http://www.imdb.com/news/sb/2005-06-29/#film1Movie Reviews: 'War of the Worlds'
Movie executives hoping that Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds, starring Tom Cruise, would pull the box office out of a record 18-week slump, are likely to read today's (Wednesday) reviews of the movie with some consternation. Although minor critics had unanimously praised it in early reviews posted on the Rotten Tomatoes website, several reviews by the major critics are about as cold as the Martian ice cap. Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times begins his review by remarking: "War of the Worlds is a big, clunky movie containing some sensational sights but lacking the zest and joyous energy we expect from Steven Spielberg." But Ebert's remarks seem delicate compared with those of the New York Post's Lou Lumenick, who particularly assails "the lamest ending yet to a Steven Spielberg movie," which he says is "so cheesy it was greeted with gales of laughter at a screening the other night -- and this disappointing War of the Worlds limps to a conclusion that mercifully insures there will not be a sequel." The scene in question takes place in a destroyed Boston, and Boston Globe critic Ty Burr says that the audience that he saw the movie with also burst into laughter. "Then the crowd fell silent -- more silent than I've experienced in a packed theater in many moons -- as the smoking ruins of our city came into focus. War of the Worlds, it turns out, is serious stuff, at times more so than it knows how to handle." Michael Sragow in the Baltimore Sun pins the blame on Cruise, comments that "the actor's relentless drive to be taken seriously pushes this escapist apocalypse past its tipping point, into irredeemable weightiness." A more charitable comment on the movie comes from A.O. Scott in the New York Times, who writes that while this may be a "lesser Spielberg movie," it nevertheless "succeeds in reminding us that while Mr. Spielberg doesn't always make great movies, he seems almost constitutionally incapable of bad moviemaking." Indeed several critics are dishing out high praise. "If you must see just one Steven Spielberg movie in a lifetime, see War of the Worlds," writes Liam Lacey in the Toronto Globe & Mail. Bruce Westbrook in the Houston Chronicle calls the movie "a towering accomplishment -- the most thrilling and action-packed Spielberg film in the director's broad legacy." Acknowledging "occasional flaws and misjudgments," Stephen Hunter in the Washington Post remarks that the film is nevertheless "a brilliantly told tale. It really rips along; it seizes you in its first seconds, holds you spellbound for two short hours and expels you, breathless and spent. It's your best summertime movie rush in many years." And then there's the review by Glenn Whipp in the Los Angeles Daily News, who suggests that War of the Worlds might well be the best and worst of Spielberg films. He writes: "Fantastic and banal, terrifying and occasionally dull, pure Spielberg and yet at times anonymous, War of the Worlds delivers multiple viewing experiences."
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