The aliens and the annoying kids
The audience in the theater watching War of the Worlds with me, I swear, were rooting for the two kids in it to be disintegrated within 10 minutes into the movie! Seriously! As poor Tom Cruise tries to flee the marauding aliens in their tripods armed with death rays, he has to put up with an annoying Dakota Fanning, his 10 year old (or so) daughter who keeps screaming (No, make that screeching), that she wants to see her "mommy" and with a headstrong teenage son, played by whoever, who wants to go back and fight the aliens...
Other than that, this is a solid Spielberg entertainer, which means that it is way better than any other alien invasion movie made in this planet! The special effects are fantastic and like his earlier movies (ET, Close Encounters and A.I.), Spielberg can't resist showing us the aliens themselves, who turn out to be the least imaginative of the FX. The ending also left a bit to be desired. Safe to say that Steven Spielberg's obsession with family values takes the gloss of an otherwise brilliant Sci-Fi movie.
NOTE: DON'T read this review of the movie at salon.com unless you want all the fun of movie watching sucked out of you! Disgustingly one-sided!!! And these are by people who get paid to watch movies!!!!
posted by Santosh Sankar at 12:29 AM
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4 comments
4 Comments:
It has to be a one sided article on Salon, and I loved it. The most boring reviews are ones that are, "oh I love this gerat movie. Praise praise crap crap" The best are the ones that butcher the movie and give you something to think about. War of the worlds was a dissapointment for me, so I guess that would make me one sided
What kills me about the salon thing is that they have apparently never read the orignal War of the Worlds. Guess what, it IS an anti war book. Having Tim Robonson is no coincedence. The book is all about how the British empire would probably fall from too many occupations, and rotting morality.. Its no wonder that SS picked this story.
Too bad Stephanie Zacharek took it so personally. I'll admit that WAR OF THE WORLDS must be the grimmest alien invasion movie filmed. Of course I could read the September 11th references. Of course I got the Algerian-French war references. It's too bad she thought Speilberg was slumming this time. But I suspect it is Zacharek who prefers the superficial cutesy mold. This may be the best Spielberg film in years -- and, yes, that *is* easy to say.
My problem with Stephanie Zacharek's review is that she was so fixated with what she perceived as Spielberg's "indecency" that she lost all perspective when watching the movie (and writing a review). That's my problem with the one-sided review, Chris. It is fun for atrocities like "Gigli" but not for WoW.
If you notice her review, almost every paragraph is about how Spiel- is trying to shock us by referring to 9-11, how he is trying to shock us by blowing up people and showing little kids in terror. We get it! This movie is meant to shock and scare the audience! That does not make Spiel- a bad guy or the movie a bad one!
And like Anon and johnnywaco said this movie, like the book is supposed to be about War and its consquences. You can't pick on the director for trying to be loyal to the book's message, while trying to update it to present times! Jeez!
Finally, for a much more balanced viewpoint check out Roger Ebert's (negative) review of the movie in his website. I may not always agree with him but atleast he's no snob (And notice how he discusses plot holes which is one reason why a lot of ppl disapproved of the movie in the first place)
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