I find it hard to believe that the KING KING trailer is getting no reaction from some of your theaters. Even when I saw it at the drive I heard people talking about it in their cars and I know my friends who've seen it at the theater said there was terrific word of mouth about the trailer.

well, generally, after a trailer, there is no reaction. Its normal...unless your Harry Potter or the 2nd Matrix..or spiderman...or Star Wars..haah.

That's one thing I've never understood - are people in America different at cinemas than people here in New Zealand? I've never heard clapping / booing at a trailer or even at the end of a film in my entire life. They laugh when its funny but the rest of the time you hear nothing but a quiet chattering before and after a film.

Either way, didn't expect any reaction after King Kong either time I saw WOTW and didn't get any - about a fifth of the country saw it during a primetime current affairs show a night before so it wasn't anything new (though personally when I saw it on TV I wasn't impressed and this completely changed second time around, looks fun and the CG is fine).

I, uh...agree with...you?

Expect I'd add a minus for some very minor nitpicks, like mommy and the grandparents looking all clean at the end and some other stuff I can't think of right now. Overall, I'd say to was very good, and Loyal, Mav and Star Wars just have their panties in a bunch. :mrgreen:

Oh god, I just used a primitive insult and the Mr. Green smilie...I'm turning into BKB! HELP!

Its too late. you were exposed to too much gamma rays/bkb juice.


Dont let your emotions get out of hand, or youll start turning green, typing in bold and start saying things like FF4 will make 40000000 million dollars...

I never said FF4 was gonna make 40000000 million dollars, HOWEVER, I did say that this movie was clearly the underdog that had appeal from teens, kids, adults who grew up on the comic and female appeal from the 2 male leads that would enable this movie to do greater than everyone is not giving it credit for.. I do agree with Mav that 60 Million plus for the 3 day weekend is in order an face it: FOX has done a tremendous job marketing this movie.. You can't deny it and they've nailed the characters...

Oh I agree, I was just parodizing the way you pimp the movies you want to see. Its not sensible sometimes, but it sure is fun to watch.

Mommy and the Grandparents simply took a shower before Tom came by with the kids.. Hell that was simple.. :mrgreen:

Oh my god, I reviewed the film? Where is it? Did I like it?

B-. A technically strong but very underwhelming movie. Buildings were destroyed, people were running, and Dakota was screaming, then it ended. It has some great parts such as from the fight to control the van to before Tim Robbins showed up, but others are just "seen that before" kind of feelings, and I never got emotionally involved. I haven't read the book, but the ending doesn't translate well to the big screen. It's something that screenwriter should've realized and said this is where the adaptation comes in. It's too anticlimatic and not really believeable. I don't want to see suddenly some amazing weapons just showed up and wiped the aliens out either. It's OK if they can't find a way to end it in the heroic fashion after all the set up. Simply end it in a depressing matter. It's amazing how millions of people died and somehow our three main characters got out without getting hurt. Why is it necessary that Robbie survived? It didn't add anything to me at that moment.

This is a family movie, a pg-13 summer blockbuster. People who are wanting some horrific depressing ending tend to overlook that. It's a movie for a 45 year old parent to take his 13 year old daughter to.

In a situation like this where you want to make a family movie out of this kind of material, you have 2 main options. Play it moderately scary and kill off a character or two, like Sith did. Or play it scary as hell but have it turn out alright in the end like War did. I'm glad Spielberg took it in the latter direction.

I've never liked kids in action movies. WOTW could have been so much better without the bratty teenage boy and screaming girl. And, as most have pointed out... the ending looked like they ran out of time and had to wrap up the movie quickly. It seemed rather unsatisfying.

But, overall WOTW was very watchable. It had some decent suspense and some snazzy effects. It's what you'd expect from a summer popcorn flick... nothing more, nothing less. I'll give it a B-

Boring...

All been done twice before... what a waste of film!

You die... You die and you go to hell

I definitely agree that I'm glad Spielberg didn't make it where the humans just magically find some new weapons and save the planet. That would be so much worse. However, it's still a Hollywood ending because human survived after all, and we still lived happily ever after. Why should we always get lucky? That's what bothered me. I loved the tone of helplessness that the movie set up. It went further than a lot of other movies, but please, take that and finish with it. If we are so vulnerable, let us get wiped out. No survivors, just complete darkness and make us feel hopeless all the way to the end. That's why I love the ending of Arlington Road, which elevated an otherwise just-above-average thriller. I can understand what Archie said about this being a family film and need an uplifting ending, but from a pure movie standpoint, the tone of last 10 minutes don't fit with all the things that came before it. The earth should've been completely left in ruins.

A good twist would've been if Tom died... then Dakota would've been left all alone to fend for herself...

I also wish the son would've died... It's stupid that he survived

And I agree with Xiayun, the human race should've been wiped out, happy endings are getting old.

Awesome. Just brilliant. My favourite film of the year so far, and the best film Spielberg's done in years.

A (possibly A+, needs a second viewing)

That seems a tad on the negative side...

Gee?? Isn't that a tad bit harsh when he's in fact telling the truth?? It has been done 2 times over and Hackson should've done something a little more original than King Kong.. Nuff said

Yeah Peter Jackson needs to do something more original... I have only seen DEAD ALIVE and that wasn't good... Fellowship of the Ring was good but yeah he really needs to get his own idea's. What a loser he is.

Yeah... such a loser... I mean ANYONE could've made the LOTR trilogy into the masterpieces that they became... And I'm sure ANY director could remake King Kong greater than PJ can... I mean it was the movie that got him into filmmaking... why remake that? Cause you want the younger generation to be inspired by beautiful filmmaking? Pfft... pointless

Peter Jackson = Greatest director alive

I've finally seen the War.

Didn't have a problem really with the ending. I do think the son should have died and that the camera should have went over the hill.

One thing that stuck out to me that no one's really talked about is the lack of space and time in the film. I'm still attempting to connect the dots from the house to where the tripod first emerged to the second house to the third house to the final house. How much time elapsed? How far are these places from one another? I know Boston to NJ is around 200 miles or so.

War Of The Worlds was a good summer sci-fi movie. but it didn't meet my expectation. i liked the first half of the movie, but in the end, it just dissapoint me. Tom Cruise deliver his best performance as usual, and so is Dakota. but there're just some question left after i leave the theatres, anyhow it still a decent movie to watch this summer. but just don't expect too much. overall it just reach a B- level.

I liked this movie a lot more than I thought I would. The special effects, and CGI were amazing. The way the tripods looked were quite incredible, and very believable. The thing I liked most about this film was the length. It never dragged, within 15 minutes of the film the action kicks in, and never gives up. The actors are all great too. Dakota Fanning continues to blow me away with her amazing ability to act. Tom Cruise was also very good. The only thing that bothered me about this movie was the ending. It just didn't make any sense to me, and it felt very stupid. Other than that, it was a fantastic movie.

A-

WAR OF THE WORLDS (2005)

I was expecting “War of The Worlds” to be a solid movie, if not a great one. It looked very good from the previews, and the reviews were mostly positive. The only complaint a lot of people seemed to have was the ending, which many found to be a letdown. The biggest thing keeping me from wanting to see “War of The Worlds” more than I did was how much I hate Tom Cruise right now. He’s gone crazy lately and I can’t stand him. It made me not want to support the movie. But other than him it looked like a good one so I saw it anyway, and with an open mind. I ended up liking it a lot. It was really interesting and involving most of the time. Unfortunately, starting with as soon as they get to Harlan’s (Tim Robins) basement, the movie starts to go downhill. The ending was also a little too happy. A happy ending could have been fine, but I don’t think they pulled it off in a completely satisfying way here. It just seems a little phony.

*****************SPOILERS*****************

I really liked Robbie (Justin Chatwin) so I was glad he was still alive, even though it seemed a little unrealistic. But the ending just doesn’t feel quite right. I mean what are the odds that the mother, her husband, her parents, etc… would all be ok too? The son still being alive is one thing, but all of them? I don’t buy that.

***************END SPOILERS***************

I don’t know, I don’t hate the ending and it didn’t ruin the movie for me, but I do find it flawed. I also found the whole alien invasion to be settled too easily and quickly. It almost felt like a cop-out. But these aren’t huge flaws, just minor complaints for me. And speaking of the aliens, I thought they looked too cutesy in the face. It was like the aliens you’d find in a kids movie. It’s impossible to find them terrifying when you see their faces. They were freaky when they were in their machines and you couldn’t see what they looked like, but then you see them and it’s like, “Aww, look at the cute alien!” That’s not exactly what you should be thinking during a movie like this.

After hearing many say that the movie was scary and they jumped quite a bit, I was thinking this might have some pretty tense scenes. But I didn’t find any here, not even a jump scene. Maybe it’s just because I’ve seen a lot of thrillers so I don’t get going as easily, but I’d say that’s only half of it. When a movie is intense I’ll find myself on the edge of my seat, and if there’s a jump scene, I’ll usually jump. Nothing like that happened with me during this movie though. I wouldn’t have even been expecting this movie to be scary had I not heard people say it was. That got me expecting more in the scares department. So did some people calling it a horror movie, which surprised me and got me more interested. After seeing it I wouldn’t call it one at all. It’s a sci-fi thriller and drama, not a horror movie. But that’s just my opinion.

All of the performances are solid. Me not liking Cruise at all in real-life now aside, he did do a good job here. Dakota Fanning (I Am Sam, Uptown Girls, Man on Fire, Hide & Seek) was very good, as usual. Justin Chatwin (The Chumscrubber, Baby Geniuses 2, Taking Lives) was really good and likable as Robbie. He was also kind of cute, thanks mostly to his character’s sweet relationship with his sister. Worth noting is that both Fanning and Chatwin starred in Steven Spielberg’s sci-fi mini-series “Taken.”

“War of The Worlds” isn’t perfect, but it’s still a very good summer popcorn movie. Before we get to Harlan’s basement my rating was going to be an 8/10 (A-), but since it went downhill starting there it ended up dropping to an 8/10 (B+), which is still great. I didn’t find it quite as great as Terminator 3: Rise of The Machines, another “end of the world” movie that opened at the Box Office during the July 4th holiday (in 2003), but I definitely don’t regret going to see it and I had a very enjoyable time. I will purchase it on DVD.

Grade: 8/10 (B+)