It is Director Steven Spielberg’s choice to avoid the cliches of the tense government or military control room and emphasize the stresses and reactions of normal people that makes this movie special. Yes, soldiers appear, but they’re grunts, not overbearing authority figures, and they don’t fare any better against the invaders than the weaponless thousands they’re trying to protect. Although the original novel was written by H.G. Welles, the movie has an excellent Ray Bradbury feel.
After a prologue in which Ray’s pregnant ex-wife Mary Ann (Miranda Otto) and new husband Tim (David Alan Basche) drop the kids off for the weekend at Ray’s New York city house, Speilberg expertly establishes the family dynamic. Ray has to work, thus leaving the kids unattended. Rachel (Fanning) can take care of herself until there’s a real crisis, but Robbie, who hates his dad, takes off with Ray’s car to local points unknown. It is then that an unusual lightning storm hits the neighborhood. We see it above the expressway that stands like its own character behind the row houses. After all of the power fails, including car engines, Ray heads a few blocks away to where lightning has struck some two dozen times in the same place.
And skipping ahead – six-story high alien tripod robots begin to terrorize the populace, shooting death rays, trashing property, and causing explosions. Ray quickly figures out that only one car in the area is actually running, commandeers it, and begins driving his kids out of immediate danger. But the danger follows them, not at a lightning speed, but at a steady pace, so that we see the mounting family tension as Ray finally takes on the responsibility he’s shirked for years.
Cruise is fine in the role, although slightly miscast. That little problem of age credibility is enhanced by the difficulty accepting the movie star as a parent at all. His most convincing sequence takes place in the basement of a farmhouse where he and his daughter hide out with a survivalist named Ogilvy (Tim Robbins). Ogilvy might have the most sensible answer to the crisis or he might be dangerously paranoid. Your take on the resolution to this portion of the film may well affect your feelings about the whole story. It is both the most compelling because Robbins is so good and brings out the best in Cruise, and the most frightening because it’s when we learn the most about the aliens’ plan. Welles saw, and Spielberg emphasizes, the association between the Red Planet and the color of human blood.
And while not critical to the storyline, Dakota Fanning’s scenes, at least the ones in which she’s not screeching in fear, are terrific. She does not back down from either the major stars or the more incidental characters with which she shares scenes. But what makes the film work on the best level is that the invaders take out all human means of communication and transportation, forcing people to flee overland in a way that belies the capabilities of our current culture. Add Spielberg’s usual tendency to let even minor folks have their moments and you get a ton-of-fun summer flick.
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