Good Action movie, lot's of suspense.Good science fiction movie. Fanning shows what a great actress she is.

>>>HERE THERE BE SPOILERS <<<

I was favorably impressed by the first 80 minutes of WotW, which in part explains why I was so bitterly annoyed at the final 40.

First off, Tom Cruise did a decent job in the lead as Ray Ferrier, he cried believably, flashed the pearly whites when needed, but otherwise seemed overwhelmed when called on to be manly--for the Ray character is a feckless wimp. His kids have contempt for him, his ex-wife patronizes him, even her new husband pities Ferrier. He's an irresponsible sloven, a cipher that I found it impossible to like or even care about.

Unfortunately, Ray Ferrier is the most likable character in this movie.

His son Robbie (Justin Chatwin) is depicted as the usual Hollywood version of an angst ridden, rebellious teen who hates his dad. Somehow the template goes awry and Robbie just comes across as spoiled, rude, and downright stupid.

For some reason, after the aliens attack, instead of helping Ray take care of Robbie's sister, Robbie starts behaving erratically, trying several times to join with soldiers deploying to fight the aliens. Although he doesn't succeed, he nearly manages to get his sister killed. At one point when the Ferriers are escaping in a ferry, he tries to help several latecomers aboard, which was an attempt to make his character more sympathetic. Trouble is, a few minutes later when they're fleeing for their lives, he decides to stay and watch the army fight the aliens. Even though he's seen the aliens' superior weapons and should have realized that no army could beat them! So essentially he abandons his little sister to go watch the show!

You're supposed to believe that he gets killed in the ensuing all-consuming fireball, but at this point after many hints, it was obvious that Spielberg wasn't playing fair and that Robbie would reappear just before the final credits to provide the requisite happy ending.

Robbie's sister Rachel (Dakota Fanning) is the kind of precocious child that only exists in movies. She is calm, centered, much wiser than her old dad and perfectly willing to tell him how to live his life.

She also has a scream that'll shatter the fillings in your teeth. Imagine Fay Wray in King Kong, then hit yourself with a hammer--that's what she's like. She screams over and over and over and over again...until you just want an alien to put her out of your misery.

And then there's that old coot Ogilvy (Tim Robbins) who hides the Ferriers in his basement. Will someone please tell me what the point was in his being in this movie??? Ogilvy's nuts, driven insane by the things he's seen (I guess) and all he wants is to attack the aliens for revenge. So you get one tiresome scene after another where the aliens are searching the basement after hearing noises and Ray has to struggle with Ogilvy to keep him quiet (seems like a contradiction, no?) so he won't give them away. When Ogilvy is finally silenced permanently, it's supposed to be tragic, but all I felt was relief.

That's it for the people. Now let's talk about the good stuff in this movie: the special FX. Here're the gems:

The scenes in the city during the aliens' first attack are amazing and almost terrifying. When they use the heatray, it instantly destroys whatever it contacts, which makes for great visuals when they turn the beams on an elevated highway.
The scene where the Ferriers, trudging along with other refugees, come to a train crossing. The barrier drops with clanging bells and flashing lights. There's a slight pause, and suddenly a train flies by, engulfed in flames. Very cool!
The crashed passenger jet that Ray discovers outside his ex-wife's house makes for a surreal moment.
The scene where Rachel, wandering in the woods, stumbles on a river where many bodies are floating down a stream. Very effective.
Nitpick #1: The bit where the overturned ferry's propeller nearly kills the Ferriers as they struggle to the water's surface was too reminiscent of the plane crash in "Castaway".
Nitpick #2: I was mystified as to why so much of what happens in the movie is unseen. A big budget movie like this should have had one jaw-dropping scene after another, but this one was unsatisfying. For instance, the electrical lightning strikes are only shown for an instant-- instead you see people's reactions to them, hardly dramatic when you can't see what they're seeing. And the battles between the US army and the aliens are brief and not as exciting as they should have been. Did the producers run out of money for FX?

Finally, it made sense when H.G. Wells wrote WotW that aliens might not know about our germs. But after the screenplay rewrite, when they clearly want the audience to think the aliens have been watching us for a million years, how could the aliens not know??? And why is it that aliens who've developed sophisticated weapons and power systems never thought of using infrared devices to scan for body heat?? The clunky camera they used was laughable (although it might have been meant as an homage to the original WotW motion picture).

In short, prepare yourself for disappointment.

I sense and read a lot of mindless Spielberg bashing in some bad reviews here.
OK, lets face it from the start: this is no masterpiece; Cruise's character is not 100% likeable, the guy sometimes is immature, but this is a councious choice in the script, if it's a good or bad choice is arguable; the family characters are not 100% likeable either, thay are all antiheroes...nobody's perfect. Moreover, this is no faithful adaptation of the novel, which I have read; but why all movies that come from a novel MUST be ultra faithful screen versions of a novel? That would be always boring.

The viewer should'nt try to descypher all the extraterrestials intentions and means of operating, they are just a misterious and formidable force from another planet that want OURS for THEM. Not only about this movie, but other SciFi, I read a lot of people complaining about 'Why This?' 'Why That?'. This is a 2 hour movie, not V The Final Battle nor Galactica, that kind of criticism belongs more to the latter or Star Trek.

As a disaster movie, this work is almost a masterpiece, the FX are superb, there is great tension and desperation always, you just try to imagine yourself in the characters' various situations of this alien invasion, and lets see if you would always make the right decisions...you will figure out, that THERE ARE NO RIGHT CHOICES in such an extreme and unbelievable situation, your life depends of some luck and to stay away as possible from the powers that be.

As Science Fiction films are concerned, I avoid to compare remakes, specially if they are decades away (except if there is an obvious difference in quality, such as Planet of the Apes). 1953 The War of The Worlds is a work from another time, Spielberg's is a work of the 21st century that exploits 21st century's sensibilities, I do not see why that has to be negative.

The ending is very similar from the novel, and it is a whole and HUGE point of the main story. Spielberg surely knew this and wisely avoided a more climatic final, those who want humans blasting off and wasting aliens should look away. A footnote: this ending is far more wise than, for example, Independence Day...my God, I still cannot make some text files compatible between my Mac and my Windows PC! You know what I mean...

In a nutshell, of Spielberg's late SciFi works I prefer this one (the others being Minority Report and Artificial Intelligence) despite that in all of them you find masterful moments, this has the more thrills and surprises that are typical of his authoring. Forget Tom Cruise and give this film a chance. I wish that there would be more SciFi movies like this and less like Alien vs Predator or Supernova, Spielberg is still the 'master', even when he does not use his full power.

I enjoyed the movie, but like many other novels brought to the big screen, it didn't do the author justice. A movie is never as good as the book, especially a classic like War of the Worlds.

I thought the special effects were great, and i was thoroughly entertained.

As for the quality of the dvd, i was somewhat disappointed. The picture looked grainy in some shots. I have a samsung lcd hdtv (1080P) with an upconvert DVD player. some of the shots just look plain bad.

I've always wanted to be a writer, and even though I was never good enough to be one, every book that I ever read on the subject basically said one thing: Never let some miracle "bail out" the main character! The main character needs to be pathetic in the beginning, overcome some trial or task, and by the end, have become smarter or wiser for having gone through it!
Not in this story!
The first time I saw this flick, everything was going to pot for Tom Cruise and company. I figured they had a good thirty minutes to solve their little alien problem, so I left the room to check on my kids. I was gone for only two minutes and upon my return the credits were rolling. My first thought was that they had possibly left the ending open for a sequel. But my friends watching the movie assured me the story had been wrapped up. No way! Not in the last minute and a half! Give me a break!
A year later I rented it and watched it in its entirety. And... well... it sucks!
If you want a really good alian story, read The Great Time-Link Photography Project by G.L. Strytler