# I know it's an old-ish release, but damn, that movie (War of the Worlds) sucks! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 1, 2005, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862 "2005-11-01T04:52:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2005, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/21 "2005-11-01T21:11:51Z")
> [@Gangster Octopus](#): > > Bah! I enjoyed it, fun popcorn flick. Exactly, like \*Amastad \*and _Schindler’s List_. Anyone who would object to an artist treating subject matters like slavery, or the Holocaust, or 9/11, flippantly and exploitively, well, they obviously hate America. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/22 "2005-11-02T00:05:17Z")
Moderator notes: I’ve modified the thread title. One of the guidelines for good manners in this forum (and in fact on the SDMB) is to please make thread titles specific, so that readers know what the heck the thread is all about. ---
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/23 "2005-11-02T00:16:11Z")
> [@featherlou](#): > > “Fantastic Four” was a fun, popcorn flick (which I quite enjoyed). “War of the Worlds” had pretensions of being something slightly more, and it fell completely short, in my opinion. The egregious use of threadbare clichés kept pulling me out of the movie (but I agree with you, **Podkayne** , that burning train scene was something to make the hair on your arms stand up.) Maybe that’s my biggest complaint; it was so damned uneven - an irritating mix of mind-blowing scenes and extremely tired clichés. But, you say, that is the hallmark of a mindless action movie. Okay, fair cop - this one just didn’t work for me. I liked “Fantastic Four”, good popcorn flick. I don’t know nor care if “War of the Worlds” had pretentions, I went into it thinking I was going to see a cool movie about a hostile alien race trying to exterminate the human race. I saw that. And, no I do not go into all moves without a critical eye. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/24 "2005-11-02T02:48:36Z")
I’m glad I’m not the only one who was affected by the train crossing. The image of the burning train was a vision of hell, running full speed like a wild animal or person on fire, screaming. I had no trouble with the _Deus Ex Machina_. In the original story, that was sort of the point. The huge machines were the hubris of the aliens brought low by the tiniest of creatures. But yeah, there was no plot. First of all, I had trouble gauging the progress of the cast towards Boston and it was hard to tell how much time was passing. Likewise, the aliens were so random and ineffective in their actions. Spielberg removed them as the focus of the story and reduced them to a handy plot driving device. “OK, we,ve yelled at Dad for a while. Now let’s have some tripods show up to herd the cst to the next scene.” Those death rays are great for taking out a building or tank, but using them to destroy individuals seems like trying to destroy an ant nest with a hammer. I wish they had shown the death rays as wide effect, destroying a block of folks all at once. Or keeping the poison gas from the original story. And I wanted the little girl to get dusted. Like little kids in some other Spielberg flicks, she was made so annoying that I lost all sympathy. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/25 "2005-11-02T03:02:13Z")
A deus ex machina is a crappy ending no matter how you slice it. Although I was impressed that they managed to make the ending even lamer than most deus ex machinas. ---
**Author:** ![Strinka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/strinka/32/512_2.png) [@Strinka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strinka)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/26 "2005-11-02T03:14:22Z")
> [@Hypno-Toad](#): > > I’m glad I’m not the only one who was affected by the train crossing. The image of the burning train was a vision of hell, running full speed like a wild animal or person on fire, screaming. Was I the only person not affected by the train crossing? The movie was better than I had expected, but still not good. Lacking in plot and sense, and the action and special effects weren’t enough to make up for it. ---
**Author:** ![Seven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/27 "2005-11-02T08:24:03Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Quite a while back, I made the decision to never see another Spielberg movie. Seems like I made the right choice. I did as well. AI was the last of his that used any of my money. I have a copy of Minority Report on DVD (a gift) and watched it. Pretty movie but it is bland-o-rama. The last thing I wanted to waste my time watching was another Cruise/Speilberg yawnfest. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/28 "2005-11-02T14:56:54Z")
> [@C K Dexter Haven](#): > > Moderator notes: I’ve modified the thread title. One of the guidelines for good manners in this forum (and in fact on the SDMB) is to please make thread titles specific, so that readers know what the heck the thread is all about. Oops - sorry about that. I made sure you could see which movie I was talking about on mouseover, but that isn’t the title. ---
**Author:** ![Malodorous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e47774/32.png) [@Malodorous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malodorous)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/29 "2005-11-02T15:47:04Z")
> [@Rysto](#): > > A deus ex machina is a crappy ending no matter how you slice it. Although I was impressed that they managed to make the ending even lamer than most deus ex machinas. I don’t know, in the book and the original movie it didn’t feel like such a cop-out. I think in the Spielburg version the problem is, as **Hypno-Toad** mentions, the focus of the movie isn’t really on the Tripods, so it seems to make them even more extraneous when they just fall down at the end. In the book and original film, the heros are witness to more of the human effort to fight the Tripods, and watch as our biggest weapons don’t make a dent. Stopping the Tripods is more of a focus, and it gets you wondering if that’s it for humanity. In the end, having virus’s come out of left field and wipe out the invaders when humanity couldn’t was fairly satisfying. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/30 "2005-11-02T15:47:15Z")
I’m I didn’t pay to see the flick. It was one of the movies playing on the flight I was on. Otherwise, I doubt I would ever have seen it. I’m glad that I didn’t lose any money to it. ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/31 "2005-11-02T16:46:34Z")
> [@Strinka](#): > > Was I the only person not affected by the train crossing? Yes. Okay, maybe not. For me, a big part of it was the anticipation. You hear the warning bells and the arms go down, and I was thinking, “Ah, a train! Things can’t be that bad if trains are running! Wonder what’ll be on it? Soldiers to combat the threat? War materiel? Refugees? Supplies?” Then . . . “WHOA! That’s damn fast for an at-grade crossin–HOLY SHIT, IT’S ON FIRE!” And that’s when you know that Everything Has Gone to Hell. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/32 "2005-11-02T19:05:20Z")
I liked this movie quite a bit. I think it was going more for mood and imagery than a super-tight plot, and it was VERY effective in those things. The sounds and sights and feelings and images were very compelling. I agree that the son being alive at the end was a cop-out, however. (Oh, and if anyone is even remotely seriously suggesting that Spielberg hadn’t read and respected the original book, probably many times, you’re smoking big crack. The guy has more money than God. If he’s making a movie of some source material, it’s because there’s a story he wants to tell, and source material he respects, not because he’s out to wring a name for a cheap buck.) ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/33 "2005-11-02T19:16:46Z")
The two things that bothered me most that haven’t been mentioned: 1- The aliens planted pods in the Earth millions of years ago… and their technology hadn’t changed in all that time and the machines still worked and… uh… why again didn’t they just send a landing team down? 2- Gene Barry in a walk-on non-speaking cameo? The hell? He can’t need money that badly. ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/34 "2005-11-02T20:29:01Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > 1- The aliens planted pods in the Earth millions of years ago… and their technology hadn’t changed in all that time and the machines still worked and… uh… why again didn’t they just send a landing team down? I agree on #1. Why not just invade then? You know, when people didn’t have tanks and rocket launchers? And wouldn’t somebody have accidently dug one of those tripods up by now? I mean, they were under the cities for gods sake. I’m sure a subway tunnel would have eventually intersected one(Yes, I’ve been watching 5 million years to earth, why do you ask?) Hell, wouldn’t natural erosion have unearthed one for us over millions of years? And you got to admit, that power cell is something. Still working after all that time. ---
**Author:** ![UncleRojelio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unclerojelio/32/3160_2.png) [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/35 "2005-11-02T20:56:14Z")
And, how come at least one of those tripods didn’t have some type of biological sampling equipment that would have told the aliens about those pesky microrganisims before they arrived? ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2005, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/36 "2005-11-02T21:20:53Z")
> [@UncleRojelio](#): > > And, how come at least one of those tripods didn’t have some type of biological sampling equipment that would have told the aliens about those pesky microrganisims before they arrived? Or at least some way to detect explosives attached to those you’re picking up and processing. Wanna bet tripods in the middle east would have been going down all over the place? ---
**Author:** ![Atticus\_Finch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ec9cab/32.png) [@Atticus\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atticus_Finch)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/37 "2005-11-03T00:41:41Z")
The ending of the movie’s presented like some great victory, but surely it isn’t, in the long term. The aliens would just have to make their walking machines airtight next time, and they’d be completely invincible. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/38 "2005-11-03T06:27:31Z")
> [@featherlou](#): > > Well, we just went to see “War of the Worlds” in the cheap theatre. Wow. That just…sucked. . . . I described the movie to my husband later as a bunch of cool scenes strung together like beads on a long string of sucky. > [@HPL](#): > > I rather liked the new War of the Worlds, though it had a lot of “Hollywood scenes” Spielberg suprised me a lot. I really thought it was going to suck. James Agee had nothing on you folks. ---
**Author:** ![Snickers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@Snickers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snickers)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/39 "2005-11-03T14:12:00Z")
I agree - some of the scenes were excellent, but the movie was trash. The train (as has already been mentioned) was outstanding, as was the scene with the girl standing by the riverbank. But yeah, not so good overall. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862/40 "2005-11-03T14:31:01Z")
> [@Snickers](#): > > I agree - some of the scenes were excellent, but the movie was trash. The train (as has already been mentioned) was outstanding, as was the scene with the girl standing by the riverbank. But yeah, not so good overall. I live in Connecticut, basically downstream from where they filmed the river scene. They lost a few of the dummies, so all boaters in that part of Long Island Sound were warned to look out for them. Even knowing that there were fake drowned bodies in the area, if I had hooked one while fishing I would have beshitted myself. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-know-its-an-old-ish-release-but-damn-that-movie-war-of-the-worlds-sucks/328862.md?page=3)