Cast: Tom Cruise, Dakota Fanning, Justin Chatwin, Tim Robbins.
Director: Steven Spielberg.
Tom Cruise teams up with Steven Spielberg to save us from the mother all alien invasions. This £73 million update of HG Well’s 1898 classic will undoubtedly do the business at box office and there is no arguing that Spielberg is a true master of eye-popping special effects.
If it’s good enough for Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg, it should be good enough for the rest of us - but does War of the Worlds come too soon after ID4’S rah-rah’d victory over alien bastards?
Indeed. In transposing H.G.Wells’ alien-invade-Victorian-England classic to modern America, Spielberg and screenwriter David Koep have put the emphasis on terror, as dockyard mechanic Ray Ferrier and estranged kids Rachel and Robbie roam the US like refugees trying to stay ahead of the evil E.T.s.
Divorced and put-upon New York dock worker Ray Ferrier (Cruise) is looking after his children one weekend when strange events unfold without warning. The ground is scorched by massive lightning strikes, which herald the arrival of extraterrestrial creatures who clearly don’t come in peace. Ray has to use all his resources to get his kids to safety, but it is soon clear that the battle to stay alive is going to be a lengthy one. With the cry of ’’Oh my God’’ ringing in his ears, Ray and his freaked-out siblings grab what they can before hightailing it to safety - in this case Boston.
It soon becomes clear that this is no isolated incident, but just the beginning of a catastrophic alien attack on Earth. The family’s journey takes them across the ravaged countryside and bang into the middle of a desperate tide of refugees fleeing from an extraterrestrial army of blood-thirsty tripods. With no place to hide, the only question is whether Ray has it in him to protect his loved ones and in the process prove himself as a father.
Elsewhere, the reliable Tim Robbins provides a distraction from all the screaming and hollering of Cruise and Fanning as a deranged ex-ambulance driver, drunk on peach schnapps and holed up in a disused cellar where Team Cruise find temporary refuge. This provides the best scene of the film as our heroes finally come face to face with their alien tormentors.
The ubiquilty of elaborate movie special effects means that it’s pretty rare for a film nowadays to blow you away with it’s visual trickery. But War of the Worlds does just that, with imagery so striking and disturbing that you may well cower in your seat. Suprisingly, considering the movie’s scale, Spielberg started shooting only in November. As such, the schedule frontloaded with major action sequences so that ILM could get a jump on the 400-500 FX shots. That doesn’t seem too many-Revenge of the Sith boasts around 2, 200 - but Spielberg is promising quality, not quantity.
Alien invasion epics need to deliver great set-pieces, and some the action scenes here are jaw-dropping. But it’s not a film that lazily relies on it’s incredible spectacle alone. War of the Worlds scores high for visual wizadry and probably will go down a storm with sci-fi geeks and the like, while also satisfying anyone with the inexplicable urge you get during the summer to watch earth being saved in spectacular big-screen style.
The reliable Tom Cruise is fine in the lead role, despite being out-performed at times by his freakishly confident 11-year-old co-star Dakota Fanning. Both are upstaged by the marauding invaders, who ooze menace with their weaponry and blood-curdling noises.
The sole problem with the story - based loosely on HG Wells’ classic book - is a somewhat anticlimatic ending. But it can’t stop this from being Steven Spielberg’s most arresting film in years and a dazzling thrill-ride. But mums and dads be warned-this is a very violent movie with a body count that Stallone would envy, so parental guidance is highly recommended-don’t say I didn’t warn you.