This Ain't No Independance Day! (The War of the Worlds (1953) (DVD))

Member Name: marandina

Product:	The War of the Worlds (1953) (DVD)
Date:	03/07/05 (438 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Superb FX, Great story

Disadvantages: Family mush

Let’s face it, we’re all entranced by the thought of little green men (especially after a few beers). The concept of aliens from another world has fascinated us for the most part of the last couple of centuries. The 1950’s saw an explosion of hostile aliens in comics and B-movies that lit up the imagination of teenage children and day-dreamer adults. The cult of science fiction can be traced back as early as 1898 when, amazingly, HG Wells wrote the book “The War of the Worlds”. An infamous broadcast in 1930’s America caused pandemonium as thousands of listeners mistook the programme for a real invasion (only in America) whilst the 1953 movie brought wholesale galactic warfare to a cinema near you. So it was with a weighty history that Stephen Spielberg has put together a re-make of a modern classic.
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Main cast:
Tom Cruise - Ray Ferrier
Dakota Fanning - Rachel Ferrier
Justin Chatwin - Robbie Ferrier
Tim Robbins - Ogilvy
Miranda Otto - Mary Ann
Rick Gonzalez - Vincent
Yul Vazquez - Julio
Lenny Venito - Manny
David Alan Basche – Tim

Director: Stephen Spielberg
Writing credits: HG Wells, Josh Freidman & David Koepp (screenplay)
Cert: 12A
Run time: 116 mins
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Set in New Jersey, Ray Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is an ordinary, hard working guy doing an every day, blue collar job. Having finished his shift, he picks his teenage son and 11-year-old daughter up from his ex-wife to look after them for the weekend. Rachel (Dakota Fanning) and Robbie (Justin Chatwin) resign themselves to a tedious couple of days in dad’s untidy house equipped with an empty fridge. There is tension between Robbie and his father as Robbie stamps his rebellious nature on the occasion by taking dad’s car without permission. Before Ray has had a chance to find his errant son, he finds a large group of people outside his house looking up at the sky. A curious mix of pitch black with stars and a swirling vortex hurling lightning at the ground suggest that all is not well. Before you know it, huge tripod machines are exploding out of the ground and zapping the locals like there’s no tomorrow. Ferrier escapes the carnage just in time to drive off to the relative safety of Boston (home of his ex-wife although why that would be a safe place is anyone’s guess) with family safely ensconced in the car.

War of the Worlds could easily have been a monumental turkey. With critics already unhappy at the lack of opportunity to see and review the movie before release, rumours were that this film was a stinker. However, this is definitely not the case.

The original, 19th century story was written in response to the militarization in Germany in the late 19th century. Here, Spielberg is clearly influenced by the September 11th terrorist attacks in 2001 with more than a touch of the Holocaust in many of the scenes.

Tom Cruise is not the Tom Cruise that you might expect to see in a movie like this. Gone is the flashy showmanship and the scene-stealing smiles. Ferrier is meant to be a man lost in the crowd and this is the overwhelming image that the viewer is left with as Cruise battles along with thousands of extras to find a safe haven. Throughout Cruise wears a leather jacket with something like 60 identical jackets employed during the film's making with a variety of degrees of wear and tear to give Cruise that authentic feel of being an ordinary guy who just blends in with the rest of the masses. This "de-Cruisification" works well as he rails against the archytypal gung-ho American so often featured in movies like “Independence Day”. Far from wanting to blast the aliens to Kingdom come, Cruise is often shown skulking about building basements, hiding from the invaders with the simple premise of surviving and keeping his children safe.

This is thrown into stark contrast by the role of Tim Robbins who plays a rather convincing hermit who does want to blow the aliens away much to Cruise’s amazement and fear. This is a far cry from the Will Smith, kick-ass GI Joe type of all-American hunk with even an acknowledgement from Robbins that the invaders have defeated the mighty US of A inside only 2 days.

As you might expect from a Spielberg production, there is the usual family angst as several sets are dominated by family hugs and kisses. We know that Spielberg had a difficult upbringing himself and that recurring theme throughout his films pops up yet again although not enough to deflect a darkly, sinister movie complete with apocolyptic scenes that might have been drafted in from a Dante work.

The 11-year-old Fanning is ahead of her time playing another strong role as the clausterphobic daughter who gets to scream on plenty of occasions. Her vulnerability is set in contrast to the testosterone fuelled Robbie who just wants to join the forces and fight the good fight. This results in an ongoing conflict with dad whilst Fanning is left to view the world through the eyes of a frightened child even having to witness dead bodies floating down a river when all she wants to do is take a leak in the bushes.

As well as being a dark homage to a classic work, WOTW is a multi-million dollar special effects fest. The tripod machines are straight from the front cover of a 1950’s comic along with their shooting rays blasting buildings and people alike. The aliens themselves are impressive although not that dissimilar to creations made in other movies. There are plenty of explosions with stunt men working overtime as the audience is treated to a long night-time image of Armageddon. It’s interesting that the director feels that he couldn’t have made this movie 10 years ago. I’ve no doubt that this is because of the impact of the 9/11 attrocities and perhaps it’s no coincidence that a crashed plane features in one of the sets. In the making of the movie, apparently a whole Boeing jet was bought purely to crash to lend a feeling of authenticity about the scene. As the carnage starts at the top of the movie, Fanning enquires as to whether New Jersey is under terrorist attack. It’s hard to imagine that kind of line appearing in a movie like this up until now.

The co-writers, Josh Friedman and David Koepp have managed to capture a screenplay that allows the director to include many of his trademark touches. Innocents running away from rampaging beasts is all very “Jurassic Park” whilst the lighting effects through cracks in doors and filtering through windows pays more than a nod to "Close Encounters of the Third Kind”

Nevertheless, the movie has flaws. It’s up to the audience whether it takes or leaves the family bonding and back-slapping but this can be tedious at times without wishing to sound too cynical. The movie does slow in pace towards its finale with a rather tame ending but then this is inherited from both the original story and the movie from the 1950’s so it was hard to see how this could have been avoided.

Overall, this film will be a big hit. Spielberg has put together a meticulous piece of work in a relatively short time that has echoes of recent times and is more of a brooding, modern-day reflection of current times than sci-fi epics of the last decade. The director has also paid due respect to the 1953 version with elements that the movie-goer will recognise if you've seen the original film. For this, Spielberg should be applauded.

One note of caution is the rating. A 12A means the little ones can get in with an adult but my 9-year-old lad was scared at times. It has been the subject of debate whether this should have been a 15 Cert.

Whatever you do, enjoy the ride!

Thanks for reading

Marandina

War of the Worlds in on general release across the UK.

Footnote: This category has no descriptor or indicator that it relates to the 1953 version of the movie. However, there are 2 old ops that do relate to that movie. I am contacting Dooyoo to either re-classify this cat for the 2005 version and move the old ops to a 1953 cat or something similar. I hope this puts folks minds at rest about rating & commenting.

I also understand that new movie releases can be written about and added by Dooyoo. This would be a VHS addition even if the video hasn't been released yet. Again, I'll seek to clarify :O)

Summary: Great Sci-fi blockbuster that fills a big screen.