07-01-2005, 08:54 AM
I just came back from the new "War of the Worlds" movie.
I'm thinking. . . . wow.
The movie was. . . . different, difficult to describe, sometimes difficult to watch.
You ever see "Saving Private Ryan"? Remember the Omaha Beach landing scene? Where people kept streaming out of the landing craft and drowning or getting shot and dying? Well, imagine about 100 minutes straight of that. Scenes of people dying -- playing over and over and over in endless variation. Crushed to death. Vaporized. Impaled and the blood sucked out of them. Like the aliens, the movie itself was relentless in this respect, and you actually got emotionally drained watching practically every single person introduced in the movie get killed -- sometimes by aliens, sometimes by desperate humans.
I pretty much knew what to expect having seen the 1953 version -- knew the beginning, knew the end -- so I really didn't have high hopes for this work. But what this movie lacked in surprises it made up for in atmospheres. There were two main ones at work here: the desperation of the humans, and the absolute implaccable and unstoppable aliens. I'm reminded of some historian's comment that when two cultures (human, he was speaking of) collide, that there are only five outcomes: assimilation, accomodation, isolation, subjugation, or extermination. And in this movie, it's us versus the aliens, and the aliens are intent upon erradicating us.
So in that respect, the movie was absolutely terrifying -- there was nothing we could do to stop these invaders, and they had no moral qualm about slaughtering us like cattle. It was watching people get incinerated to the left and right of a fleeing Tom Cruise to the point where a patina of vaporized human remains coated him and his clothes like flour. It was watching the aliens mowing down hundreds (thousands?) of people outside the ferry landing as they fled on foot. It was watching Tom Cruise and daughter run through a woods while a heavy snowfall of bits and pieces of clothing (from incinerated humans) drifts down about them. The movie drove this point home over and over and over -- about 100 minutes of a 117 minute movie. It was an enormous weight on your heart to watch everyone and everything you cared about get destroyed. Nothing is spared. Not buildings, not homes, not animals, and certainly not people. Not even the environment, which the Martians attempt to Arieform (as opposed to Terraform).
So in that respect, the movie both impressed me and depressed me. Dunno exactly if I can recommend it, but damned if it wasn't different.
That said, some nits/spoilers......
*****
In the movie the aliens have already seeded the Earth with their "tripods", their death machines. And they did this prior to humanity ever existing on the Earth (i.e., several million years prior to humanity's appearance). So, why did they wait so long? If they wanted to conquer the Earth, why not do it THEN before humans -- and the germs that would kill the Martians -- even existed? Afterwards just let the Earth sit until the Martians need it a million years later. Seems odd that so advanced a science would have no concept of evolution, mutation, and germ theory. [Yes, I know that Spielberg was using the "Martians-are-here-among-us-already" device as an allusion to certain terrorist/religious groups. It's just that it does open a gaping plot hole you could drop a Martian tripod through.]
When the Martians start Arieforming the Earth, they use human bodies and human blood as a component in this process. Again, very odd. How did the Martians know millions of years ago that humans would develop and that our biologies would be so similar to that of the Martians that human corpses and blood could be used to nurture a Martian ecology? Wouldn't it be much more likely that some odd bacteria, virus, or prion would be toxic to Martian biology? How could they plan to use something that wasn't even in existance when they made their plans?
If the Martians buried these death machines on Earth nearly a million years ago, then in the million intervening years, shouldn't their science have advanced to the point where they could have found a more efficient way of exterminating the human race and Arieforming the Earth? They should have at least(!) watched the StarTrek movie where there was that "Genesis Project" (Star Trek II?) wherein a single capsule with nanobots injected into a planet would completely Terraform the entire thing in a matter of hours, regardless of the planet's pre-existing biota. I mean, in the million intervening years the most efficient means you've devised of wiping out a species is a tripod-mounted death ray??? Come on! (And of course the tripods themselves clank about like so much WWI armor; again, this is the best your advanced science could come up with?)
So the movie is a bit of a disappointing anachronism in that and other respects. We as humans already know much more efficient ways of exterminating races (including our own) compared to this "advanced" alien species.
*****
So overall it's hard to say.... I mean, this work was really different, absolutely terrifying, the special effects were awesome, and the acting and dialogue were fine and all.... but the movie itself was just such a downer! Kind of a Schindler's List for the new millenium, only there isn't any Oscar Schindler in this story. Everyone and everything's getting killed -- vaporized or planted -- and there's nothing we can do to stop it. True to the original book (and the idea of a war between worlds) and certainly brought home with a vengence, but it's like watching a two hour movie about death, dying, and suffering. Somewhat tough to sit through.
I'm impressed with the storytelling, just depressed by the story being told.
Anyone else see it? Thoughts?
I'm thinking. . . . wow.
The movie was. . . . different, difficult to describe, sometimes difficult to watch.
You ever see "Saving Private Ryan"? Remember the Omaha Beach landing scene? Where people kept streaming out of the landing craft and drowning or getting shot and dying? Well, imagine about 100 minutes straight of that. Scenes of people dying -- playing over and over and over in endless variation. Crushed to death. Vaporized. Impaled and the blood sucked out of them. Like the aliens, the movie itself was relentless in this respect, and you actually got emotionally drained watching practically every single person introduced in the movie get killed -- sometimes by aliens, sometimes by desperate humans.
I pretty much knew what to expect having seen the 1953 version -- knew the beginning, knew the end -- so I really didn't have high hopes for this work. But what this movie lacked in surprises it made up for in atmospheres. There were two main ones at work here: the desperation of the humans, and the absolute implaccable and unstoppable aliens. I'm reminded of some historian's comment that when two cultures (human, he was speaking of) collide, that there are only five outcomes: assimilation, accomodation, isolation, subjugation, or extermination. And in this movie, it's us versus the aliens, and the aliens are intent upon erradicating us.
So in that respect, the movie was absolutely terrifying -- there was nothing we could do to stop these invaders, and they had no moral qualm about slaughtering us like cattle. It was watching people get incinerated to the left and right of a fleeing Tom Cruise to the point where a patina of vaporized human remains coated him and his clothes like flour. It was watching the aliens mowing down hundreds (thousands?) of people outside the ferry landing as they fled on foot. It was watching Tom Cruise and daughter run through a woods while a heavy snowfall of bits and pieces of clothing (from incinerated humans) drifts down about them. The movie drove this point home over and over and over -- about 100 minutes of a 117 minute movie. It was an enormous weight on your heart to watch everyone and everything you cared about get destroyed. Nothing is spared. Not buildings, not homes, not animals, and certainly not people. Not even the environment, which the Martians attempt to Arieform (as opposed to Terraform).
So in that respect, the movie both impressed me and depressed me. Dunno exactly if I can recommend it, but damned if it wasn't different.
That said, some nits/spoilers......
*****
In the movie the aliens have already seeded the Earth with their "tripods", their death machines. And they did this prior to humanity ever existing on the Earth (i.e., several million years prior to humanity's appearance). So, why did they wait so long? If they wanted to conquer the Earth, why not do it THEN before humans -- and the germs that would kill the Martians -- even existed? Afterwards just let the Earth sit until the Martians need it a million years later. Seems odd that so advanced a science would have no concept of evolution, mutation, and germ theory. [Yes, I know that Spielberg was using the "Martians-are-here-among-us-already" device as an allusion to certain terrorist/religious groups. It's just that it does open a gaping plot hole you could drop a Martian tripod through.]
When the Martians start Arieforming the Earth, they use human bodies and human blood as a component in this process. Again, very odd. How did the Martians know millions of years ago that humans would develop and that our biologies would be so similar to that of the Martians that human corpses and blood could be used to nurture a Martian ecology? Wouldn't it be much more likely that some odd bacteria, virus, or prion would be toxic to Martian biology? How could they plan to use something that wasn't even in existance when they made their plans?
If the Martians buried these death machines on Earth nearly a million years ago, then in the million intervening years, shouldn't their science have advanced to the point where they could have found a more efficient way of exterminating the human race and Arieforming the Earth? They should have at least(!) watched the StarTrek movie where there was that "Genesis Project" (Star Trek II?) wherein a single capsule with nanobots injected into a planet would completely Terraform the entire thing in a matter of hours, regardless of the planet's pre-existing biota. I mean, in the million intervening years the most efficient means you've devised of wiping out a species is a tripod-mounted death ray??? Come on! (And of course the tripods themselves clank about like so much WWI armor; again, this is the best your advanced science could come up with?)
So the movie is a bit of a disappointing anachronism in that and other respects. We as humans already know much more efficient ways of exterminating races (including our own) compared to this "advanced" alien species.
*****
So overall it's hard to say.... I mean, this work was really different, absolutely terrifying, the special effects were awesome, and the acting and dialogue were fine and all.... but the movie itself was just such a downer! Kind of a Schindler's List for the new millenium, only there isn't any Oscar Schindler in this story. Everyone and everything's getting killed -- vaporized or planted -- and there's nothing we can do to stop it. True to the original book (and the idea of a war between worlds) and certainly brought home with a vengence, but it's like watching a two hour movie about death, dying, and suffering. Somewhat tough to sit through.
I'm impressed with the storytelling, just depressed by the story being told.
Anyone else see it? Thoughts?