War of the . . . movie elements?
War of the . . . movie elements?
by Jay Chrisman
The aliens of Steven Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds” are no match for someone with a camcorder bootlegging the film on opening day. This technique altered the qualities of the film – tweaked to perfection by directors, editors and producers – over emphasizing sound effects and dialogue and distorting the special effects and cinematography.
The appeal of “War of the Worlds” is purely a visceral one, which made this bootleg particularly hard to watch. It is an extreme disappointment when compared to some of Spielberg’s other accomplishments. Even today, people remember seemingly mundane lines like “E.T. phone home,” and “This means something, this is important,” but there will probably be no connection to this film. Even though the only part of the bootleg version that was clearly decipherable was the dialogue, there was nothing memorable about it.
Ray Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is your stereotypical blue-collar tough guy who drives a mustang, drifting it around corners on his way home from work. When he gets home, however, you find out his role as tough guy is completed with his near-inability at being a father to his 15-year-old son Robbie (Dustin Chatwin) and his 10-year-old daughter Rachel (Dakota Fanning).
In the first few scenes you get a crash-course in how bad of a father Ray really is. Then the aliens fall from the sky and the action begins. It’s too bad because in the few scenes you get without over-produced sci-fi, you get the feel that there’s potential for character development between Ray and his kids.
After the arrival of the aliens Rachel becomes nothing more than a scream machine. A piercing 10-year-old pair of lungs belting-out at every opportunity so that the viewer is constantly on edge. Half the time Rachel cued me with a scream as to what scenes were supposed to be scary before I had made out through the garbled effects what was going on.
In this movie it’s easy to pick out inconsistencies that make it wholly unbelievable, but these days who can’t pick out an inconsistency? Why have filmmakers become so careless? Is it because they’re so focused on the CGI that they don’t notice simple flaws in plot?
The only refreshing part of this movie was Spielberg’s loyalty to the author of the novel, H.G. Wells. Unfortunately Spielberg couldn’t even get that right. In the novel the aliens are rounding up the humans and using them as food. That explains why there are parts of the world that are left untouched – they serve as a corral where they can be preserved until they are needed.
In the movie this is not made clear. The aliens senseless killing makes you wonder what their intentions really are.
Most disappointing was Morgan Freeman’s voice-over. Can Freeman do a movie without using his smooth, soothing voice to explain the movie to you? The age-old rule of literature should apply to movie-making as well: “Show, don’t tell.”
-Jay Chrisman
by Jay Chrisman
The aliens of Steven Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds” are no match for someone with a camcorder bootlegging the film on opening day. This technique altered the qualities of the film – tweaked to perfection by directors, editors and producers – over emphasizing sound effects and dialogue and distorting the special effects and cinematography.
The appeal of “War of the Worlds” is purely a visceral one, which made this bootleg particularly hard to watch. It is an extreme disappointment when compared to some of Spielberg’s other accomplishments. Even today, people remember seemingly mundane lines like “E.T. phone home,” and “This means something, this is important,” but there will probably be no connection to this film. Even though the only part of the bootleg version that was clearly decipherable was the dialogue, there was nothing memorable about it.
Ray Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is your stereotypical blue-collar tough guy who drives a mustang, drifting it around corners on his way home from work. When he gets home, however, you find out his role as tough guy is completed with his near-inability at being a father to his 15-year-old son Robbie (Dustin Chatwin) and his 10-year-old daughter Rachel (Dakota Fanning).
In the first few scenes you get a crash-course in how bad of a father Ray really is. Then the aliens fall from the sky and the action begins. It’s too bad because in the few scenes you get without over-produced sci-fi, you get the feel that there’s potential for character development between Ray and his kids.
After the arrival of the aliens Rachel becomes nothing more than a scream machine. A piercing 10-year-old pair of lungs belting-out at every opportunity so that the viewer is constantly on edge. Half the time Rachel cued me with a scream as to what scenes were supposed to be scary before I had made out through the garbled effects what was going on.
In this movie it’s easy to pick out inconsistencies that make it wholly unbelievable, but these days who can’t pick out an inconsistency? Why have filmmakers become so careless? Is it because they’re so focused on the CGI that they don’t notice simple flaws in plot?
The only refreshing part of this movie was Spielberg’s loyalty to the author of the novel, H.G. Wells. Unfortunately Spielberg couldn’t even get that right. In the novel the aliens are rounding up the humans and using them as food. That explains why there are parts of the world that are left untouched – they serve as a corral where they can be preserved until they are needed.
In the movie this is not made clear. The aliens senseless killing makes you wonder what their intentions really are.
Most disappointing was Morgan Freeman’s voice-over. Can Freeman do a movie without using his smooth, soothing voice to explain the movie to you? The age-old rule of literature should apply to movie-making as well: “Show, don’t tell.”
-Jay Chrisman
posted by Sassmo at 4:17 AM
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