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innerSpaceman · 01-24-2007, 08:43 PM

Oddly enough, the movie I've been musing on lately is War of the Worlds

I'm one of the twelve people on earth who actually like Steven Spielberg's version. I've heard many people complain they didn't like his take on the story. Personally, I thought the change from 50's scientist concerned about his new girlfriend to everyday citizen concerned about his young daughter was brilliant. That scientist stuff went out a long time ago, and it's not cool to portray gals as so helpless nowadays.

But besides that, I've heard complaints about the scenarios played out in the Spielberg film ... and I've wondered how much of that stuff was from the book, never having read it. The book has a reputation for being snoresville, so the next best thing would be the infamous 1930's Orson Welles radio broadcast that caused a public panic. Well, it just so happens the broadcast is a DVD extra on the recent release of the George Pal War of the Worlds. It was surprising to me in many ways.

First off, the segment that imitates a radio broadcast of Martian attack is less than 30 minutes long! A whole lot of people had to have tuned in 2 minutes late (to miss the announcement of fiction) and gone to the bathroom at the 15-minute mark (when there was a 2nd such announcement) and freaked out so much by minute 28 that they turned off the radio. Because after that point, the show shifts gears completely and becomes practically a monologue by Welles of a diary of one of the lone survivors. Unlike the radio broadcast portion, the much longer diary section is not in real time. Welles speaks of doing one thing one day, and two minutes later he's talking about a week later.

Frankly, this section is so boring, I couldn't listen to all of it. But in the parts I did hear, I gathered that much of what Speilberg chose as scenarios for the film were, in fact, either based on the original book or on the Mercury Players radio teleplay. There were the tripods crossing the Hudson river while refugees panicked boarding a ferry. There was the crazed dude in the abandoned house who spoke just about every line of Tim Robbins dialogue. Other scenarios - such as the suspenseful probe and Martian encounters in the abandoned house, and the world-gone-mad mob scene with our protagonists dragged from their cars - are right out of the earlier George Pal movie.

I think Spielberg's film ultimately has a great pedigree of influence from all the previous versions of War of the Worlds, and for that I admire it even more than I did as simply a great alien-invasion movie.

Anyway, sorry for a completely irrelevant post ... but that's the film I happen to be musing on.

01-24-2007, 08:43 PM	#2
innerSpaceman Kink of Swank Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Inner Space Posts: 13,075	Oddly enough, the movie I've been musing on lately is War of the Worlds I'm one of the twelve people on earth who actually like Steven Spielberg's version. I've heard many people complain they didn't like his take on the story. Personally, I thought the change from 50's scientist concerned about his new girlfriend to everyday citizen concerned about his young daughter was brilliant. That scientist stuff went out a long time ago, and it's not cool to portray gals as so helpless nowadays. But besides that, I've heard complaints about the scenarios played out in the Spielberg film ... and I've wondered how much of that stuff was from the book, never having read it. The book has a reputation for being snoresville, so the next best thing would be the infamous 1930's Orson Welles radio broadcast that caused a public panic. Well, it just so happens the broadcast is a DVD extra on the recent release of the George Pal War of the Worlds. It was surprising to me in many ways. First off, the segment that imitates a radio broadcast of Martian attack is less than 30 minutes long! A whole lot of people had to have tuned in 2 minutes late (to miss the announcement of fiction) and gone to the bathroom at the 15-minute mark (when there was a 2nd such announcement) and freaked out so much by minute 28 that they turned off the radio. Because after that point, the show shifts gears completely and becomes practically a monologue by Welles of a diary of one of the lone survivors. Unlike the radio broadcast portion, the much longer diary section is not in real time. Welles speaks of doing one thing one day, and two minutes later he's talking about a week later. Frankly, this section is so boring, I couldn't listen to all of it. But in the parts I did hear, I gathered that much of what Speilberg chose as scenarios for the film were, in fact, either based on the original book or on the Mercury Players radio teleplay. There were the tripods crossing the Hudson river while refugees panicked boarding a ferry. There was the crazed dude in the abandoned house who spoke just about every line of Tim Robbins dialogue. Other scenarios - such as the suspenseful probe and Martian encounters in the abandoned house, and the world-gone-mad mob scene with our protagonists dragged from their cars - are right out of the earlier George Pal movie. I think Spielberg's film ultimately has a great pedigree of influence from all the previous versions of War of the Worlds, and for that I admire it even more than I did as simply a great alien-invasion movie. Anyway, sorry for a completely irrelevant post ... but that's the film I happen to be musing on.
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