War of the Worlds

ndhaon91

ndhaon91

(something clever)
Joined
Jul 22, 2004
Messages
55
I thought it was very well done, overall. A little too "Signs" and not enough "Independence Day" for my taste, but I guess that's how it was intended.
 
ndhaon91 said:
I thought it was very well done, overall. A little too "Signs" and not enough "Independence Day" for my taste, but I guess that's how it was intended.
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A little too signs *groans* :( that makes me want to reconsider if I'm really going to see it this weekend. Not saying Signs is a bad movie, just saying that there was virtuely no kind of alien veus human scene. Independce Day was great :)
 
Saw it last night.

Distinctly underwhelmed by the combination of Tom Cruise and Dakota Fanning, both in ultra-annoying form.

Eventually I was just hoping their fellow refugees would toss both of them to the aliens. It would have at least meant we didn't have to listen to Fanning's shrill whining.
 
Like Ourobouros, I was distinctly underwhelmed by Tom Cruise and especially Dakota Fanning.

The disconnect between seeing bridges blown up and people dying and subsequent whining about back pain and uncomfortable beds just felt... wrong. I also disliked the prolonged basement sequence which just felt... out of place.

And, the saccharine movie ending. Ugh. Ugh Ugh. Ugh Ugh Ugh. Can't Spielberg LAY OFF the sentimentality?

Overall, it was OK to pass time, but there have been much MUCH better movies this year, and yes, SW Ep 3 was one of them.
 
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Oooooo....I totally disagree about the Signs comparison. I hated Signs but loved this. Signs you never really got to see the aliens. War of the Worlds is 15 minutes of build up then 2 hours of aliens kicking ass. The ending was a little underwhelming, but it didn't detract from how suspenseful the whole film was.
 
Good news, Black Couldren. I will be seeing that movie this weekend and will post my comments. :D
 
8 of us saw this last night. Two of us loved it and the other 6 were distinctly underwhelmed.

They all thought it was going to be very Independance Day whereas I've seen the original film and it was great to see the odd nod towards it's predecesor.

Solaar
8 outta 10
 
War of the Worlds is the worst movie I have ever seen in my entire life. and I watch really bad movies for the fun of it, such as anything MST worthy.
War of the Worlds had NO suspensful or intense moments. nothing was built up, it just sort of happened. The dialogue was stupid, I wish it had been directed by someone much less kid-friendly than Stephen Speilburg, at least it would have been a better action movie if it was rated 'R' instead of 'PG-13'. it made me angry when all of the would be gory scenes took place on the other side of a door, or behind a tractor. but that still does not excuse the horrendous script.
I just began reading H.G. Well's novel, and the first 4 pages of that blows the movie away. H.G. Well's is brilliant. and I bet he is turning in his grave so much, that we could run a small city for a few weeks if we wrapped him in copper wire and stuck him in the middle of a large magnet.
The absolute worst part of the War of the Worlds, is that it SHOULD have been so awesome. it was based on perhaps the most legendary SF novel, directed by the man who did Indiana Jones and The Minority Report. I had been waiting for this movies since Christmas. and I was so disappointed. I almost cried, then I almost died, then I almost left the theater, and I really wish I had. but its ok, because tonight, a local theater is playing the original 50's War of the Worlds movie, and I really hope I can go see it.
sorry i got a bit ranty.
but the original novel really is fantastic, and I love how it is written almost like a scientific journal.
 
Makes sense... That's exactly what he's done. Abandoned narrative sense.
 
Spoilers contained throughout this post

I just come back from seeing it and I didn't mind it. I've seen the 80s remake of the 50s version (after reading the book) and the musical version as well and this one does hold up as the 'blockbuster' version. I used to love Independance Day but now I think it is really really bad. What bugged me in this is that the 'aliens' looked too much like the ID4 aliens - um a little creativity wouldn't have gone astray.

The basement scene = done well. Very much like the horror of the book - and the mechanical tripods are done really well.

A little too much emotion (ie the whole beginning sequence seemed a little out of place but to be expected in every movie that comes out nowadays) in places - plenty of gore though (to an extent of course I'm not talking about Sin City or Kill Bill gore).

Anyway - I think it works.
 
I gotta agree with a lot of you; the takeover did kinda just happened, it was still a pretty good movie.

War of the Worlds is 15 minutes of build up then 2 hours of aliens kicking ass.

Yes, yes, yes. The humans totally got their asses wumped by the aliens from almost the very start of the story.

War of the Worlds is the worst movie I have ever seen in my entire life.

Makes me wonder how many movies you've seen(probaly only the biggest sellers)

Like Ourobouros, I was distinctly underwhelmed by Tom Cruise and especially Dakota Fanning.

Aren't we all, I found a lot of the male characters in the movie very annoying. Ecspecially Robb, and that little girl(who screamed everytime something slightly out of place happened, and always did something that attracted attention to the group).

All in all a good movie I'll give it eight out of ten. I haven't read War of the Worlds, but it's been on my "to do" list for a very long time. Has anyone read the Otherland series by Tad Williams. I believe their is a world in there were the aliens actually win. Not much description on it, but now that I remember, that is a place of interest.
 
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I just saw it, thought there were some good moments interspersed through a pretty bland film, I've never read the book, but I really hope the whole reason that the aliens died and lost wasn't because of some virus or other biological thing on earth, I mean seriously if the aliens had come and buried superior technological devices in the ground many, many thousands or millions of years in the past and just sat and waited to take us over, I seriously doubt they'd be so retarded that they wouldn't have had protection against biological agents. But I also suppose that they had to have some way for us to win, after all, we are fairly well off against most biological threats, which somehow gives us the right to live and the aliens not to.....
 
Yeah that's one thing I don't get about the movie, bacteria or something kills off the aliens? :confused: The end was very bad....but I loved the middle part of the story.
 
Dom: in the book, it was indeed microbes which killed the aliens. However, they hadn't come to earth and buried their machines. In the book there were some projectiles launched from Mars which cause some concern and consternation on Earth. These meteorite-like projectiles then landed on earth, broke open and released the machines with their heat rays. In essence, they had never been to Earth nor had any exposure to earth prior to their assault. All the data they had gathered was at a distance, from Mars.

Also, one of my favorite scenes in the book was of this ironclad (I forget the name) valiantly taking on a machine and being destroyed in the process, but allowing a ship full of refugees to escape. Of course, not in the movie...

But I also suppose that they had to have some way for us to win, after all, we are fairly well off against most biological threats, which somehow gives us the right to live and the aliens not to.....
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And that's what the closing lines from HG Wells said: by the billions of deaths that infectious diseases have caused amongst humanity, we had earned the right to live amongst the microbes...
 
I'll say the same thing I posted in the 'last movie you saw' thread. I saw it last night, and because my expectations were incredibly low, I came away pleasantly surprised.

The alien attacks were pretty scary, which is what I hoped for. The effects were top notch, nothing stood out as obviously CGI. I like that, a lot.

I didn't catch any reference as to where the aliens came from.. did it mention Mars in the film?

Anyway, my favorite scene in the movie, as strange as it sounds, was the peanut butter sandwiches incident. Man that was funny. Tom Cruise was in a serious state of shock, and it was entertaining as hell to watch. :D
 
Just got back and I have to say I enjoyed it a lot.... I loved the POV, the confusion, not knowing anything and the world being torn apart before your eyes.

The feel at you might be at much at risk from your fellow man as the aliens was well done, also there were acts of courage in there that was very human.

The point about burying machines I assumed they had
Been sent on a head computer controlled/ unmanned and buried themselves waiting for the aliens, as the news reporter showed the Tom Cruise character on her video tape. I think it is believable that even an advance society could make a mistake with regards to viruses, they might have believed their wonder drug or technology had “all” under control. It takes only one virus does it not, lose among a population with no immunity to run riot. They might have realised too late, been working on a cure, to dismiss the whole thing as not logical and not with in the parameters of the story line is in my opinion a bit silly. Why can't an advance civilisation make a mistake?

If you are expecting an Independence Day II then you are out of luck. The approach was narrower and I felt not so gung ho, which brought it closer and more personal, least to me.

The comments about the little girl being very adult one minute and screaming her head off the next. Well having two daughters I can say girls of that age can be like that, one minute they say and do things so adult and grown up it rocks you back on your heels. The next they are crying because Barbie fell off the table. The mix was about right I felt.

the bit that freaked me out the most was the train crossing the line of refugees bound for the ferry.

The only Huh??? scene was the next to last, felt in all honestly that might have been tacked on at last minute, but never mind I enjoyed it and the approach. The alien machines were organic in the way they moved and mimicked the aliens themselves in the way they moved.
 
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Well, they can sure make mistakes, but I guess my point was more, they've been planning it for so long they should've taken care of almost every eventuality, it makes much more sense from the book's perspective, ie, them never coming to Earth before the invasion.

Oh yeah, and one thing that I just have to be annoyed about is that after the 'lightning' knocked out all the electronic devices in a huge radius, there is a guy walking around with a minicam recording things...I mean, Sony or whoever is awesome and all, but I'm pretty sure they don't protect household electronic devices from EMP fields....
 
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I believe there is an old saying among soldiers the best laid plans never survive contact with the enemy....;)

As to the EMP thing,
I can buy that maybe only machines/devices in an area first "attacked" got knocked out after that maybe no need to "come down" in that manner. Maybe the camera was in a lead box or something ;)

In the end it is a film. If you want to pull each part of it to pieces and say this is wrong, that is wrong, why the heck bother going to see anything. Because you can do that to any film, even the so called "classics" and you will find inconsistencies and crap. The whole thing is supposed to be an hour or two of enjoyment. Same with books, if I enjoy the story and it is in my opinion well told, then that's great, if not then that's the luck of the draw.
 
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In regards to the virus/bacteria destroying the aliens, I actually thought that was kind of cool. Better than a lot of other ways the humans could have won.

It's interesting to think about what happened when European explorers/settlers started landing in North America. The Europeans brought viruses with them, viruses that they were immune to in Europe, but the natives were not. Thousands of natives were wiped out by smallpox and other diseases the Europeans brought with them.

In that context, imagine if the movie had shown the aliens bringing the viruses, and the humans dying from them, instead of the other way around. It would have made the alien invasion even easier I guess.

PS I really liked the aliens themselves, in the basement scene. They looked so cool, and pretty believable (except I'm not so sure about the massive cranial ridges). I, too, noticed the resemblance between the alien bodies and their giant machines.
 
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