A rather disappointing movie

Rating: 3/10 (15 July 2005)

I went to see War of the Worlds yesterday. I remember enjoying the book and also the Jeff Wayne concept album (hurriedly re-mastered and re-released to coincide with the movie's release, I notice) a few years back. However, I wasn't a big fan of the first movie, brought out in the sixties. The same applies to the latest movie too. The concept of aliens invading earth has been a literary (if you can call it that) cliché and a movie cliché for a long time now and it's this that makes War of the Worlds rather dull  you know what's going to happen and you feel get a "here-we-go-again-with this-old-chestnut" sort of feeling  or at least I did.
I also found War of the Worlds disappointing because it failed to live up to its hype. This movie has been rammed down our throats in the media for several weeks now, so I guess my expectations may have been a teensy bit too high.
My opinion is that Tom Cruise was badly miscast. He just doesn't look like a working class dysfunctional father and he doesn't act one out very well either. Dakota Fanning as Rachel is far too precocious to be true and as for the one-dimensional son (Robbie)  I felt no sympathy for him whatsoever. As far as acting credits go, Tim Robbins (as Harlan) stole the show hands down, but even he struggled with a rather lifeless script. To the movie's credit, it does maintain a first person viewpoint, much like in the novel, but the movie is, if anything, far more introverted than the novel and we find ourselves examining Ray's relationship with his kids rather more than the "Big Picture" where we can see what the invaders are doing to human society. If Ray and his kids had been characterised better, then War of the Worlds would have had far more impact.
I have to say that I expected better from Stephen Spielberg. There are few signs of his usual flair for narrating a scene in new and thought-provoking ways. The script had very little tension and I found myself getting bored around the middle of the movie. The Tripods seem like incidentals and Spielberg is so obviously overdoing the old movie technique of keeping them off shot to increase the fear factor that I ended up feeling frustrated rather than afraid.
The special effects were what you might expect from a big budget movie like this but again, there's nothing new here.
In my very 'umble opinion, Independence Day was the best working of the War of the Worlds idea. As far as direction and quality script are concerned it leaves this movie eating dust. There was no attempt to develop Wells' story by letting us in on the reason for the aliens' envy of our planet. Likewise, there was no attempt to convey Wells' stark social observations on human society. In this sense, Independence Day succeeded where this movie failed.
All in all, I would give this movie a rather disappointing three out of a possible ten.