Aliens have been spotted in Grover’s Mill again. Tom Cruise was running from them carrying Dakota Fanning and Miranda Otto in tow. Then out of falling buildings swings the caped crusader known the world as Batman. Unfortunately, the hero can’t seem to move as quickly and becomes entangled with the aliens
H.G. Wells’ “War of the Worlds” has reached legendary status once again as another great creator in his medium took up the torch or perhaps ray gun and turned the brilliant science fiction book into a major motion picture. Steven Spielberg seems once again quite able at capturing something in the psyche and making it larger than life.
“No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man’s and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable.”
Many are comparing this film to life in our world right now, or at least before 9/11. Some say this has no political overtone and it probably doesn’t but it does do one thing. It explores our fear of having our lives disrupted by some unknown quantity when no one seems to know why.
Spielberg has always had a gift for telling story visually, whether in rooting for our favorite hero, Indiana Jones or in the tears of horror watching Nazi atrocities in WWII. One can never forget the overwhelming feeling of awe seeing dinosaurs walking across the screen. These aliens, as they crawl out of the ground and begin their assault on humanity, represent much of what they did when Orson Welles (no relation) his radio show back in 1938.
Sales on the movie look promising for a rather lackluster summer movie season. Fantastic Four is slated to hit theatres next week. Batman and a host of others haven’t done as well as predicted but War of the Worlds hits a nerve, as many great films do. Whether this is a great film remains to be seen but this one does have something special.
John Stith is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business.
