I believe Spielberg could have added some more touches to make the film more interesting and terrifying. Here are my observations and comments. If you have answers to my questions I'd love to hear them.
First, why didn't Spielberg go into the 747 plane crash. The movie seems to take up nearly three to four minutes of sound and effects resulting from the plane crashing, but all we see are flashes of light and terrible noises. The plane crashes but the next morning the plane was empty of people. From the sounds it seems like one of the alien machines got a hold of it. That would have been exciting and scary to see.
Second, when the fighting begins the Army is holding a hill against the Aliens, the Air Force is attacking and the helicopters are going in, but we can't hear what the commanding general is saying as he shouting on the phone and we hear a soldier screaming about refugees and the next thing we see the army is rushing in to engage the alien war machines. What did the general say? Was the Army at that moment simply buying time for the refugees to escape? Third, in the HG Wells Novel the red vegetation seems to be a stow away from the Martian machines. In the movie am I correct in assuming the red weed is a result of human blood being used as fertilizer? The character played by Tim Robbins sceams the aliens won't get his blood for fertilizer. And near the end, Cruise's character grabs a dying piece of the red weed and crushes it leaving a white powdery dust similar to the dust covering Cruise in the beginning of the movie when the Machine incinerates fleeing people.
What I found haunting was the rail road crossing scene. The crossing arms come down, the bells ring, and the crowd watches helplessly as a passenger train, probably fleeing NYC, rushes by completely engulfed in flames, automatically making its way northward with it dead passengers. The message, there is no escape.
Finally, I find it disappointing that so many of us hated the ending. Read the book, the Martians die not by our hand but by bacteria and viruses we have long since acquired an immunity to. To have it end with the military blowing up the tripods (as satisfying as that might be and believe I loved when the Boston soldiers blew up one of the tripods) would have turned the movie into Independence Day.