War of the Worlds: Spielberg Mutilates His Own Masterpiece (SPOILERS included)

[Theben]

Originally posted by MarkG

apples vs. oranges...

well, after that argument i can only agree with you

well damn, if that's all it took the 1st time...

[JohnT]

OK, you do have a point. I mean after all, it's Tom Cruise saying it and he's a Scientologist.

No, it's Tim Robbins' character who says it, and he's as mad as a hatter.

I thought you saw the film?

[JohnT]

I didn't buy Robbins' transformation to raving nutcase.

Robbins was a nutcase from the beginning of his sequence. The war and the death of all he loved unhinged him, and seeing the blood harvesting finished the job that was started before Cruise even got there.

Cruise was able to keep him quiet and passive when the alien probe was searching his place & only a few feet away, yet a few minutes later he starts screaming about his "tunnel to the city" and how they won't get his blood?

It was a lot more than a few minutes. I would say there was at least a week, maybe more. When the aliens came down into the basement, there were no red vines. When Robbins realized what was happening, the red vines were everywhere... and growing.

[JohnT]

Originally posted by Pyrodrew


Check out the scene where Cruise tells the guard to look at the tripod with the shield down because of the flock of birds around it. How many birds naturally clutter (trying to land?) around a large loud moving metal machine?

Ever see seagulls on a trash barge?

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
Allowing a character to live has nothing to do with legitimizing his position. A mass murderer who eludes police in the end is not necessarily sanctioned by the director.

On the other hand, If Robbie had been killed trying to get people on the evacuation boat, we would all know he died doing the right thing.

Getting lost wanting to watch a battle is just idiotic, and the fact that you somehow believe this as a brave act further goes to show what a nut you are about this youth advocacy front. That you buy his miracle survival from a dramatic standpoint isn't encouraging either.

wth?!

Now you are even attacking my movie reviews because of my youth advocacy?

**** you.

[Pyrodrew]

Originally posted by JohnT
Ever see seagulls on a trash barge?

First, I didn't see any trash or blood on that tripod - much less for a whole flock. Also there was plenty of trash and blood on things that weren't loud moving machines (recall the Paul Revere statue)... give the seagulls an option between eating peacefully or not and see what happens.

[Pyrodrew]

Originally posted by JohnT
Robbins was a nutcase from the beginning of his sequence. The war and the death of all he loved unhinged him, and seeing the blood harvesting finished the job that was started before Cruise even got there.

He was not a screaming nutcase when they met him or during probe invasion. An abulence driver losing it at the site of blood harvesting?

It was a lot more than a few minutes. I would say there was at least a week, maybe more.

Maybe a day or 2. Cruise and Robbins would have had much more facial hair if it was a week+.

When the aliens came down into the basement, there were no red vines. When Robbins realized what was happening, the red vines were everywhere... and growing.

Those vines didn't take long to spread from what I saw.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by JohnT

OK, you do have a point. I mean after all, it's Tom Cruise saying it and he's a Scientologist.

No, it's Tim Robbins' character who says it, and he's as mad as a hatter.

I thought you saw the film?

Yes, I did, but you know scripts are often rewritten numerous times during the shooting of a movie. Producers, directors andf actors often have a role in the creation of the final draft. Prehaps the whole "buried a million years before" was Cruise's contribution.

[DanS]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
What was so heroic about Robbie's actions? He had no weapons, he could have been no more than a hindrance to the troops. Cruise could not have gone charging of over the hill, he had his daughter to take care of. In fact he risked the daughter by lingering to try to talk some sense into Robbie.
I don't see Cruise as a coward either. He uses his head to do his utmost to guard the safety of his children. He eventually risks his life first to go up into a machine to get his daughter and then by putting himself deeper into the machine to plant the grenade that puts it out of action.

Robbie was looking to help in any way he could. See, for instance, his helping people get on the ferry. Cruise didn't lift a finger to help them, even though he and his child were safely on the ferry. There was no cost for him to help people, but he chose not to.

Cruise was a coward because he murdered the Tim Robbins character even though it wasn't at all certain that the Tim Robbins character was going to lead to their capture. Then his little girl flips out, making the murder totally pointless.

[Wiglaf]

Now you are even attacking my movie reviews because of my youth advocacy?

I was attacking your movie review because it was ridiculous. Your youth obsession merely influenced your position.

[OzzyKP]

[JohnT]

Originally posted by Pyrodrew


He was not a screaming nutcase when they met him or during probe invasion. An abulence driver losing it at the site of blood harvesting?

Ambulance driver or not, he was a human being slowly losing it because he lost everybody he loved and his world, his support system: his civilization. He was slightly unhinged when Cruise first entered and became a complete nutcase while in the basement over the next couple of weeks as the aliens plans became readily apparent and he dwelt upon how utterly and finally this war was lost.

The planet Earth, not just people, but billions of years of evolutionary growth, all life as we know it, lost to the aliens - don't you think that would freak the **** out of you too?

Maybe a day or 2. Cruise and Robbins would have had much more facial hair if it was a week+.

Possibly, but who knows what supplies were in the basement? Who knows if they snuck up in the house and got food/toiletries/etc?

Again, this isn't something we're told. Movie-goers assume that because the movie didn't show them going up in the house, then they didn't.

Those vines didn't take long to spread from what I saw.

How long do you think it would take for them to spread over tens, hundreds of square miles, in the valley that was pristine (as far as alien plants are concerned) when Cruise first entered the basement?

The shot of the eerily quiet valley, red mist hanging over everything, no wind blowing, and the ground covered with red vines (and other alien plants for all we know) is the best indication that a fair amount of time had passed, a time much longer than a mere couple of days. Now if you want to calculate the growth rate of the alien vine just from the bit that we saw in the film to determine how much time it would take to cover the valley, go right ahead. We all eagerly await your results.

[JohnT]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove


Yes, I did, but you know scripts are often rewritten numerous times during the shooting of a movie. Producers, directors andf actors often have a role in the creation of the final draft. Prehaps the whole "buried a million years before" was Cruise's contribution.

Tom Cruise is in the business of Tom Cruise. He's not there to write lines for Tim Robbins. If Tom is going to make this into some sort of Scientology mission statement (as bizarre a notion as the one that states the movie is a Fascist masterpiece), he would've said the words, not Tim Robbins (who is not a Scientologist.)

Here's what Cruise and Spielberg had to say about that idea:

NEW YORK — Well, at least now we know Steven Spielberg likes the Phoenix. But Tom Cruise probably never will, thanks to me.

As you may have divined from the trailers, Spielberg’s War of the Worlds departs from all previous versions of the story by having the alien tripods emerge from underground, where they’ve lain dormant for eons, instead of arriving in spaceships. To me, that sounded like some aspects of Scientology lore. (Google "Xenu" and see for yourself.) So I wondered whether Cruise was behind the plot change. At a media press conference at Manhattan’s Essex Hotel last week, I asked him, "What resonance does that have for you as a Scientologist." "In what way?" he replied. "In that some of the tenets of Scientology deal with the past of aliens on this planet." Cruise bristled but never stopped smiling. "That’s not true," he said. "Like, huh? W-w-what? What paper are you from?" "The Boston Phoenix." "The Boston What?" He looked at Spielberg. "Is that a good paper?" Spielberg nodded. "I read it. It’s a good paper." Cruise then returned to my question. "It has no resonance whatsoever. There’s absolutely no relation to that whatsoever."

Spielberg picked up the ball and said that the plot change had been his idea. "I didn’t want to do the old ‘death from above’ cliché that we’ve seen so often in science-fiction movies. I just thought that was more of an original way of introducing a threat from where we least expect it to come, an extraterrestrial threat coming almost from the inner reaches of earth." Cruise interjected, "If you are interested in Scientology, you should read Evolution of a Science, I don’t know if you’ve ever read that, or Fundamentals of Thought. That will give you a greater understanding of what Scientology is. There’s a book called What Is Scientology? Read that." Uh, thanks.

There's more at: http://www.portlandphoenix.com/movie...s/04793537.asp

[JohnT]

Originally posted by Pyrodrew


First, I didn't see any trash or blood on that tripod - much less for a whole flock. Also there was plenty of trash and blood on things that weren't loud moving machines (recall the Paul Revere statue)... give the seagulls an option between eating peacefully or not and see what happens.

Perhaps alien meat is a delicacy far and above anything the birds have ever tasted, one that was worth the chance of losing their life. Perhaps they were addicted?

(yeah, I'm really reaching with that one. )

[JohnT]

Cruise was a coward because he murdered the Tim Robbins character even though it wasn't at all certain that the Tim Robbins character was going to lead to their capture. Then his little girl flips out, making the murder totally pointless.

That's a damn good point, about what Dakota's scream implied about the murder of Robbins.

Though it could be argued that, not knowing the future and given the absolute life/death situation they were in, Cruise still made the correct decision in killing Robbins as he was then a menace to his and his childs' very lives. It's not as if Cruise hadn't had to do it before.