Last night, I finished watching Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds.
I had watched part of the film earlier in the week, but had to put it aside because I needed sleep.
I have decided it is the most wretched film Steven Spielberg has ever directed. Not that he's directed very many wretched films, but he's had a few. The Lost World: Jurassic Park II comes to mind.
I think the reason WotW is so wretched is that it has a star cast in the lead role. That star is Tom Cruise, and his having been cast in the lead throws the entire movie off. Everything centers on Tom Cruise, who is not that good of an actor, imo. And you know that he's going to survive the whole film, because during the first attack people are blowing up inches away from him, and he just gets ash all over him. The film would have been much more believable if Spielberg had pulled a Marion Crane and blown up Cruise along with everyone else. Then the film could have focused on his two kids, and how they surivive, and we all know how Spielberg is great at directing kids. Or, if Spielberg had cast an unknown in the role, then it would have been more believable, because an unknown wouldn't have had people getting blown up inches away from him, they would have at the very closest been feet away. But no, this is Tom Cruise, who has to survive an attack by inches, because how else can you justify his having an action figure made of him to sit on his office shelf next to where he plans to display his Oscar.
The rest of the film just went downhill from there.
At least I got one more film crossed off my list of films that we have in our collection that I haven't watched.
