A contemporary retelling of HG Wells' classic novel. This version surrounds a divorced father Ray (Tom Cruise) who is stranded with his two children Robbie (Justin Chatwin) and Rachel (Dakota Fanning) in the midst of a alien attack. They struggle to survive while heading out to find the children's mother.

Let me start off by saying to any of you that are questioning weather or not War of the Worlds is a horror film to get that idea out of your head right now. This movie is HORRIFYING on numerous levels. It blends together human horror with alien horror to such immaculate perfection. It stirred up real feelings of fear in me on more than one occasion, and may I add that is not easy to do with me. It also has restored my confidence in Spielberg’s abilities.

As I said above Ray is the father of two children who he must protect in the midst of total and complete worldly chaos. The character development is done very well and in a short period of time, which we all can appreciate. There is a major gap between Ray and his children due to divorce that makes this horrific journey more difficult. Its not long before the aliens arrive and absolutely rip through the human race like a Pit bull with a steak. What makes their attacks even more terrifying is that it’s very personal.

Forget what you saw in films like Independence Day these aliens like to fry, disintegrate, and filet us one by one. You see numerous kills and tons of blood (although probably not how you'd imagine) and quite frankly I can not believe how much violence and carnage this film displayed with a PG-13 rating.

What makes this film even more great is that the human horror scenes were just as terrifying if not more so than the alien horror. There are scenes in this flick that truly make you cringe and wince about what man is doing to one another. At the same time it displays our greatest qualities along with our putrid ones. The social commentary is very good, its not over done to take away from the story but very effective. It really is a horror film for our times. A great example of what I mean takes place in the first 30 minutes, the aliens explode onto the scene and everyone’s reaction is that it's the terrorists pummeling us. Well done!

This film will stir many, many emotions in you and I am proud to review it on Horrorwatch. This is as good a horror story as is out there. In my opinion, there is no more powerful storyline than a man's vulnerability when protecting his loved ones. Combine these fears and weave them together with brutal aliens, and scared humans and you have got a first class piece of cinema.

Of course the film has its flaws. The relationship between Ray (Tom Cruise) and his son really bugged me. The kid was a difficult brat that you almost root for the aliens to get him. I don't mind family conflict but this film gave you no explanation as to why he hated his father so much. Also the ending was sort of a let down compared to the power of the rest of its body. It came quite suddenly and it was not what I was expecting.

The acting was first class all the way around. We are even treated to a small scene done with Tim Robbins as a survivalist nut that does wonders for the overall horror of the story. I am generally not a Tom Cruise fan but even I must say this may be the best work he's ever done.

So to summarize, this film is a MASTERPIECE on numerous levels and it really caught me off guard. I would rank this right up there behind "Jaws" and "Saving Private Ryan" for Steven Spielberg’s best overall work. Once you find out what the aliens are doing with us it will please even the most serious of horror fans. This is one to be experienced at the movie theatre and worth the 8-9 bucks you will spend to see it. EXTEREMELY RECOMMENDED!

8.6 out of 10 innovative fertilizers

War of the Worlds was fluffy and cheesy but entertaining as hell. Tom was great, the stereotypical “father who’s not good at it because he never had a good chance but now he does so he’ll be great” role worked for him, although I’m not sure how many times Spielberg will use it, maybe a million. I give Tom the credit for being so forgivable and likeable about it that we really cared.

The effects were beautiful, the carnage was even more beautiful. Rampant destruction of civilization always scores big points with me, and this movie served it up with a side order of massacre, and it was yummy.

There’s a giant hole in the plot, but it’s HG Wells’ plot and he wrote it long enough ago that it’s forgivable. I had a perfect way for them to fix it, but they didn’t and like I said, that’s forgiven but frustrating.

Prime made a point about the humans and their natural way of yielding to the lowest common denominator is what gave the movie so much bite and kept me liking it. The twin fears that Tom talks about early and we see over and over really come together nicely in a basement scene that filled me with a claustrophobic stress that made the movie.

But the ending is sugary crap, so much so that it nearly ruins it. Realism was thrown by the wayside in a way that can’t help but remind me that the director removed guns from the hands of cops in [b]E.T.[/b] because they’re scary. Maybe massive destruction and the deaths of millions could have resulted in just a little loss, but I guess not.

Just the same, it’s everything it was supposed to be and I wasn’t bored for even a second, so no one can call this one a failure.

8 out of 10 aliens that really should have done more research in the last few centuries

All of the good has been said above. It was tense, thoroughly entertaining, and Cruise performed very well. On its own, it's an enjoyable 2 hours. But compared to the wealth of versions that came before it (the book, the radio broadcast, the original movie), I think this one came up short.

This version happens very quickly. Barely 20 minutes go by before the machines start frying people. More build up (and I don't mean character development) would have done wonders for it. And it doesn't go into the depths of the old movie either. In that one we get a look at the military coordination, scientific examinations, use of nuclear weapons, and the narration in the beginning goes on for much longer and hints at more explanations. Here we just "witness the result" as Spielberg put it. The old sounds of the machines were more sinister as well, though that's one thing that made them so famous back in the day.

Spielberg, like many directors, was better in his younger years. The more movies I see by him, the less I like him. I do not understand his fascination with stupid, obnoxious kids; major Jurassic Park syndrome going on here. The end of one of the machines is straight out of Empire Strikes Back, and the aliens look a lot like those in Independence Day.

AND THEN there are the typical hollywood movie gripes. First, in a world full of subway tunnels, aqua ducts, sewer channels, water pipes, mines, oil drills, gas drills, phone lines, etc, an invasion in this fashion simply would not take us by surprise. And after watching other disaster movies, you will be able to spot some of these events a mile away. Like what's going to happen when you drive through a crowd of people who would all like a ride from you? And true or false: you are a sitting duck if you are fleeing 50-story monsters on a fucking ferryboat!

Some things you will learn from this movie. For instance, you will be comforted to know that in a mass of hundreds of desperate, panicked people, only one or two of them will have a gun. And did you know that a single line of soldiers can hold back a stampede of thousands?

What's most annoying is that this movie is littered with insanely idiotic people. Phrases like "Pick up the gun!" and "Don't do that!" left my mouth regularly. They're so bad and frequent that I think it may be a Romeroesque critique on society, and his message is that nobody listens! Everyone is right, everybody else is wrong. And Spielberg's attempt to make this a movie of 'our times' boils down to one kid wanting to 'fight the terrorists,' and a dad letting go of his son to go fight a war; not very subtle and not very well done in my book.

Some of the new stuff is good, like the aliens' fog horn and what they do to people they capture. But really my favorite parts were either purely visual, or they paid homage to one of the originals.

But like I said, it stands well on its own. I guess I had fallen too hard for the previous mediums and was expecting more with a Spielberg budget. Like Severin said on SciFiWatch, maybe it is a bit rushed (though I disagree about where it was rushed). A movie like this with these people deserved to be over 2 hours, but it barely broke the 110 minute mark. And what this movie is to the original works epitomizes what movies today are to what they were 10, 20, 30 years ago.

6 out of 10 eye candies, and apologies to whoever sat through that bitch rant.

First off I have no idea how this film received a PG-13 rating, I mean there are deaths and bodies everywhere, there were so many people blown to bits in the first twenty minutes of this flick, that I thought I was watching Saving Private Ryan 2.

There are also some very dark scenes in this film that deal with the black side of human nature, and they were more horrific than the alien attacks going on outside. Two that deserve mention are the part with the mini-van and the very tense scenes with Tom Cruise and Tim Robbins, makes you wonder how far you would go to protect your own.

This film is Independence Day to the tenth degree as the mass destruction is some truly beautiful carnage. If we are ever invaded by an alien force, this has got to be a glimpse of how it goes down. The effects in War of the Worlds are also top of the line, from the look and sound of the tripods to the crumbling buildings everything looks authentic. The cast also do a great job, Cruise and young Dakota Fanning are spectacular.

Now that the praise is out of the way I'll get to my gripes, only a few but big ones. First the kids. Spoiled children of a divorced family who have attitudes bigger than the effects budget in this film do not make for very likeable characters. Both of Ray's (Tom Cruise) kids were annoying to the point of despicable. The son was a constant dumbass and the daughter was a know-it-all hypochondriac, although both roles were played well by the actors, I cared little for their general well being by half way through the movie.

Second and perhaps worse part of the flick, no one could be this freaking lucky, let alone a family. Everything happens to the core three characters and they seem to make it through, literally all of the big sequences revolve around them and no one could survive the level of destruction that is rained down upon them. It would have been a lot better if they had only seen some of the events, more as observers than victims.

And my final gripe is the ending, not the alien side but the human side, way, way too sugary.

In the end though, War of the Worlds is an excellent summer movie it also manages to stay fairly faithful to the book. It will deliver some laughs, gasps and quite a few "Holy shit!" moments and that's what a summer movie is supposed to do. Grab the popcorn and soda and sit back and enjoy, it's a great ride.

7 of 10