FM2: Section C: US Film Comparative Study

FM2: Section C: US Film – Comparative Study

War Of The Worlds (Dir; Steven Spielberg; 2005)

Cast: Tom Cruise as Ray Ferrier Dakota Fanning as Rachel Justin Chatwin as Robbie Miranda Otto as Mary Ann Tim Robbins as Harlan Ogilvy Morgan Freeman as the Narrator

Plot Synopsis The story is once again updated from H.G. Wells’ original novel, to the 2000s, while the setting is moved to New Jersey, USA and the immediate surrounding area. Ray Ferrier is a divorced dock worker temporarily looking after his children, Rachel and Robbie, whilst his ex-wife, Mary Ann, goes to Boston to meet with her parents. Whilst Ray is failing as a parent, he does have the instinct to protect his family when it becomes apparent that an alien race is emerging from beneath the surface of the Earth in previously buried tripod war machines. Ray and his children head for protection outside the cities, but their journey is threatened by a series of events involving the crashing of an airliner, a mob attack, a Tripod attack upon the ferry they were using to escape, a failed military campaign and an encounter with a ranting, vengeful stranger. Ray loses Robbie along the way and later, along with Rachel, is captured by a Tripod. His fight for his and his family’s survival pushes Ray to violence, murder and self sacrifice, but in the process restores the parental bond he had previously lost with his children, and his role as protector. It seems that, against impossible odds, mankind is doomed, but, as in the novel and the 1953 film, the invaders are defeated by "the littlest things which God in His wisdom had put on the Earth." Background The film is Spielberg's third on the subject of alien visitation, along with Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Producer and long time collaborator Kathleen Kennedy notes that with War of the Worlds, Spielberg had the opportunity to explore the antithesis of the characters brought to life in E.T. and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Spielberg stated that he just thought it would be fun to make a "really scary film with really scary aliens", something which he had never done before. Spielberg was intent on telling a contemporary story, with Kennedy stating the story was created as a fantasy, but depicted in a hyper-realistic way.

Adapting the novel After re-reading the novel, the screenwriter David Koepp, decided to do the script following a single narrator, "a very limited point of view, from someone on the very periphery of events rather than someone involved in events", and created a list of elements he would not used due to being "cliché", such as the destruction of landmark buildings.

Some aspects of the book were heavily adapted and condensed: Tim Robbins' character was an amalgam of two characters in the book, with the name borrowed from a third. With the changing of the setting from 19th century to present day, Koepp also tried to "take the modern world back to the 1800s", with the characters being devoid of electricity and modern techniques of communication. Spielberg had been against the idea of the aliens arriving in spaceships, since every alien invasion movie used such a vehicle. The original Martian cylinders were discarded and replaced with the idea that the Tripods were buried in the underground of the Earth a long time ago. The unscrewing of the lid is kept, but presented on a much more alarming scale. The ‘Red Weed’ is also retained from the novel, but is given a gruesome and sinister connotation not apparent in the original story.

Design and visual effects Industrial Light & Magic (the famous special effects company originally created in 1975 by George Lucas to make Star Wars) was the main special effects company for the movie. In order to keep the realism, the use of computer- generated imagery (CGI) shots and bluescreen was limited, with most of the digital effects being blended with miniature and live-action footage. However, it took the huge advancement of special effects in the 1990’s to be able to realistically realise Wells’ vision of the tripod ‘fighting machines’, which had previously been so difficult to depict on screen. The visual effects crew tried to blend organic and mechanical elements in the Tripods depiction, and made extensive studies for the movements of the vehicle to be believable, considering the "contradiction" of having a large tank-like head being carried by thin and flexible legs. Echoing the ‘three’ motif, Spielberg’s aliens are three-legged. Spielberg did not want any blood or gore during the Heat-Ray deaths, in order to appeal to a wider and younger audience, so the effects crew came up with the bizarre vaporization effect, which is arguably more disturbing. Spielberg uses it to haunting effect in the scene where shredded clothes rain down from above.

The ILM crew admitted that the destruction of a New Jersey bridge was the toughest scene to be made and used a mix of CGI effects and live action elements. Over 500 CGI effects were used in the film. Costume designer Joanna Johnston created 60 different versions of Ray's leather jacket, to illustrate the degrees to which he is weathered from the beginning of the journey to the end. One piece of Dakota Fanning's costume that takes on a special importance is her lavender horse purse: "I wanted her to have something that made her feel safe, some little thing that she could sleep with and put over her face," Johnston notes. "That was the lavender horse purse. We tied it up on a ribbon and Dakota hung it on her body, so it was with her at all times." Johnston dressed Robbie for an unconscious emulation of his father, "They're more alike than they realize, with great tension on the surface," Johnston says.

Contemporary themes in the film At the time of its release in June 2005, many reviewers considered that the film tried to recreate the atmosphere of the September 11 attacks, with bystanders struggling to survive and the use of missing-persons displays. Spielberg declared to Reader's Digest that beside the work being a fantasy, the threat represented was real: "They are a wake-up call to face our fears as we confront a force intent on destroying our way of life." Screenwriter David Koepp stated that he tried not to put in explicit references to September 11 or the Iraq War, but said that the inspiration for the scene where Robbie joins the army, were teenagers fighting at the Gaza Strip - "when you’re that age you don’t fully consider the ramifications of what you’re doing and you’re very much caught up in the moment and passion, whether that’s a good idea or not." Spielberg sees the plight of the fictional survivors as a way to reflect America’s and his own uncertainty after the devastation of the 9/11 attacks, and there are scenes in the film which clearly recall the images and feelings of that day and the days that followed. For Spielberg, the characters' stories of survival needed to be the main focus, as they featured the American mindset of never giving up. The first person perspective from the point of view of the ‘everyman’ (a common theme in Spielberg’s films) is the same as Wells’ novel, but Spielberg makes the protagonist a failed husband and failing father in order to explore contemporary issues of parenthood and masculinity, particularly the traditional notion of a man’s role as a provider and a protector. The idea that if a man cannot provide for and protect his family, he is redundant, reflects the current trends in today’s society, with its escalation of divorce, female bread-winners, independent female parents and ‘weekend fathers’. Whether the way Spielberg manages to resolve the issue for Ray Ferrier is believable, is open for debate, but it certainly re- establishes the father as a hero-figure, at least in the eyes of his daughter and the audience.

Response War of the Worlds grossed an estimated $592 million worldwide, making it the fourth highest grossing film of 2005, and the fifty-first highest grossing film worldwide. The film received largely positive reviews from critics. James Berardinelli praised the acting and considered that focusing the narrative on the struggle of one character made the film more effective, but described the ending as weak, even though Spielberg "does the best he can to make it cinematically dramatic". Total Film's review considered that "Spielberg finds fresh juice in a tale already adapted for film, TV, stage, radio and record", and described the film as having many "startling images", comparing the first Tripod attack to the Omaha Beach landing from Saving Private Ryan. Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan, who felt the special effects were unusual, stated Spielberg may actually have done his job in War of the Worlds "better than he realizes", showing how fragile the world is. Turan claimed Spielberg raised a most provocative question: "Is the ultimate fantasy an invasion from outer space, or is it the survival of the human race?" However, some reviewers felt that Morgan Freeman's narration was unnecessary, and that the first half was "great", but the second half "became filled with clichés, riddled with holes, and tainted by Tim Robbins".

Roger Ebert criticized the "retro design" and considered that despite the big budget, the alien invasion was "rudimentary" and "not very interesting", regarding the best scenes as Ray walking among the airliner wreckage and a train running in flames, declaring that "such scenes seem to come from a kind of reality different from that of the tripods" – surely a reference to the film’s use of contemporary real-life disaster imagery.

The Appeal of the Stars By 2005, the War of the Worlds story had been familiar to audiences since the publication of H.G. Wells’ novel in 1898. This familiarity was helped by the variety of adaptations produced over the years, most notably Orson Welles’ notorious radio broadcast of 1938, George Pal’s film production of 1953 and record producer Jeff Wayne’s musical version of 1978. However, the other major appeal of this film version is the casting of Tom Cruise, who appears in virtually every scene, and the worldwide reputation of Steven Spielberg as a director of big budget epics with a human centre to them. Despite its close similarity to the first person narrative of the novel, the film does pander to the expectations of the Cruise/Spielberg audience towards the end by breaking its previously realist representation of the ‘ordinary man in extraordinary circumstances’. Throughout most of the film, Cruise convincingly plays a man who is actually difficult to like, but we slowly warm to as he struggles to protect his estranged family. But, as if to firmly establish Ray Ferrier as the hero, and confirm Tom Cruise is as much a man of action as he was in Top Gun and Mission: Impossible, Spielberg allows him a victory straight out of Independence Day.

Science Fiction Films of the 2000s With the promise of ever more astounding special effects, courtesy of CGI, science-fiction became one of the dominant genres of the 2000s. Although the genre introduced new concepts which reflected the fears of the era (as science fiction often does), such as virtual reality and apocalyptic biohazards (The Matrix, 28 Days Later), it equally plundered the past in its depiction of end-of-the-world, millennialist fears with remakes of classic 1950’s and 60’s science fiction films such as The Day The Earth Stood Still, I Am Legend and Planet of the Apes, as well as H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine. Even after the reality of 9/11, Hollywood science-fiction continued the obsession with the wide-scale destruction of humanity, and America in particular, in War of the Worlds, The Day After Tomorrow, The Happening, Knowing and 2012.