Director: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Tom Cruise, Justin Chatwin, Dakota Fanning, Tim Robbins, Miranda Otto, David Alan Basche

- Reviewed by Vickie and Linda

VICKIE: Unless you live in a cave or under a very large rock, you’ve most likely heard by now that there’s a new Tom Cruise vanity project… I mean, movie… out. It’s called War of the Worlds and, in it, Tom Cruise saves humanity. Okay, not really, but in this bloated, violent, LAME-ASS sci-fi actioner, director Steven Spielberg sure does his best to make it look like Tom does.

LINDA: Let me just start to say the the most memorable thing about the preview screening I went to was the unprecedented and outrageous amount of security. After I was scanned with a metal-detecting wand, both front and back, had my coat inspected, and had to turn in all my belongings which were put in a ziplock baggie (including my purse; but they let me keep my Carmex), I then had to wait a FREAKIN' HOUR for the movie to start half an hour late. Even with several hundred eager people waiting outside to get in, the process was taking so long that the theater was only about 3/4ths full when the fury of the audience finally made the theater people start the film. Talk about beginning a movie with a hostile crowd.

VICKIE: For the uninformed or wholly disinterested—and I suspect a large number of moviegoers fall into the latter category thanks to the publicity juggernaut known as “TomKat”—the film is another adaptation of the H.G. Wells’ classic about marauding aliens making mincemeat of Earth and its inhabitants. The setting is moved from the turn-of-the-century to present day, and Tom stars as blue-collar deadbeat dad Ray Ferrier, who’s more like a stranger than a father to his kids, Rachel (Dakota Fanning) and Robbie (Justin Chatwin). Long story short, aliens invade the planet via some initially-pretty-cool but eventually tiresome after the first 40-or-so minutes special effects. The plot of the movie then basically devolves into simply: aliens blow s**t up for an hour while Ray and the kids run around a lot. Implausibilty and plenty of audience eye-rolling ensue.

LINDA: Oh, c'mon! So jaded, Vickie! Yes, as in all of his films, Tom Cruise plays the Tom Cruise Character... you know, The Asshole that Overcomes Adversity and is Humbled to Become a Good Man. BUT! That only lasts about ten minutes, and then lightning strikes! And strikes again! Crack! Crack! CcccrrrAAAACK! It's SCARY! There's something not right! At that point I was hooked, and almost... ALMOST forgot I was watching a film that can be summed up as The Two-Hour Tom-Cruise-Palooza (I think he is literally in every scene). And then when the "tripods" came out of the ground in the middle of the town square and started zapping everyone in sight? Well, HOLY CRAP!

VICKIE: Here’s the thing: I liked this movie the first time I saw it, when it was called Jurassic Park. Spielberg has lifted so many elements from that dinosaur movie that I half expected a T-Rex to come trotting onscreen after the giant alien tripods that were so very clearly modeled on their prehistoric, villainous and similarly destructive cinematic predecessors. From the stomping to the deafening death knell/foghorn the tripods emit, I had a distinct sense of déjŕ vu. Ditto the humans being snatched up into the “jaws” of death, the cars being tossed around like toys and the countless scenes of people running from the gigantic killing machines.

LINDA: But this first hour or so of War of the Worlds, I thought, has a really impressive momentum. It is much more terrifying than I expected... really rather horrifying. This is a WAR movie, not a popcorn movie. Speilberg has again created the sort of relentless, gut-wrenching tension that he did so well in Saving Private Ryan. This isn't E.T.'s mothership coming for a visit.

VICKIE: The entire storyline with Ray’s resentful son Robbie was awful. There is no way, NO WAY I SAY!, that he would have survived the initial battle he engaged in, let alone the walk (?) to Boston. And yes, Steven and Tom, we all got the anvil-like moment of forgiveness that came when Robbie called Ray “Dad” and meant it for the first time. Even better was the fact that Miranda Otto (in a completely thankless role as the ex-wife) and all of Ray’s in-laws emerge from their pristine Boston brownstone, perfectly coiffed and impeccable dressed amid global carnage and destruction, like they were just about to sit down to Thanksgiving dinner! Yet poor Robbie, who endured heaven knows what to survive against all odds, is left unwashed in his tattered clothes! What, did he JUST get there??

LINDA: Well, if Dennis Quaid can walk from Philadelphia (or wherever) to New York City in two days in sub-zero temperatures in The Day After Tomorrow, then Robbie can walk from Amish-country-covered-in-blood to Boston. It's not THAT much of a stretch. Personally, for me the movie started to lose momentum when Tom and screaming Dakota Fanning end up in the basement of a house, in the middle of the warzone. Crazy Tim Robbins invites them in, playing a sort-of more unhinged version of his slightly dim character from Mystic River... except this time he has lots of tools and weapons. They are stuck there for a cinematically long time. And when the aliens show up, I suddenly felt like I was watching the movie Signs. Unfortunately, Speilberg forgot the key to classic suspense: DON'T SHOW THE ALIENS. Alas.

VICKIE: Don't even get me started on the whole scene where Tom Cruise blows up one of the tripods from within! That, for me, was the biggest, dumbest moment in the entire film. Okay, so person after person is sucked up from the alien holding tank by the tripod's vagina (???) and no one else does anything but scream... but as soon as Tommy boy starts to go, EVERYONE IN THE CAGE BANDS TOGETHER TO PULL HIM TO SAFETY?????? Why???? "Because he's Tom Cruise, star of this picture, that's why! People, even fictional characters, LOVE him! And we need a scene where all the moviegoers will get to see him be a hero and blow up one of the villains!"—the collective reasoning of everyone associated with WOTW, I’m sure.

LINDA: Wait, Vickie, I must clarify: it wasn't a vagina, it was an asshole... that is what my friend and I decided. Tom gets sucked into the machine's ass, where of course he can wiggle around enough in order to pull TWO grenade pins out... with his mouth! And when the people pile together grab him to pull him out of the sphincter, I expected one, then all of them to shout "Swim down! Swim down" a la Finding Nemo.

VICKIE: Ray spends much of the film trying to prove himself as a father, and Tom Cruise has made a point of hammering home the point that he believes, ultimately, this movie is about family. My response? Not so much. Instead, it’s a movie about Tom Cruise trying to prove the importance of family but never really succeeding at it. Not once did I think, “Wow, what a great message about sticking together and loving each other against all odds!” Instead, I found myself thinking, “WTF?”

LINDA: Yeah, the "family" part of the film didn't really work. The children were just props to supposedly give Tom Cruise more of a reason to live. And don't even get me started on the crap-o-rific closing scene. I knew it was coming. It was like the totally unnecessary pregnant-wife shot at the end of Minority Report, and the bizarre last half-hour of A.I.... Spielberg just can't let a dark movie end as it should, with everyone dying. I fully admit that the WOTW ending is one of the stinkiest in a long line of stinky Spielberg endings.

VICKIE: Finally, the demise of the aliens at the end of the film was also completely anticlimactic. It just kind of... happened. No fanfare, no great realization on the part of humanity as to how to kill them. They just wheezed off into the night with some expositionary narration from Morgan Freeman to clue in any audience members who didn’t realize our extraterrestrial foes were finally done in by…wait for it…bacteria.

LINDA: I have to admit I was baffled by the abrupt wrap-up at the end. "What... the aliens died of THE FLU??!?! Did I miss something???"

VICKIE: Ugh. What a disappointment, especially after the weeks and weeks and WEEKS of hype. Steven Spielberg, what hath thou created??? Some good special effects and a few scares mired by a whole lotta poop, that’s what.

LINDA: Yes, there was poop involved, Vickie, but not enough to completely wipe out the whole WOTW experience with its pungent stench. I'd say WOTW is definitely worth seeing for the first half of the film, or even two-thirds. That part is Speilberg at his best, which I don't think we have seen in many years, and I even admit to being surprised that I feel that way. To keep the experience pure, just walk out of the theater when Tom walks out of the basement. Give the rest of the movie a good, cleansing flush, and send the rest of WOTW's poopy existence where it belongs.

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