Jackskeleton

I'm atheist also and I kinda grunted when it was mentioned in WotW. but eh,

wm lopez

God was mentioned a lot in Hollywood movies upto the 1990's.
Then all of a sudden like in vampire movies from the 1990's the cross doesn't do any harm. It was decade were things were changing, but since 2000 I've noticed a big swing the other way.

glassdragon

The only thing's i guess i can nitpick about are

1. This car they had must have been a supercar to somehow work through 2 emp's and be pretty much the only thing that got missed by the crashed plane in that part of the city
2. Everytime they left somewhere there just happened to be a nice little neat path thorough the traffic/destruction for them to get out of there.


Otherwise.. those very small nitpicks didn't bring down the movie too much which was pretty good.

Groucho

I'm not sure why my fellow atheists are complaining about the God line. It, like all of Freeman's narration, is more or less straight out of the novel.

Breakfast with Girls

Need a hug?

Giantrobo

Of course there will be exceptions but I stand by my statement. And I'm by no means bashing you antit-religions folks.


You got enough problems without me pissing in your pool.


j/k

mikehunt

I wish my issues with this movie were simply that god was mentioned or could be solved with suspension of disbelief.

Blade

This seemed odd to me at first, but it occurs to me that the EMP was always caused by a major freak lightning storm. I think that's something that would cause drivers to pull off to the side of the road and then the EMP hit and the cars died. Given the lack of any car accidents, this is the only logical answer.

marty888, I think the reason this thread was started was not because the original poster wasn't familiar with the idea of suspension of disbelief, but rather, like me, probably wasn't really drawn into the story and thus all these little nitpicks stood out even more.

Regarding the camcorder (and not the news people, but the one in the city during the first viewed attack)...my problem isn't so much that it was working, but that NOTHING else (except for the car) was working. And about the car...I had no problem believing Cruise's character would be able to figure this out (one of the mechanics even said he was just talking about that), but to be the ONLY person to figure this out? We (or Cruise's character) should have seen at least a few other moving cars by other smart auto mechanics, and enthusiasts, along with the spread of word of mouth.

resinrats

What is atheists' problems when God is mentioned? Just ignore it. You don't have to whine about it. Do you sob in your seat when a movie shows a Muslim or a Buddist, or Hindu or is this just a anti-Christianity thing?

glassdragon

I agree that athiests should just ignore it. I don't believe in unicorns but if i see one in a movie then it won't make me like the movie any less or get mad that they have a creature that i do not believe in somewhere in it
Correct me if i'm wrong, but athiests don't hate god, they just don't believe in god (which is fine by me, live and let live i say). So to you it's just a word, think of it as so and just forget what "others" think it means and just think of it as a nonsense word (which athiests think it is) problem solved

Jon2

Off hand, I'd say a lot of people here need to read a bit more.

However realisticly written it may have been for its time, as an allegory, it was not meant to be a scientifically accurate (even by scientific standards of the time) portrayal of an invasion from another world. WotW (and every movie adaptation) contains the same major scientific "faux paux" that prevents it from being such a portrayal. Wells was very aware of this "faux paux", but chose to ignore it (somewhat) to write the story he wanted and have it end the way he wanted.

Wells wrote his book as a cautionary tale, an allegory. Just transpose the British Empire for the Martians, and the indigenous inhabitants of British colonies for the humans in his story. It was meant as a warning to the intellectual and technologically advanced British Empire (THE world power of the time) that they are not indestructable, and that they can be brought down by things they can't even imagine.

The ending of Wells' story doesn't just postulate the Martians have no resistance to earth germs, but that they have no idea what is happening to themselves. The story clearly states the Martians have no knowledge of germs, and since the Martians are so much more advanced than we are, it can only mean one thing. Microbial life does not exist on Mars. The only life on Mars are the Martians and the red vines.

Wells' scientific "faux paux" was ignoring evolution, because from an evolutionary standpoint (even by what was known in Wells time), this kind Martian evolution could not have occured.

However (and this is why I said "somewhat" above), Wells does not completely ignore evolution. He also postulates that, by the untold number of human deaths caused by germs, man has "earned" (in other words...evolved) his immunity to earth's germs.

sinister

all i know is this movie was going great until robbins showed up. it seemed they spent an hour in the dumb basement. why? it served no purpose. Independence Day was by far superior and for me to say that is alot. at least in ID4 the aliens weren't so stupid. i'm sure the aliens in wotw would've done a little homework before doing their strike. for how advanced they are they should've known what on the planet was harmful. there weren't enough battles actually seen. who cares what happends in the basement. i'm very dissapointed. where was there great technology, their air force, their ships. even if they didn't die of disease, just bring some grenades, get captured and bang, they dead. and the ending came 40 minutes to fast. movie should've been at least two and half hours and with alot more action. and better plot.

silentbob007

I'm still trying to figure out why the story was changed so that the aliens arrived by lightning? The only reason I can think of is to make it look cooler and to cause the EMP, a plot point ignored when convenient. I mean ... what are the odds that the newscrew would a) have a working camera b) have a working van with equipment c) have been rolling film on exactly the point where lightning struck (they were quick bursts if I remember correctly) and d) just happen to run into Ray long enough to give him information, show him tape, and then leave.

In my opinion, at least when the aliens arrived like meteors, you could say that they perhaps were escaping/fleeing another world and while they planned the invasion, this was the first time they had visted Earth. The aliens in this movie had obviously been here before to install their machines. If this were done thousands or millions of years ago ... why wait? If it were done in recent times, how'd they cover their tracks and how did they have any advantage in coming out of the ground instead of just landing and starting the massacre? I know these can be rationalized with conjecture about the alien technology or intentions, but it seems like a lot of silliness for one change in the "arrival".

I also don't buy Ray's character. We are shown that he is a bit indifferent about his kids in the beginning, then of course he becomes a fierce, protective father through the proceedings ... a fierce, protective father who is still trying to get his kids to Boston to dump them off with their mom. Well, I guess that makes sense ... we all know that the aliens would never attack a major population center like Boston.

kcbrett5

My biggest problem is the ending scenes. Every city in the world is being devastated yet Cruise and everyone else keep heading towards the cities. At the end, he arrives in Boston and finds it in tact. Plus, his dumb bastard son who charged over a hill seconds before it is annihilated somehow beat him to Boston? This was just stupid.

The movie worked well as a 2 hour chase scene, save that one 20 minute interuption with the arm in the basement. But the end just made the whole thing pointless.

steebo777

Obviously you missed the shot at the end of Boston being fu**ed up, which was obvious by the Zakim Bridge in the middle of the shot. However, the area Cruise and family was in wasn't as badly damaged (possibly somewhere in Cambridge from the looks of it), which was corny. That and having the family survive pissed me off to an otherwise wonderful popcorn flick experience.

And Jon2 pretty much answered any plotholes or inconsitincies that are mentioned in this thread. Overall, I found nearly nothing wrong for a movie other than the super-minivan.

Numanoid

Amen. I will forever refer to it and movies like it as employing the "Robbie makes it home ending". Totally demolishes the rest of the movie (though the rest of it pretty much blew as well), though coming from Spielberg I should have expected it.

darkessenz

Its interesting that the aliens even knew the method of attack that would be effective, especially if they planted the machines long ago. Maybe they planted them during the "caveman" days.

What are they jealous of anyway? The infrastructure? They are destroying it. The water and trees? They were there before. The good conversation? They are killing anyone who can talk.

Human blood is the only thing that seems to be useful to them, and evidently it is like an elixir for the plants that the aliens must have. Why wouldn't animal blood do? How did they make the blood-plants before they had human blood? Who knows.