Enjoyable, but not "Earth shattering".

Rating: 7/10 (29 July 2005)

Keep in mind that I watch movies totally for enjoyment and rate them on that basis only. I'll leave the technical discussions to those with more knowledge in that area.
Things I liked about this movie: 1) Cool effects. The Martians were awesome. The destruction of humans, buildings & such was great and seamless. No hokey effects here! 2) Acting was believable---could have been better tho.
Things I did not like about this movie: 1) Annoying sub-plot with Cruise & his family. That stuff doesn't belong in a sci-fi movie. (They did that crap in Starwars II also and it sucked.) If Cruise wants to play the daddy role, then find another movie to do it in. 2) Could have used more visuals of the Martians and more intensity when the humans' weaponry is being destroyed---you know, like tanks flying up in the air and exploding, planes crashing into stuff when they're beamed, etc. 3) Somehow it needed a little more explanation. You don't know where the Martians came from unless you've either read the novel or seen the original movie. And you have to guess at the atrocities they were using the humans for (of course if it's just for drinking the blood, then you've got another vampire movie on your hands) Why did they turn the humans to dust at first instead of capture them? And another thing, they should have explained how the Martian tripods got underground. I know the crazy guy said they were there for millions of years, but he wasn't believable.
I really enjoyed watching this movie (mostly because of awesome effects), but later I thought about how much better it could have been. If you cut out some of the slow parts and add more effects (or intensify current ones) this movie would totally rock.
Even tho I've dissed this movie a tad, you still have gotta see it. Few remakes make the grade, but this one does.