FilmsJuly 2, 2005

Review: War of the Worlds

By Ian

Oh heck, I’m not going to say much about this – Spielberg does it again. Aliens turned up a million years ago and buried giant killing robots underground. We missed them and built cities over them. They sit in space and watch us for years then zap pilots down into the robots so they can mince humans and make us into fertilizer.

SPOILER ALERT: If the aliens have been watching us for ages, why didn’t they watch the 1953 original and remember to wear encounter suits, lest they succumb to the same ‘flu as the others? Silly aliens.

Still, it’s a much better film than A.I. and the flaming train was a moment of genius. But the ending? Oh, so Minority Report. Thumbs neutral, I guess.

[Edit – John points out that the technical term for a thumbs-neutral is ‘meh‘]

3 Comments

  • John Montgomery
    The technical phrase is "meh" for thumbs neutral. You can hardly expect Spielberg not to have a happy ending though - it's in his nature after all.
  • Duncan Jauncey
    After watching the new film, I still prefer the book. At least the death-rays were impressive. :-)
  • Ian
    Not only were those original death-rays impressive, they scared the hell out of me. The scythe-the-crowd scenes this time around reminded me more of the scenes from Mars Attacks!