Movie Review #67

Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
Directed by Blake Edwards
Screenplay by George Axelrod
Based on the novel by Truman Capote

Rating: 6.25/10.00 or ** 1/2

It's the scene from which we all remember Audrey. Her back is to the screen, in that black dress. With that white necklace. With those goggle-eyed shades. Staring through the window into Tiffany's. She seems out of this world. Her smile is innocent, yet sophisticated. Her gait is smooth, yet vulnerable. Her charm is pleasant, yet ambiguous. Yes, she seems out of this world. And in this film, that's exactly where she was.

Holly Golightly is arguably Audrey Hepburn's most recognized role. It's also, from what I've seen, Hepburn's best performance. Finally, she's given a character who has depth behind the shallow doldrums of innocence and naivete. A character with uncertain motives, a vague and troubled past, and an unclear sense of purpose or direction (i.e., dimensionality). Hepburn handles the role well. However, Breakfast at Tiffany's fails at nearly every other aspect in its final form. This romantic yarn is basically a yawn.

One of my chief problems with the movie is the rather dull characterization of Paul Varjak, Golightly's newfound friend and love interest. Varjak is a new tenant at Golightly's apartment complex. We learn he's a struggling writer who hasn't written a book in five years. We learn he has a relationship with a married woman named Tooley. Tooley is married to a wealthy and older man, but she occasionally drops by to pay Paul a visit. Her visits typically end with a gift of money.

Paul is an interesting person; he just doesn't seem interesting. This is caused by two problems: a poor script and incompetent acting. George Peppard portrays Paul as a one-dimensional, emotionally "bursting" individual. For ninety percent of the movie, Peppard has a frozen facial expression. For the other ten percent, he explodes with sudden emotional eruptions. These outbursts seem unbelievably phony. Unfortunately, Axelrod gives little to help him out. Many of Paul's lines are predictable, flat, and unintelligent. Take this monologue:

You know what's wrong with you, Miss Whoever-you-are? You're chicken, you've got no guts. You're afraid to stick out your chin and say, "Okay, life's a fact, people do fall in love, people do belong to each other, because that's the only chance anybody's got for real happiness." You call yourself a free spirit, a "wild thing," and you're terrified somebody's gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it's not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somali-land. It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself.

Oh, God, the horror! "No matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself." It's a monologue that induces the instinctive fetal position. Obviously, this monologue occurs at the climax of the film (Most romantic comedies have such a "shock"-worthy monologue at this particular point). And it is true that Holly Golightly, the nameless slob or Miss Whoever-you-are, is afraid of commitment, but it does not making the writing here any more acceptable. And poor Peppard yells and screams in earnest desperation. I thought I could almost see his bottom lip stick out.

Fortunately, Hepburn and Peppard are not annoying together. In fact, many scenes between them work together. I especially enjoyed one of the earliest scenes between the two of them. Holly was escaping her apartment from a rowdy drunk pounding on her door. She slips into Paul's apartment:

Holly: It's alright. It's only me.
Paul: Uh... Now wait a minute, Miss... uh...
Holly: Golightly. Holly Golightly. I live downstairs. We met this morning, remember?
Paul: Yeah.

It was fun to watch this scene because of their collective confusion. Hepburn portrayed Holly with a strange combination of suavity and nervousness. Varjak, meanwhile, seemed bemused in Golightly's charming surprise visit. It felt genuine. Most scenes involving George Peppard did not, but this one did.

Peppard's acting and the dialogue he was given were not the only problems in this film. The character of Mr. Yunioshi (played by Mickey Rooney) was a stinging headache of obscene offensiveness. Perhaps the character's name versus the actor's name is enough of a hint. If it is not, let me just say that a Caucasian in excessive make-up playing an Asian American stereotype is not a good idea. In 1961, this might have been seen as humorous. In 2005, it is grossly unfunny and insulting.

Unfortunately, Mr. Yunioshi does not go away. He keeps coming back for brief appearances throughout the movie. And really, his character isn't that funny anyway. But in today's world, his character is painful to endure. It was interesting to watch this movie with the group I was with. All of them were cringing during his scenes. The reaction was universal and instant. TCM host and film historian Robert Osborne euphemistically called Rooney's portrayal "interesting" in his introduction to the film. I should have realized the full meaning of this warning.

Another fault of the film is its predictability and generally formulaic plot. Circumstances develop so there would be dramatic "monologue" scenes between Tooley and Paul, Paul and Holly, Holly and her former husband Doc (played by Buddy Ebsen)... The scenes could be predicted and iterated without ever watching them. My guess is even for 1961 this film could be labeled a cliche or a re-hash.

For all of the film's faults, though, Breakfast at Tiffany's is at least watchable (save for Mr. Yunioshi). Most of this can be attributed to the wonderfully engrossing Audrey Hepburn and the devilishly coy performance by Patricia Neal (as Tooley). The women of Breakfast at Tiffany's steal this show, and they do it with beauty and style. I think it's fitting that Audrey is remembered most for her role in this picture. She can make even the most mediocre pictures a little more tolerable to watch.

Editor's Note: This review was co-written by Chad Shafer, Troy Littleton, and Vanessa Holt.

Movie Review #66

American Graffiti (1973)
Directed by George Lucas
Written by George Lucas and Gloria Katz & Willard Huyck

Rating: 9.00/10.00 or ****

I remember the rides up and down 13th Street. It was called "taking some mains". I'd go out in the "Old Red" and ride up and down the dark, empty downtown streets of small-town Tekamah, Nebraska. Sometimes my car would be loaded with passengers. Other times on sleepless nights, I'd take a few mains at 2 or 3 in the morning alone. I usually wasn't the only one doing that, though. I'd end up talking to a friend or two at the Mini-Mart before long, drinking a cappuccino or eating a doughnut. And then I'd slip back home with that creaking door that somehow never stirred my father.

Life in high school is often set on the streets. School is a place to learn, but the streets were a place to experience. I'd talk to my friends Jarrod, David, Chet, Amber, Brad, Justin, Mehdi, Mike, Niles, Jordan... Occasionally, we'd have a run-in with a bully, an idea about stealing some political signs, or a conversation involving someone's latest interest. It was school where I learned about Newton's laws of motion, the nuclear cloud, Macbeth, and de facto laws. It was on the streets where I learned about life.

George Lucas directed American Graffiti in 1973 with fresh memories of his high school days. His were in the early 1960s, a time of innocence, the Beach Boys, and Chevy Impalas. JFK was still alive, and Vietnam was some strange country in the other hemisphere. Life was hopeful, but unknown. The future was promising, but distant. The graduating high schoolers of this era were comfortable at home, with the radio on, taking some mains.

American Graffiti takes place in a small town called Modesto, CA, but really it could have been any town in America. At least in the early 1960s it could have been. The big questions revolved around college and relationships. Those discussions took place in cars, diners, and street corners. What little they knew that the culture of their day was in the throes of death.

The year was 1962, one year before Kennedy's assassination and the beginning of the end of Generation X's youth. After that fateful day, everything changed. Martin Luther King, Jr., would lead the Civil Rights Movement and eventually lose his life because of it. RFK would run for President and be assassinated for it. Communism was lurking everywhere, and we fought and died in Vietnam to counter it. Dark times would reach America, and this was the generation that would endure them.

No culture like that of the '50s and early '60s will ever exist again. Our society will never return to those innocent days; it can't. We've endured too much to regain our blissful ignorance. But Lucas presents us with a taste of it, a memory. A beautiful and unbelievably accurate depiction of that era. To call American Graffiti a movie is a misnomer. It instead is a fictional documentary, a historical look at a past culture.

But there's something even more magical about American Graffiti. It's not just a look at this moment in time. There's something more universal about the movie. It's the blonde in the Thunderbird. So beautiful, so dazzling, so tantalizing, but always untouchable. As she drives the white vehicle down the street, she catches your eye. You think she says, "I love you." You may be right. You think she says, "Let's see each other tonight." You may be right. But you'll never know.

The blonde in the Thunderbird is our innocence, specifically the collective youth of the early '60s but more generally any youth's blissful ignorance. There's always a moment when we can still see it or sense it, but we can no longer reach it. And throughout American Graffiti, this happens to the film's primary character Curt (Richard Dreyfuss). He's pondering whether to go on to college or not, but a more front-and-center question that night is, "When will I meet this girl?" He finally hears from her by telephone. "Let's meet up tonight." But Curt has to go to college that day; he must.

And as he flies off that morning, he sees from the plane the white T-bird driving off with him. Yet it's getting smaller and smaller and smaller. He'll never see it again.

I can remember the last night I took a main. It was with my friend Chet. We passed this blue house. It was a nice looking house, and there was a sense of pride with it. The house was stout looking, with two tall pines in front of it. It had a faint light on in the living room. It was simple, beautiful. It felt good to see it. But the next day I left it, and I grew up.

Guest Review #3

The Conformist (1970)
Directed by Bernardo Bertolucci
Written by Bernardo Bertolucci
Based on the novel by Alberto Moravia
Starring Jean-Louis Trintignant, Stefania Sandrelli, and Dominique Sanda

Rating: 9.75/10.0

Giulia: What are you going to do now [that Mussolini has fallen]?
Marcello: The same as everyone else who thought like me. When there are so many of us, there's no risk.

He huddles in his black coat, shoulders hunched over and eyes apparently always on the ground. His face is not remarkable, nor is he particularly fat or thin, short or tall. In fact, he’s not particularly anything. Chances are that you would never notice him, if you passed him on the street. If you did, you might imagine that he is an actuary for an insurance company, a tax attorney, maybe an anonymous middle manager happy to have his five digits a year, his three squares a day, and his two-point-seven children. His name is Marcello Clerici (Jean-Louis Trintignant), and he is a fascist.

It may sound like The Conformist is concerned with ordinary citizens caught up in the horror of fascism, but Clerici is anything but normal. He is the only son of a once-wealthy family in steep decline, his mother in exquisite decay in a rotting villa and his father spouting nonsense phrases because of insanity brought about by advanced syphilis. He obsesses over a homosexual seduction that ended tragically, and it’s not clear whether he’s more upset about the homosexuality or his partner’s death. (He is quick to tell his confessor that he’s had a very normal sex life—“with women”—ever since.)

For Clerici, the normal life is the perfect place to hide, and he tries obsessively to be as normal as possible. His wife, whom he refers to as “all bed and kitchen,” is an ordinary woman from a middle-class family. More importantly, he hides in the Fascist Party; to a man afraid of his own impulses and desires and desperate to avoid taking responsibility for his life, what could be better than hearing that all your decisions will be made for you? The appeal is practically religious: give your soul over to the Party—lose yourself in the masses—and be redeemed of your sins.

The movie takes place largely during a half-hour car ride from an opulent Parisian hotel to parts unknown. Clerici occasionally exchanges words with his handler/driver (Gastone Moschin), but mostly he broods: over the gun in his jacket pocket, over the assignment he’s about to undertake, and over his life. Like Once Upon a Time in America, the action largely takes place in the memories of the protagonist, and like Sergio Leone after him, Bernardo Bertolucci imbues those memories with a hint of uncertainty. The camera inevitably focuses on some imposing edifice, leaving Clerici standing diffidently in the corner of the screen. He looks like a man waiting in an airport, as if he’s desperately trying to disappear from his own memories.

This ambiguity extends even to the central seduction. It’s presented—unconvincingly—like the tragic result of an innocent childhood game. However, future events suggest that it might not have happened in the manner presented, and it quite possibly might never have happened at all. Some critics have dismissed the film as an exercise in dumbed-down Freudianism (repressed homosexuality = fascism), but Bertolucci takes great pains to undermine such reductive solutions.

There are, incidentally, other characters in The Conformist, including a bisexual former prostitute (Dominique Sanda) with a few mysteries of her own. (Giulia, the wife, is not so fortunate; Bertolucci apparently sees her as all bed and kitchen too, and can’t hide his condescension.) And the expressive direction (aided in no small part by DP Vittorio Storaro) offers scene after scene of what can only be described as magic. The climactic scene in particular is indelible in its evocation of a forest at dawn, with fascist apparatchiks racing out of the fog like malicious wood sprites. In terms of sheer visual acumen, this is not to be missed.

But my mind keeps returning to Clerici himself. It is an astonishing accomplishment (by both Trintignant and Bertolucci) that a character this elusive is nonetheless so compelling. Like all great movie characters, he is more of a question than an answer, one that I’ve spent the past week mulling over and trying to decipher. Every time I think I’ve got the bastard, he disappears into the crowd again.

Editor's Note: This review was written by Daniel Linehan.

Ask the Critic

Your criticism of From Here to Eternity is surprising, not only because of its general acceptance within the critics' circle, but also because of its depth and rather dark tone. These seem like film qualities you embrace rather than shy away from. How can you not be moved by the final scene between Karen and Lorene on the ship to America? Or by Prewitt's goodbye to Lorene? Or to his tragic and preventable death?

Just because a movie has a somewhat darker tone and digs deeper into the characteristics of humanity does not mean I will recommend the film. From Here to Eternity is plagued by these qualities. The movie is fairly average in length, but the material it tries to convey usually takes two-and-a-half to three hours to completely develop and carry out. Really, there are five stories going on here. There's Warden and Katie, Warden and Prewitt, Prewitt and Lorene, Maggio and Fatso, and Prewitt and Warden versus their peers and superiors. That's a lot to cover in 120 minutes. And when director Zinneman takes large chunks of his film to focus on one of these storylines, the other four are easily forgotten by the time we return to them.

Specifically, those three scenes you talk about were not effective in my mind. I thought the last scene between Karen and Lorene was awkward, even silly. Prewitt's goodye to Lorene was dramatic but not memorable. And Prewitt's death, although inevitable, seemed contrived and anticlimactic.

To put it in a sentence, From Here to Eternity had eyes bigger than its stomach.

You ask in your review of Scarface why the film did not end more like Kill Bill 2, with its more subtle, potent punch. Don't you think that would have destroyed the whole film's tone, with its larger-than-life feel and main character?

Certainly, and your point is well taken. But that was a roundabout way of me saying that the movie Scarface had a development that ensured its own destruction. The film starts out so big and just gets bigger and bigger. Eventually, the balloon pops. And in this case, it seemed to be right about when Tony Montana's life began to start caving in on him.

I was wondering what you thought of the blimp in Scarface.

"The world is yours." I thought it was appropriate given the nature of the movie. Tony Montana was driven, intimidating, hungry for power. Some have questioned whether the blimp really existed. I don't think it matters whether or not it did. What matters was that Tony saw it, and he knew it was meant for him.

You mention in your review of Bringing Up Baby that you enjoyed the chemistry between Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn. What are some of your favorite onscreen couples?

Goodness. I'm a big fan of Bogart and Bergman in Casablanca. I thought Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan were a fun pair in Sleepless in Seattle. Although I'm not such a fan of the movie itself, Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak sizzled in Vertigo. Bergman and Grant in Notorious...quite the pairing. Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally. I treasured Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

It's hard to answer this question because I'm not a fan of such movies, generally speaking. Many of my favorite films have no leading pair. I'm almost certainly missing other great couples I've seen onscreen, but like I said...hard to answer.

How have your theater experiences gone recently?

Interesting question. Generally, since I've moved to Huntsville, they've been decent. I tend to go during the week for the late show. I saw War of the Worlds a couple of weeks ago with about 20 people, and we all enjoyed ourselves. The theater was generally quite behaved. No cell phones went off during the movie, which was a first since probably high school.

More often than not, my complaints come in two fashions recently: seating choices and projector quality. I can't tell you how annoyed I get when a theater is generally empty, and somebody decides to sit right behind my group or right in front of my group. They have all of these seats, and yet they choose to sit inside our personal space bubbles. That is irritating.

Projector and sound quality are also insufficient at times. When I went to see Batman Begins, the theater's right side sound system went out for all of the previews and about the first ten minutes of the film. Plus, so many cracks, blips, marks, etc. on the screen. Was not impressed with viewer quality on that theater excursion.

Honestly, though, I haven't gone to the theater that much since I've moved here. I prefer to rent a few DVDs or watch a Turner Classic Movie, invite some friends over, and discuss the film while and after watching it.

First, I want to mention my surprise at you seeing The Way We Were. And then to see that you were relatively decent in your review? It also sounded like you were a bit of a Streisand fan. True?

Sad, but true. My mother absolutely adores Barbra Streisand, and I grew up with her acting/singing on my TV over and over again, from The Prince of Tides to her latest world tour concert to Yentl. Indeed, my friends. Yentl.

I've never been a big fan of Streisand's films, but I do have an appreciation for her acting abilities. Furthermore, she has an amazing voice and an occasionally great song. As much as I dislike Yentl, I love her songs in it. Papa, Can You Hear Me? was a personal favorite. But the lyrics to one of her pieces remains embedded within me.

What's wrong with wanting more
If you can fly and soar?
With all there is,
Why settle for just a piece of sky?

I can hear her singing it now. The maternal influence is strong with this one.

When was the first time you watched Close Encounters?

I was a relatively late bloomer on this one. My first time was in 2003, actually. I had seen E.T. years before (I think it was 1991), but I hadn't had the opportunity to watch Close Encounters during high school. One of my roommates in college happened to own the movie, and I watched it. I liked it then, but I like it even more now.

Thanks for recommending Snatch. I appreciated the dark humor. The language was a bit excessive, but I suppose it goes with the territory.

Glad you enjoyed it.

You prompt me to say that I don't often mention a film's language, violence, sex, nudity, etc. When I do mention it, it's because it feels out of place to me. Snatch has a lot of expletives, lots of blood and violence. But it's a humorous caper movie about London's underworld. Of course it's going to have a lot of foul language and guns blaring.

I've actually received several e-mails regarding my lack of mentioning excessive language or violence in movies. As a critic, I probably should mention this to a greater degree since the purpose of these reviews is to inform the reader of the movies that he/she may be missing. Part of that information is certainly a film's graphic content. But I prefer to focus on what a film has going for it and what a film does not have going for it.

A good source (generally) to start with on a film's graphic content may be Kids-In-Mind: Movie Ratings That Actually Work. Ignore the title; most of the ratings give a pretty good overall synopsis of what you can expect from the film in three categories: sex and nudity, violence and gore, and profanity. Furthermore, they provide a thorough synopsis of each "questionable" scene regarding the three categories. They even have a profanity glossary. I'm not joking.

Any hints on upcoming fairly recently released movies you might be seeing?

Yes. I plan to see Me and You and Everyone We Know on Friday with my movie group (Road trip to Nashville!). On Saturday, I plan to see Sin City (Road trip to Chattanooga!).

I have no idea besides that. Likely decisions based on a whim.

I'll answer more of your questions on August 10.

Movie Review #65

War and Peace (1956)
Directed by King Vidor
Screenplay by Bridget Boland and Robert Westerby and King Vidor and Mario Camerini and Ennio de Concini and Ivo Perilli
Based on the novel by Leo Tolstoy

Rating: 6.50/10.00 or ***

Film historian Robert Osborne summed up War and Peace in one word: mammoth. Strangely, this word is an injustice to King Vidor's ambitious adaptation of the epic novel written by Tolstoy. War and Peace crosses the finish line at three-and-a-half hours. While I watched the movie's final moments, I was reminded of Kramer crossing the finish line at the AIDS marathon in a particularly funny episode of Seinfeld. Beaten to a pulp and exhausted to the bone, he crawls past the finish line and just lies there staring up at the sky. It took every calorie of energy he possessed, but he made it. In much the same way, this is how War and Peace ends.

For those unfamiliar with the novel or the movie, War and Peace takes place in Moscow during Napoleon's thirst for world domination. He threatens invasion of Russia and prompts the evacuation of Moscow. The novel's focus is on a particular group of Russian aristocrats and their families. Specific attention is given to three characters. The first is Natasha Rostov (Audrey Hepburn), a maturing daughter of a wealthy Russian family. Natasha is just beginning to understand love but tends to accept and deny it at a moment's whim. Her heart is one of gold, but she hasn't matured enough to act with the same compassion yet.

The second is Pierre Bezukhov (Henry Fonda), an aged man who is anguished by a seemingly non-loving father. His goals are clouded by his lack of self-worth. He is not sure of what he wants and feels genuinely useless to the world. Although he has feelings for Natasha, he does not feel worthy enough to act on them. He marries Helene (Anita Ekberg) instead. Helene is notoriously promiscuous, is wretchedly behaved, and treats Pierre badly. Pierre's reputation is tarnished, which leads to a duel between him and Dolokhov (Helmut Dantine), an abrasive man known for his outspokenness. Pierre wins the duel but never quite recovers from it.

The third primary character is Pierre's friend Andrei Bolkonsky (Mel Ferrer), an ambitious and courageous prince whose efforts in war prove to be consistently heroic. Andrei is the son of a powerful and somewhat wretched father and is married to Mary (Anna Maria Ferrero). Mary unfortunately dies in childbirth, leaving Andrei in mourning. However, Andrei finds new hope when he meets Natasha. He soon falls in love and asks for her hand in marriage. But, war and politics soon beckon, and he asks Natasha to wait a year before they wed.

Natasha is young and impatient and soon falls for Anatole (Vittorio Gassman). Anatole proves to have harmful intentions, and Pierre fortunately prevents their elopement. Pierre saves Natasha from disgrace, but the damage is severe on her relationship with Andrei. Andrei is heartbroken and refuses to return to Moscow. He instead decides to battle the French head-on.

Pierre is also drawn to the battlefront and soon departs Moscow to witness the war as a civilian. Pierre is tormented by what he sees. He returns to Moscow with a hesitant plan to murder Napoleon. Meanwhile, Andrei is badly injured in battle and is returned to Moscow. But Moscow's residents are planning to retreat, so he is taken with some civilians to a rural monastery. It is there that Natasha discovers Andrei, and they reconcile. But their reconciliation comes at a high cost as Andrei's injuries prove to be too severe.

Although saddened, Natasha has high resolve, and she returns to Moscow with pride and grace. Napoleon's army is ravaged by the Russian winter and the lack of food (in and surrounding Moscow), and they march back west. Pierre tries to murder Napoleon, but his killing of Dolokhov haunts him. He soon becomes a prisoner of war and is forced to march with the French back west. The Russian winter is extreme, and hundreds of prisoners die during the march home. But Pierre has found courage and strength. He has now found a reason to survive.

As the Russians launch a surprise attack on the French, Pierre is found alive but badly beaten by starvation and exhaustion. He recovers and returns to Moscow with a greater sense of happiness and hope. He returns to Natasha, finally with the courage to start anew.

The story is actually fairly engrossing, and some of the scenes are wonderfully touching. I especially liked the ballroom scene with Andrei and Natasha. Their meeting seemed like two kids in a candy store. Andrei had found new hope and new love while Natasha found something more profound in her youthful attachment. The ball is elegant, with extravagant costumes and serene music. Everything feels right in this scene.

Another scene of great power occurs between Andrei and Pierre. Pierre has arrived at the battlefront and discusses the next day's battle with Andrei. Andrei is obviously worried, and he tells Pierre that this is the first time that he feels as if he will die. Pierre reacts quietly and somberly. Few words are spoken after this, but the looks in both of their faces were enough. What a great scene.

But these scenes are few and far between, surrounded by vast amounts of mediocrity. The dialogue is poorly written (I get concerned when six people write a screenplay, even one as long as this film--these films tend to lose focus, and War and Peace is no exception). The acting is quite stale and plastic (common with such long war epics, but nonetheless irritating). The direction seems self-important and often without energy. And all of these flaws are magnified by the film's length. Three-and-a-half hours is a long time to endure these problems, a very long time.

One of the primary complaints among critics with War and Peace is the appearance of American and Italian actors as Russians. The biggest target of such complaint is Henry Fonda, which I think is a little unfair. There are countless films that have American actors speaking English in non-American parts in non-American countries. For the most part, I thought Fonda's performance was solid. Audrey Hepburn was merely average, but the fact that she didn't try to have a Russian accent was not distracting. Mel Ferrer gave a wonderful performance (although his facial expressions were not always convincing). The film's focus is much more on character development, and these characters have universal qualities. Yes, the characters don't sound Russian or look Russian, but the story is not about Russia either. It's just set in Russia.

My major complaint, as I stated before, is the film's length and the amplification of its fundamental flaws. Many of the greatest movies are longer than three hours in length, and part of their success is due to the risk taken is making such a long film. War and Peace does not succeed in many aspects, but for its occasional moments of touching drama, Vidor allows his film to struggle past the finish line. And at such a long length, there's something to be said for that.

Movie Review #64

War of the Worlds (2005)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Screenplay by Josh Friedman and David Koepp
Based on the novel by H. G. Wells

Rating: 5.50/10.00 or ** 1/2

There is always a sense of fear regarding the unknown. One of the biggest question marks of our civilization is the vastness of the universe surrounding us. With all the galaxies and solar systems that we know about, what are the chances that life, in any form, exists elsewhere in the universe? In the 1950s, many people's opinions about extraterrestrial life were changing. Many started to believe in life elsewhere. More and more were joining the growing consensus. Science fiction followed suit, with films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers, It Came from Outer Space, and The War of the Worlds inundating cinema screens. Most of these films depicted extraterrestrial lifeforms as more intelligent and more technologically advanced than humans. But a nearly universal trait among the science fiction motion pictures were the sinister motives of these alien beings.

Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind was a breath of fresh air to the genre. He depicted aliens as curious, gentle creatures who just wanted to communicate with humans on Earth. Spielberg continued this pleasant look at alien beings in E.T. Spielberg did not look at life elsewhere as a threat. He looked at extraterrestrial life with a sense of wonder and awe.

How disappointing then it was to see that Spielberg's latest film would be based on the apocalyptic science fiction novel written by H. G. Wells. Spielberg's latest film looks at the skies with horror, not with hope. Aliens come to our planet in this case, well, to kill everything.

So the primary question I face with this film's setup is why? Why do the aliens want to do nothing but kill every human on the planet? Food? Conquest? Testing out new battle strategy? A reason is not given. At least in It Came from Outer Space (e.g.), we learn of the aliens' reasons for their presence on Earth. In this picture, we are given no clues as to their purpose. Their goal is genocide, but why is that their goal?

The world that Friedman, Koepp, and Spielberg have created is awkward and implausible. How are tripods hidden beneath the planet for millions of years? In all of Earth's explorations, civilizations, and modernizations, how could this fact be missed for eons? Why did these aliens come to the Earth millions of years ago anyway? And why attack in the present day when we are as technologically advanced as we are? If it didn't matter what our weaponry consisted of and if the goal of their visit is complete extermination, why not kill us all decades ago when our war technologies were relatively primitive? Why take the risk with today's society?

These bewildering thoughts were crossing my mind throughout the film's two hours. Essentially, War of the Worlds is one long chase with an eerie combination of the relatively fun Jurassic Park and the completely overrated Minority Report. We see an immature and careless father (played by Tom Cruise) protect his two children, Rachel and Robbie (Dakota Fanning and Justin Chatwin), by running, driving, screaming, and crying. We see scenes of mass destruction, like a burning train and a crashed jet. We see more scenes of death and gloom, like a stream of bodies flowing down a river or a crazed mob fighting and killing people for possession of a van. Blood is everywhere, hopeless battles are raging, and the tripods keep on disintegrating humans with "death rays".

Spielberg personalizes the film by always focusing on the father and his care for his two kids. When circumstances become life or death, he matures as a person. He protects without question the lives of Rachel and Robbie. And really, that is the story of War of the Worlds. It just happens to be in a world of alien invasion without purpose, violence and extermination without explanation. And unfortunately, the family story is predictable and annoying, Spielberg's classic double trouble onslaught of manipulation.

War of the Worlds is also a chance for Spielberg to throw in some commentary on sociology and the present world's attitudes on terrorism. The word "terrorists" is injected in the film for no other reason than to jerk heads upward. "Is it terrorists?" And there's this brief pause. Throw in some scenes of human mobs killing each other for food, shelter, and mobility, and you have Spielberg's look at mass hysteria and world panic, not necessarily too far from accurate.

***Here's the spoiler section.***

The ending of War of the Worlds is sudden, anticlimatic, and unbelievably unintelligent. H. G. Wells had this ending for his original novel, but this was set in the late 19th century world for audiences in a civilization that lacked the technology we have today. This ending seems suitable for Wells's world, but it seems silly in Spielberg's world. The aliens die of molecular poisoning. They cannot drink our water, suck our blood, feed on Earth's life because of single-celled organisms and molecular life, the aliens' form of poison.

And this conclusion is rushed to the screen in the last five minutes of the film. It made me believe that Spielberg was thinking, "Wait, I've got to end this movie now!" And so he did, in a most unsatisfying fashion. When the film's end credits began to roll, I loudly said, "Oh..." And really, that's all I could take out of War of the Worlds. A disappointing sigh of dissatisfaction. Oh, indeed.