Barkerburgh

Well, I watched Steven Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds” with Tom Cruise last night.

When I was a kid, I was a big fan of the 1953 “War of the Worlds“, and later, Orson Welles’ radio play, dramatised in 1975’s “The Night That Panicked America“.

I wanted to see this one at the cinema but never did. I wish I’d never seen it last night.

It was worse than then entire second season of “Doctor Who“ and “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen” put together.

It had everything that was wrong and silly about Independence Day and Starship Troopers (and ripped off the designs for the aliens from both movies, for Christ’s sakes), and added the fact that Tom Cruise’s Ferrier character was an asshole, Tim Robbins was completely wasted, and the unholy mix-mash of references to both the original book (eg, red weed, badly used) and the 1953 movie (eg, the alien camera on the snake arm, unfulfilled).

One thing that really burnt my toast was that Ray and Rachel were always, everywhere, exactly where all the shit was coming down. Granted there was a lot of shit coming down all over the place but always?

Aliens from underground? TV news cameraman looting a crashed plane for TV dinners? A convenient path for the SUV to drive out of the plane-crash area? The son surviving the firestorm on the hill and getting to Boston all by himself? Fuck right off.

And why was it never established that the aliens were Martians? That’s half the cool about the book and old movie. Martians!

I’ve never really liked Senor Spielbergo movies (with a few exceptions). He’s too much like a film student in a candy store.

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 26th, 2006 at 11:24 am and is filed under Mindless Time Waster, Rants, Rails & General Inarticulate Splutterings, Timeless Mind Waster. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.