War of the Worlds
In my week of movie catch up, I hadn’t planned on seeing War of the Worlds. From the trailers, it looked like another disaster movie that was going to be driven by special effects and no plot. A friend told me I had to see it, so off I went. I didn’t change my mind.
The telling point of any movie is how the audience reacts. As is the case in Carlsbad, there was only a handful of people in the theater so we could hear everyone’s conversation. The first 45 minutes of the movie, one man kept telling his wife how ridiculous various scenarios were and no one even tried to sshhh! him. We were all in agreement. After the first hour, there was no point in the man telling his wife how contrived the movie was, as it was apparent to all of us.
If you’ve read the book or seen the 1953 version, you know the basics. Aliens land on earth in giant ships, proceed to destroy everything in their path, and then are finally done in. (I’ll leave that part out, just in case you have no idea how the aliens are finally defeated.) In this version, the only thing similar to 1953 is that aliens arrive, destroy, and then stop. The in-between stuff is Tom Cruise running around and Dakota Fanning screaming.
In watching War of the Worlds, I had the feeling that this was Steven Speilberg’s anti-Close Encounters. The characters of Tom Cruise and Richard Dreyfuss are opposites. The visual beauty of CE3K is replaced by brown and red filtered lights. The alien spacecraft are threatening and ugly instead of saucers with pretty lights. In fact, the John Williams score at times echoed the CE3K score with darker notes, especially when the alien ships were present. (Nice touch John!)
What I really hated was coincidences that are so common now in blockbuster summer SF movies. Tom Cruise’s character Ray had the best luck. The only car that would start in NYC is the one that Ray knew how to fix. The owner even left the keys in it and the doors unlocked even though they lived in NYC. The car had a full tank of gas. When they make a pit stop and Ray’s daughter goes down to the river, that’s when all the corpses go floating by. Later, the military goes to the rescue and all their vehicles seem to be in working order. As is the news minivan and even though all electronics are out, we can still work the VCR in the news van. The hand grenade appears at the right time and only Ray can get it into the alien ship and survive.
Whatever.
Yesterday I blogged my disappointment of Fantastic Four. Today in retrospect, it’s a brilliant work of art. How things change in a day.
What did I like? The alien ships looked good. At times I enjoyed the risk that Spielberg was taking with the use of visuals, camera shots, music, and lighting. I liked the tribute to the 1953 movie. Is this enough to recommend War of the Worlds? No, but if you go, you need to find something to enjoy or you might just find yourself wishing that the aliens would win.
The telling point of any movie is how the audience reacts. As is the case in Carlsbad, there was only a handful of people in the theater so we could hear everyone’s conversation. The first 45 minutes of the movie, one man kept telling his wife how ridiculous various scenarios were and no one even tried to sshhh! him. We were all in agreement. After the first hour, there was no point in the man telling his wife how contrived the movie was, as it was apparent to all of us.
If you’ve read the book or seen the 1953 version, you know the basics. Aliens land on earth in giant ships, proceed to destroy everything in their path, and then are finally done in. (I’ll leave that part out, just in case you have no idea how the aliens are finally defeated.) In this version, the only thing similar to 1953 is that aliens arrive, destroy, and then stop. The in-between stuff is Tom Cruise running around and Dakota Fanning screaming.
In watching War of the Worlds, I had the feeling that this was Steven Speilberg’s anti-Close Encounters. The characters of Tom Cruise and Richard Dreyfuss are opposites. The visual beauty of CE3K is replaced by brown and red filtered lights. The alien spacecraft are threatening and ugly instead of saucers with pretty lights. In fact, the John Williams score at times echoed the CE3K score with darker notes, especially when the alien ships were present. (Nice touch John!)
What I really hated was coincidences that are so common now in blockbuster summer SF movies. Tom Cruise’s character Ray had the best luck. The only car that would start in NYC is the one that Ray knew how to fix. The owner even left the keys in it and the doors unlocked even though they lived in NYC. The car had a full tank of gas. When they make a pit stop and Ray’s daughter goes down to the river, that’s when all the corpses go floating by. Later, the military goes to the rescue and all their vehicles seem to be in working order. As is the news minivan and even though all electronics are out, we can still work the VCR in the news van. The hand grenade appears at the right time and only Ray can get it into the alien ship and survive.
Whatever.
Yesterday I blogged my disappointment of Fantastic Four. Today in retrospect, it’s a brilliant work of art. How things change in a day.
What did I like? The alien ships looked good. At times I enjoyed the risk that Spielberg was taking with the use of visuals, camera shots, music, and lighting. I liked the tribute to the 1953 movie. Is this enough to recommend War of the Worlds? No, but if you go, you need to find something to enjoy or you might just find yourself wishing that the aliens would win.
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