posted
Besides, if Tom Cruise HADN'T survived, you know people would've been saying, "What, did GRRM write this!?"
Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Seriously: suppose for a moment aliens had really attacked Earth, and we survived, and the movie were a historical record.
Much of humanity survived. Even in the NJ-NY area (as we saw, when the tripod was stumbling because the alien inside was dying), there were survivors. Would it be better to chronicle the story of someone who got killed in the initial assault? Short movie. Why wouldn't we pick one of the survivors, and chronicle _his_ story? If nothing else, we get to see a lot more.
Posts: 1877 | Registered: Apr 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
The movie was worth watching, but that’s about it.
Of Course Tom Cruise survives through impossible odds, Nobody watches the story about the guy who gets killed in 5 mins.
The boy surviving really ticked me off also. As soon as he went over the hill thought if he shows up again I'm going to be pissed.
I thought it was OK the aliens looked like the ones from Ind. Day. ID stole the whole idea of giving the aliens a "virus" from WotWs. Seemed like a fair trade.
H.G. Well's story is amazing considering it was written in 1895.
Posts: 555 | Registered: Jun 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Surviving against impossible odds is fine, as long as there was some skill or intelligence involved. Not just because the character was super-naturally lucky. The initial running scene and the swimming away from the boat scene are good examples of this. In the running scene, the only logic to who would be zapped seemed to be "whoever is closest to Tom Cruise". Seriously, everyone who was running next to him, be they in front, behind, left or right got zapped. The aliens zapped the guy hanging onto his car, but then didn't bother to blow up the car.
Then in the boat scene, I think everyone but Tom and his kids made it. The aliens let them swim away, while killing everyone else. Seems like as helpless as the swimmers were, the aliens could have focused especially on those trying to escape their circle of death.
Add to that every time there was a near death experience which Tom survived because of luck. The alien machine stepping on the car he hid behind for one, that car falling off the boat and nearly hitting him for two. There were many, many more.
By a fourth of the way through the movie, you realize he's not in any real danger. The only thing he was ever in real danger of was getting a cramp with all the running he was doing. Hence I lost my suspension of disbelief.
Its great that you guys didn't, and there were also many things I LIKED about the movie.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
"there just happens to be space for them to navigate through in their Caravan."
I was thinking along the same lines.
"What is most interesting is what the humans are doing while this is happening."
Yeah I thought that was scarier than, say, the aliens.
BTW, if it really was an extermination, then how could they have put the tripods underground years ago? Wouldn't people have noticed? Unless maybe it was the stone age or something...but if it was then wouldn't it have been easier to wipe us out then?
At the beginning they say that the aliens look at earth with jealousy, so why didn't they take it back when it would have been easier? DUH! :-P
Posts: 46 | Registered: Apr 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
The fact that the hero survived by blind luck goes along with the theme that there was nothing humanity could do to stop the martians.
Posts: 7085 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
That may be Pix, but that didn't make for compelling cinema, at least for me.
Edit: I would contrast this with Jurassic Park, where the heroes all made actual decisions and smart choices, which led to their survival (the ones who did survive)
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well, there'd be those in WotW who saw the lightning storms and HID, or those who saw the earth cracking and RAN the moment it started, all instead of looking at it in awe and saying "Oh, COOL." Sorta like staring death in the face as it takes you or making it work for the reaping.
Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999
| IP: Logged |
I too thought it was LAMe the boy survived, come on that WHOLE hill was on fire. oh well, it is spielberg. overall a good suspense movie.
Posts: 2752 | Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I liked it too. I think this movie will win one Oscar this year: Sound editing. The sound was terrifying and kept me involved, even when I had to roll my eyes (at all of the above mentioned ridiculous points).
*spoilers below*
My biggest pet peeve is that they arrive at this lovely little street in Boston where everything seems to be fine. I know the aliens hadn't gotten there yet, but if people beat the crap out of Tom Cruise for a minivan, don't you think there would have been some serious looting/pillaging of the places that were still standing?
Oh wait. I almost forgot. Tom Cruise was the ONLY one that made it to Boston. (That is where they were all going, wasn't it?)
I also wanted to shout at Miranda Otto at the end of the film. She seemed so selfish and pampered after what they had just been through. I thought "the aliens didn't get to your house and you didn't even have any NEWS, so you couldn't possibly know what they've been through, ya wench." Don't know why I had that reaction, I guess she wasn't emotional enough for me.
But, aside from that, and the irritating men in my row that talked through the entire movie, I really enjoyed it. It was tense, and I loved that.
Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
My pet peeves about the movie: 1) Son doesn't die 2) An alien race so technologically advanced still don't have equipment capable of detecting heat signals as Tom, daughter, and crazy man run around in basement. 3) The electro magentic pulse renders all electrical equipment useless, except the video camera held by the man who ends up getting zapped. 4) The scene where the tripod first comes out of the ground. Electrical workers are still on one of those ladder things attached to those trucks used for maintenance of electrical wires. The fact that those workers remained on these ladders for the extent of a violent lightening storm is highly unlikely.
Posts: 48 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[ROFL]](graemlins/rofl.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
