War of the Worlds (2005)

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Plot Summary:

The film starts with some images and the voice of a narrator (this voice belongs to Morgan Freeman), who speaks of the man and his dominion over the earth, and intellectually superior beings. Intellectually superior beings decided that now make their plans against us. At the beginning of the 21st century, the man spread across the world and he extended his empire across the globe, and still unknown in outer space and beings observe very carefully and very slowly they made ​​their plans against our kind.

Family

Ray works on cranes at a port of the transport boats. Ray is a rude and vulgar man, the most ordinary mortal. Ray is irrelevant, not listen to anybody, he's on his way home. The story begins on a typical day in which Ray (Tom Cruise) returns home to receive the children. Ray (Tom Cruise) returns home to receive their children, Rachel (Dakota Fanning) and Robbie (Justin Chatwin), who currently live with their mother, Mary (Miranda Otto), and stepfather, Tim. Things like the lack of milk and Rachel and Robbie had to share a room despite the great difference in age, this gender of things shows that Ray certainly was not prepared to receive the children. To better the relationship between the children and himself, Ray invites Robie for a baseball game in his backyard. Ray's personality conflicts with the personality of his son and soon began the disagreements between father and son. The baseball game ends with Ray throwing the ball angrily against the kitchen window. Rachel tries to calm Ray, but he's tired and he decides to go take a nap (Ray needs to work to eat). In the next morning, Ray will talk with his daughter, during the breakfast, Rachel reveals that Robbie left the house and he took his father's car. Nevertheless,Ray is worried and he decides to go looking for his son.

Ray and Rachel

But other things attract the attention of Ray, as the strange storm that formed near his residence. To the astonishment of Ray and the local population, the sky got a weird color and it appears that a storm is beginning. A neighbor asked if he had ever seen something like that in his life, but Ray is back to the garden of his house to see better what kind of storm is taking shape. The formation of the storm follows the thunder storm that first generates unusually strong winds that blow in the direction of the house of Ray And then it unlocks a series of strange rays, and the rays are not accompanied by thunder, the rays hit the same place .

The lightnings scare humans and thunder make Rachel and Ray flees to the house in fear. After the lightnings stopped , Ray realizes that everything at home does not work . Electricity, phones, watches and electronics, all stopped . When he goes outside to investigate, Ray discovers that the whole neighborhood is in the same situation, including several cars that no longer work . He then sees his son Robbie approaching , after leaving his car without permission . Robbie tells his father ,where the rays fell (more than 20 rays fell on the same place not far from the home of Ray ), Ray decides to go there to investigate , but not before reprimanding his son for leaving his car without permission or driver's license.

Friends

Ray walks up to the place indicated by his son. On the way, he meets with his mechanical friend, Manny, he tries to fix his car. Ray recommends replacing the solenoid. Then he meets two friends who are also curious to see the place where the lightnings fell. When Ray arrives on site, an intersection in front of a church, he finds a crowd around a hole left by the rays. Ray examines a piece of asphalt, which despite having been hit by more than 20 rays. One friend asked if the piece is hot, but the piece was frozen. Police advised people to stay away from the place. The ground begins to shake and people discover that something moves in the subsoil. A noise and some tremors are felt, causing the crowd to depart. Surprise, then the ground begins to crack, causing the windows of nearby buildings shatter to be achieved through the cracks (the windows are falling down). The police officers (who were on place) are instructing people to leave the place.

Bad Day

The Tremors are tearing the entire intersection, until you open a huge crater in its place. The church, the buildings and the street are suffering immense damage. As people observe what is left stunned from the crossing, "Shanks" made of steel emerge from the crater and landed in place, crushing cars. Then a gigantic machine tripode rises from the crater, causing panic in people. After a few anxious moments, the machine releases two small "arms" that begin to vaporize people with lightning, turning them into ashes and sparing only their clothes. The rays destroy everything that is organic, even uprooting whole pieces of wooden houses. Ray runs desperately for his life, and he hides into a street. He arranges shelter behind a building, and he notes the tripode is not far from where Ray is. Ray is surrounded by a rain of clothes that were torn from their deceased owners. Back at his home, Ray is in shock - he is ignoring the questions of his children. Ray is covered in gray (or dust that hung in the air, whose origin seems to be the corpses of humans). Ray is frightened and he hides underneath the kitchen table. Rachel touches his father and of course Ray gets scared. Ray goes to the bathroom and then he announces that they must leave home as soon as possible. Ray sends Robbie collect some groceries and useful items. Ray also goes up the stairs and he seeks for his revolver.

Outside the home, Ray goes to the place where Manny keeps trying to fix the car while his children watch desperate the people on the streets. Robbie asks what is going on. Ray enters the car with her children Manny after learning that Manny was able to fix it. Manny tries to stop Ray from taking the car away, while Ray tries to convince him to join him. Ray gives up and he goes away with the car, at the same time that a tripode vaporizes Manny and begins to destroy the neighborhood.

Ray looks in the rear-view mirror and he sees the fall of a bridge and several tripods destroy the place completely (the bridge and the vehicles are dropping over the houses below it, causing huge explosions). While Ray drives fast and carefully on the highway full of cars smashed, he tries to speak to his children that cry of despair. Rachel's having a nervous breakdown and Robbie tries to calm her. Robbie asks Ray what is going on (Robbie asks if terrorists are attacking). Ray says a strange machine left the ground on the street and this machine started killing everyone. Ray thinks it likely these strange machines come from the odd thunderstorm. Ray drives to the new home of his x-wife, but she is not there. Ray decides to spend the night there, but he considers safer sleeping in the basement.

Production of Steven Spielberg's War of Worlds

Steven Spielberg wanted to make his version of War of the Worlds since he boughtthe script for the radio by Orson Welles.Read like a newscast, the text has caused panic in the population, people believed it was a real invasion. At an auction, the director bought the last remaining copy of the script, and he wanted to film it. Spielberg wanted to tell a story with modern and contemporary perspective on the theme of alien invasion (unlike his other previous works). A story with more dark elements and also more family relationships with the human touch (the main fact that Ray Ferrier and Mary Ann are divorced, Ray's relationship and problems with his two children). Spielberg added: "This is not one of my sweet, cuddly, benign alien stories." War of Worlds is not another alien invasion movie about the war between humans and aliens, being focused more on the relationship of the family, the War through the eyes of a family struggling to survive. This is the main objective of Spielberg for his version of War of the Worlds. Spielberg also gave an interview with Empire, where he explains the real purpose for his film:

"I'm creatively comfortable on everything I do these days. I acclimate really quickly into a new genre. I always find familiar things from my own comfort zone that I carry over into a new genre. This to me is a hard movie to make. This was very difficult. It was a very large mount – this many special effects, this many extras, this much action to do a story that is more of an odyssey than a narrative. This is a journey, an odyssey. It starts in iron-bound New Jersey and moves to Boston, Massachusetts. It's not a long trip but it seems to take forever because there are a lot of obstacles along the way."

The first rumors about the alien movie from the book by HG Wells remote to 2002 (the rumors of Tom Cruise as the lead actor). In 2004, there was a big step toward making this film, when the Dreamworks production company was involved in the project. Later, David Koepp (Spider-Man, Panic Room) has been announced as the new head of the script. Dakota Fanning had been announced to the cast of War of the Worlds (according to Variety, the actress played the daughter of Tom Cruise). In October 2004, Tim Robbins and Miranda Otto had been announced that they would participate in the film. Filming begins in November, with locations in New Jersey. The film production began from Newark and Bayonne to Brooklyn. After the production was moved to Hudson and Naugatuck, Connecticut, Athens and New York

Also in November, producer Kathleen Kennedy explains how Spielberg can launch a film of this proportion only eight months after the filming began. The plan of Steven Spielberg is turning the big action scenes first, especially those that show the attacks of aliens who invade Earth. One of these sequences will have more than a thousand extras and will be filmed in early December (2004) in New York.

Spielberg also speak of the great challenge of working in a film of these proportions:

We started very late. I felt that we were insane. I thought I was insane even to assume that it could be done. But I had my same crew, this was our ninth picture together. In a way, these efforts have been successfully carried out in my favourite era. In the '30s, '40s, '50s, a film like this would have actually been finished three months ago. I gave myself a lot of shooting time, 72 shooting days, which is the most I've had in about 15 years. I think my last longest schedule was Schindler's List, which was 73 days. So I gave us a lot of shooting time because of all the special effects photography. I had to front-load the movie to give ILM a head start, so I think the first nine weeks of shooting, every day there was an effects shot. We were shooting wildly out of continuity. It was a little hard on all of us.

The film had 72 days of filming. The director is sending the scenes for Industrial Light & Magic since the second week of production. So, when principal photography is finished, at least half of the 500 special effects shots will already be ready. In February 2005, it began marketing the film, notably with the launch 30-second spot that will air during the commercial of the Super Bowl. Many elements of the book by HG Wells were held in the Steven Spielberg version of War of the Worlds, like a kind of red weed (Spielberg wants to use the red plant to indicate the presence of the invaders)

Producer Kathleen Kennedy said again that War of the Worlds is not a movie special effects. In an interview to Australian magazine Empire, she compared the amount of shots of CGI used by Steven Spielberg (500) with those created for Star Wars: Episode III (over 2,000). "I think Spielberg is trying to integrate elements in a real, believable. You're not just seeing a beautiful painting, you're really involved in a real event, visceral. "

Budget:

The film's budget was in his disclosure as the most expensive film in history at the time of its release. Many analysts thought that War of Worlds had a bigger budget than Titanic and the movie directed by Steven Spielberg would be his most expensive film to produce and therefore the most expensive film produced in Hollywood. The news indicated that Tom Cruise could be the highest paid actor in Hollywood history (he could receive a payment of $ 180 million for his role in the film - experts predict the film could make $1.8 billion at the Movie theaters alone - Cruise could get one tenth of the film's box office, outside the income from other segments (DVDs, video games.....). Despite numerous reports and rumors that were circulating on the Internet at the time the film's release. It was revealed that the film's final budget was $ 132 million (it was still the most expensive film directed by Steven Spielberg- until 2005). The film's budget was exceeded by Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull ($ 185 million) as the most expensive film directed by Steven Spielberg.

Film's release and reception:

The world premiere took place in Tokyo, well before the film was released around the world. On June 13, the Japanese public can check the new work of Steven Spielberg.

Reception

Box Office:

The overall box office premiere of War of the Worlds: U.S. $ 34.6 million, approximately. In the United States, the amount received was $ 21.3 million (The film opened in 3,908 theaters.) Elsewhere, the sum reached $ 13.3 million. According to Paramount, Steven Spielberg's movie cost $ 135 million - the most expensive film up to that point made by Steven Spielberg (War of the Worlds exceeded the budget of Minority Report. The North American box office of the War of the Worlds in the weekend of July 4 was $ 77.6 million. The film worldwide box office is 591.7 million worldwide (War of Worlds is the highest-grossing film of Tom Cruise), the fourth highest-grossing film of 2005. The film was behind Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire ($ 895.9 M), Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith ($ 848.8 M) and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe ($ 745.0 M ).

Critical:

Despite that War of Worlds is not Spielberg's film with greater acceptance by the critics, War of Worlds has 74% approval on Rotten Tomatoes, with average Rating: 7 / 10 (249 were counted with 65 of these reviews are negative) . Ken Tucker from New York Magazine, says in his review: " Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds is huge and scary, moving and funny-another capper to a career that seems like an unending succession of captivations". Meanwhile, Jonathan Rosenbaum, (Chicago Reader), gives a negative review and he says: "Spielberg's calculations turn out to be more prominent than any effects they could possibly produce, and the less pretentious 1953 version by producer George Pal emerges as more likable."

Other reviews:

Ross Anthony (Hollywood Report Card) says heavy criticism of Spielberg's film: " True, the first half is excellent: great direction, great acting, a great family story, and large drama backed by wowing special effects.A word on the ending of this picture -- terrible. Perhaps there are many pieces of film on the cutting room floor that would have made the ending make sense, or given it meaning. As it stands, this ending has no purpose, no emotional weight, and very little logic."

Roger Ebert (Chicago Sun-Times): " The problem may be with the alien invasion itself. It is not very interesting. We learn that countless years ago, invaders presumably but not necessarily from Mars buried huge machines all over the Earth. Now they activate them with lightning bolts, each one containing an alien (in what form, it is hard to say)"

Many film critics said some influences of the attacks on September 11 are inserted in the film. Spielberg said that the September 11 attacks were an emotional change in the country. "We live under a veil of fear that we didn't live under before 9/11. There has been a conscious emotional shift in this country."

Awards in various organizations and events.

Soundtrack:

Conducted by John Williams.