War of the Worlds....

I haven't seen it yet, but will tonight. After the scathing reviews of one of the worst movies ever... and zealous praise for one of the best ever... I mean, the reviews I've read of this movie. It SUCKS, It ROCKS. It Blows, it rules.... YES!!! Everyone KNEW after seeing it, that Batman was really fucking GOOD. You went into it knowing it would be good. Guide... I blame HHGTTG for the enviroment and Iraq, and politics and uncomfortable condoms, children crying, manic depression, the stock market... hopefully by the end of summer I'll have forgotten it existed. Star Wars, the Smith family, and Batman have provided much healing, and to go into War of the Worlds with such an open court of Flip a coin as to wether its the best or worst movie of the summer (surprisingly no middle ground in review land on this one...) I'm giddy. The hype has me gleefully without expectation.

'05's top 5 (so far) 1.) Star Wars, you had me at "Little green friend." 2.) Batman, I can count all the Batman movies and Higlander movies on two fingers. 3.) Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Pitt's highest placing on a year list since Fight Club. 4.) Sin City. Mmmmm Marv. 5).... Whhaaa? a Tie!!! Constantine and Kingdom of Heaven tie. Look at the titles, and tell me which is a history epic and which has angels? Both are solid movies, with great geek cred.... both will fall off the top 5 for the year list, possibly with War of the Worlds (unless it wants to duke it out with HHGTTG for worst movie...) the real fight will be in December, when Kong hangs onto the Empire State building fighting off Star Wars for best of the year.

So....... will War of the Worlds SUCK as bad as half the critics (including Ebert) says. Or be best of the summer (as Harry Knowles says??) ??

Well, now that I've seen it... Go see it... I'll wait. There is a lot of good here. a lot of wow... no I swear that's not a second shoe in my hand... on the edge of the bed, waiting to drop, yes. More appropriately, behind a mirror.

I'm still waiting. Bare in mind, I was on quite the thrill ride with this one, and have no guilt giving it a 10 on IMDB. BUT, as far as how good is it? On JUST a scale of Spielberg films... 28th percentile. It's probably better than that, but the ending.... I'll end up buying the DVD...

Still Spoiler Free... So, I mentioned the ending... no this is not a Matrix 3 or Final Fantasy 7 problem. Okay it has one or two of the FF7 problems, but not ALL of them. But when I start bitching ALL of it will be about the last reel or so, and 90% of it will focus on the last 2 minutes.

Segue into "Last Few Minutes in Movies". Endings can fucking MAKE movies. Just change the whole damn experience, flip it on it's head, seal the deal. They are the most transformative part of watching any movie. The ending. It made Citizen Kane and the Usual Suspects classics, No Way Out respected beyond it's years. Movies like Se7en and the Godfather and the whole Lord of the Rings trilogy build to them and they become the lynchpin of the story.

I'm gonna spoil the shit out of this thing in a minute, so go see the damn thing already. Actually Go see it my way and come back and read... How?

Eh, you were warned.

My way to see War of the Worlds: If you have to tak a pee and the where-everians are dying, in Boston. Go Pee then. You've seen a brilliant movie. One of the best of the year without question. Yes the martians die from germs like in the book and original movie... every critic to complain about that needs Tim Robbins to beat them in the head with a shovel.

Here's what you missed. Ray (Tom) and his daughter make their way through the ruins of Boston to what's left of his ex's parents neighborhood. National Guard shuffle them off to a shelter, and mother and daughter are reunited. Want happy juice on it, have the parents of the kid hold hands or some shit.

Paul, that's NOT the ending... you left out the part about the brother, being ALIVE. The one who walked over the hill into certain death.

This isn't a movie killer. It's just silly. The brother lives. How? Fine, you warned us he'd be alive, it was on the page, perfectly forshadowed in the basement with that crazy guy who was missing his cell in Shawshank. The bad thing is playing as a shocker, I'm curious and uncomfortable with the anti- Independence Day feel of this film. There's going to be a big chunk of the audience wanting the epic of ID, that scope. They'll feel cheated as hell at the amount of time spent in the basement. Hell, I was wanting out of there. But, with the brother surviving, why deny us his story? Why not split the storytelling and show us his part in this too? Espicially after him being such an ass at the begining and gaining some respectability on the ferry.

The Big baddness of the movie. As I was walking out, questions started coming to mind... Like with Mr. & Mrs. Smith... but worse. With M&Ms, you can take the bag of questions and have a catchall answer that settles them... They NEVER in that movie explained the structure of geopolitics in the world. Fuck, M&Ms could take place on the planet Vegran and ONLY corprate entities handle political and military affairs... I don't know.

But with WotW, as we were walking out two boys, think 10ish, were starting to ask questions... So, the machines are buried in the ground, all over the place, and we NEVER noticed? Under streets in New York? Just how deep, from where... and if they planned this for millions of years... wouldn't they get some biological samples to prepare innoculatios with. Don't they have doctors? In ID the aliens had apple-talk but didn't have anti-virus software... these guys can ride lightning and... I need to rewatch this thing. As I adjust to the son being alive at the end, I'm coming to terms with the movies other problems. The "They've been planning this...." info ONLY comes from that crazy mofo. There's no official explination of anything.

In EVERY previous telling of the story Welles concept is conveyed in some minor way, that the Martians didn't plan for this invasion. They just did it. They needed a chance, to escape their planet that was dying too rapidly. The martians didn't have a plan B, and while being tactical geniuses, were living by their own rules... there are hints of it in this work... in the behavior of the aliens. So we have to assume Tim Robbins was nuts.

So only one problem left... the boy. His being a problem is because he's a dash of movie reality in one of the most realistic films I've ever seen. It was gripping, clinching wow! I was loving every frame. Until the anuses. Okay, I hated the cages and the butholes. The movie was fucking PERFECT.... WOW, I'm floored, Geekgasmic until...

Shit. Somewhere, today, in this country, some good geek SHOUTED in a theater, SQUIRT SHAMPOO UP THEIR BUTT. We has a space anus like the one in Evolution. Cant the people be sucked through metal? Does it need guts? If guts, why a sphincter? Perhaps people who hadn't seen Evolution are unaffected by this. But, those who have seen it, may be reminded enough to giggle. You know what would have sold me on the cages, and maybe have forgiven the butthole? A cow (or horse) in the right hand cage. Why are they only picking up humans. wouldn't a good cow work for feeding your death rays?

There is a lot that's good and great about this movie. 1 or 2 flaws far from kill it, they just could heve not been there. Spielberg is 100% responsible for his films... most other guys have to put up with suits and test audiences... I'd like to know if they tested it, if they made changes... and mostly, why the butts? Are these machines techno-organic? Why not show that earlier?

The questions immediately overshadowed all that was great. The edge of your seat awe... first Spielbergian movie (or MOST Spielbergian) since the FIRST Jurassic Park!!!! I even was screaming at the screen at some points.... and it defied so many cliche's... Wonderfully so. The guy was middle class... Tom was awesome... the whole cast delivered really good performances.

Oh and the machines, the effects. Once again, F--- EVERYONE who hates CGI... Okay I admit it, that's harsh net flamming and I hate that type of shit. CGI haters need to admit their problem. Like enviromentalists who are really anti-corperate, most of these guys are Anti-Lucas. Not even Anti-Peter Jackson Where's the fans saying "Do KONG IN CLAY" Build another life size robot that doesn't work AND looks like shit!!!! Just say you hate Lucas, and say why... cause he makes good, fun movies, and got richer than shit doin it. He named his son Jett. Don't get it? George loves GOOD movies.... and Giant is one of the greats. Jett Rink: "I'm rich, Bick... I'm a richie! I'm a rich boy. And I'm gonna have more money than you ever THOUGHT you had!" It's just a guess. But people really hate the success of others. Which is the main theme of War of the Worlds. What the OTHER GUY HAS. Where-everians hate Terrans cause they have a habatible world. And Ray probably hates the guy his ex is fucking...

I'm sorry for the small bitches... but there's a lot of hate for this movie, that when it's thought through, it doesn't deserve. That's why I'm leaving it in the blog. To help others deal with the problems of the movie... I know, I can't fix them either... but, they're not that bad... (BUTT... tee hee.. haha LOL!)

So where is it in the years best? It shakes up the scoring.... 1.) Sith. 2.) Batman 3.) War of the Worlds. 4.) Tie: Mr& Mrs Smith and Sin City.