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THE WAR OF THE WORLDS
By Rachel Deahl
And, while wiping out civilization can be
good fun on screen (when the buildings crumble just-so and the mass
genocide is done tastefully), there's a fine line between the cinematic
joy of destruction and the grim reality of, well, judgment day.
Now, after years of making overly
optimistic movies about very dark topics, the man credited with
inventing the blockbuster, Steven Spielberg, chooses an odd film,
the simplistic alien invasion spectacle "War of the Worlds", to
show his dark side.
In this bleak actioner, Hollywood's aging
boy wonder proves that sometimes it really isn't fun to see lots of
people incinerated by little green men, no matter how many explosions or
grimaces from Tom Cruise are shot in between.
Attempting to give H.G. Wells'
classic science fiction tale, a vivid account of an alien invasion
published in 1898, a current twist, Spielberg tries to give his
fantastic film some historical perspective my equating it to September
11th.
After huge machines, manned by ETs,
descend on his Queens neighborhood, incinerating most of the gawking New
Yorkers looking on, Ray Ferrier (Cruise), an errant and self-consumed
father, grabs his two kids and sets off on a dark journey into a chaotic
landscape full of displaced and desperate people.
Hoping to make it to Boston, to reunite
with the kids' mother (Ray's remarried and pregnant ex-wife), the trio
set off into a dark netherworld where cars have stopped running and blow
horns sound the unstoppable onslaught of strange machines, with long
spider-like arms, that zap all human life in their path.
As Ray and his kids-precocious and
high-strung Rachel (Dakota Fanning) and angry teen Robbie (Justin
Chatwin)-set out in a world of dead automobiles where families
drudge through the rain on foot, fearing imminent death, they encounter
the ugly side of human nature.
And Spielberg, attempting to force a
connection between a universal onslaught from aliens trying to colonize
Earth and Al Qaeda's attack on New York City on Septemeber 11th, shows
the tell-tale symbol of the World Trade Center devastation: the posters
of lost or displaced family members tacked up on walls and sign posts.
At one point in the film, the family even passes a Red Cross blood
drive.
That people would be giving blood, or
tacking up photos of lost relatives, when they might be incinerated at
any minute by massive machines from outer space seems not only ludicrous
but, more appropriately, laughable.
Although you can hold 9/11 up to
symbolize just about anything these days, the connection Spielberg tries
to make here doesn't give any levity to an otherwise hollow movie.
Oscillating between images of a blood-soaked Earth, sticky with gooey
human remains, and scenes of people doing bad thing (in one of the most
disturbing moments in the film, Ray and his family are forcibly removed
from their working minivan by an angry mob of people), "War of the
Worlds" doesn't ultimately put human history in perspective so much as
highlight something we can safely assume: When it looks as if humanity
is about to be exterminated, it's safe to assume that violence and
insanity will ensue.
Although Spielberg has made bombs in the
past-"1941" or "Always" -"War of the Worlds" stands as one of his
most disappointing efforts. While the director tacks on his standard
theme, in which a shattered family is reunited to its rightful nuclear
state, the overwhelming thrust of "War of the Worlds" leaves you feeling
that it was a lot of death for the sake of death.
Sadly, the artistry the director usually
brings to everything he does is gone here. From the capsized ferry-boat
scene that looks like a bad knock-off of the sinking ship in "Titanic"
to the evil aliens who appear to be the step-children of the standard
little green man we've seen evolve from "Alien" on through to "Signs,"
almost everything in "War of the Worlds" feels like a lazy
pastiche of other peoples' films.
Whether Spielberg took one too many
massages in Tom Cruise's Scientology tent, or he was distracted by other
things, let's hope this dismal entry doesn't mark a downhill spiral for
the director.
Grade: D |
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