Guest Posted July 3, 2005 Share Posted July 3, 2005 You thought AI was terrific Matt? Ok well proof positive that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Certainly the majority opinion on that one was that it was a real stinker. (not that the majority is always correct mind you :D Just saw War Of The Worlds last night, not the worst thing I've ever seen. I have to read the book now to see if Wells actually had a story or plot line in there? The movie was basically devoid of any plot or story line. It was just a travel log. Of course this is what we have come to expect from big budget FX movies, who needs a good script when you have 75 million for special effects? The best scene for me was when that probe thingy was trying to find them in the old basement. It was actually suspenseful and scary mainly because I didn't know what was going to happen at that point. Good job on that scene Spielberg and crew! The rest of the movie, well, a lot of stuff gets blown up. It was nice to see the aliens from "Independence Day" working again, how many aliens get to blow the crap out of the earth twice in their acting careers? R, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy O'Neil Posted July 3, 2005 Share Posted July 3, 2005 The aliens were much creepier in "2001", and we never even saw them. I loved the aftermath of the plane crash. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Filip Plesha Posted July 3, 2005 Share Posted July 3, 2005 Aliens were not creepy in that way, they felt scary in the conentional way that you are scared of a lion, or a burgler. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member Adam Frisch FSF Posted July 5, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 5, 2005 Great work by Kaminski and company. It has a raw, unpretty feeling with lots of nerve - I was impressed with it's cold starkness. All the day exteriors have certain feel to them, with a cool, harsh, unsettling sun. Maybe it was the Fuji, maybe something else - it was just a palette I hadn't seen in a while. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michel Hafner Posted July 5, 2005 Share Posted July 5, 2005 How can there be any similarities, two compleatly different kinds of movie and two different themes.WOTW was supose to be a movie similar to Jurassic park: not to serious, yet not silly <{POST_SNAPBACK}> That's your preconception. A film is what it is. The two films are not that different. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member Bill Totolo Posted July 5, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 5, 2005 OK, after reading all the reviews on this thread I'd like to add my thoughts. **Warning spoilers** The film is titled "War of the World's" but how boring and predictable would it be if the worlds at war were Earth vs. Alien. Spielberg takes this movie on a profoundly personal journey. The battle is really between a father and his children. Emotionally they're world's apart and the battle of wills between father and son is palpable. Also the disconnect between father and daughter is evident when he tries to calm his daughter's fears amidst chaos. He has to learn from his son how to help his daughter. The 2nd level of interest to the film are the Jungian influences. Tom Cruise is not battling aliens with laser canons and mindless nonsense, he is battling his own ego, externalized in this movie by the alien invasion. Only after going to the depths of his humanity and going to the ultimate extremes can Tom Cruise's character redeem himself and rescue his familial relationships and restore the bonds he selfeshly broke over the course of many years. The film is a much more mature film than say "Batman" in that at the end of the day the hero doesn't rescue the citizens of Gotham, he merely and heroically restores balance to his family. What more can you ask for from a summer blockbuster? Seriously? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member drew_town Posted July 5, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 5, 2005 OK, after reading all the reviews on this thread I'd like to add my thoughts. **Warning spoilers** The film is titled "War of the World's" but how boring and predictable would it be if the worlds at war were Earth vs. Alien. Spielberg takes this movie on a profoundly personal journey. The battle is really between a father and his children. Emotionally they're world's apart and the battle of wills between father and son is palpable. Also the disconnect between father and daughter is evident when he tries to calm his daughter's fears amidst chaos. He has to learn from his son how to help his daughter. The 2nd level of interest to the film are the Jungian influences. Tom Cruise is not battling aliens with laser canons and mindless nonsense, he is battling his own ego, externalized in this movie by the alien invasion. Only after going to the depths of his humanity and going to the ultimate extremes can Tom Cruise's character redeem himself and rescue his familial relationships and restore the bonds he selfeshly broke over the course of many years. The film is a much more mature film than say "Batman" in that at the end of the day the hero doesn't rescue the citizens of Gotham, he merely and heroically restores balance to his family. What more can you ask for from a summer blockbuster? Seriously? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Signs tried, without much success, to do this too. I think you're right on the money, but at the same time there's too much alien and egomaniac fluff in the movie. There's too much talk about force fields and exterminations and shots of roots and so on. I think it makes Ray's family issues seem a little silly. If Ray's conflict was meant to be externalized by the alien invasion, there should have been some subtle clues to support that. I don't recall any. I need to see Ray and the alien invasion juxtaposed or paralleled somehow. I think the movie was shot beautifully, but I was rather disappointed with the content. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Pacini Posted July 5, 2005 Share Posted July 5, 2005 [i"... there's too much alien and egomaniac fluff in the movie." <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Oh come on, be serious. Can you imagine how the critics and the audience would have hated this movie if there was less "alien fluff"? After all, it's not titled "War of a guy trying to be a good father". Criticizing Speilberg has become an international sport. I'm not gonna build an altar to the guy, but let's just face the fact he REALLY knows how to make movies. P.S. The best part of the film was the engine block in the kitchen. I'll bet there are several of those in my neighborhood! MP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 6, 2005 Share Posted July 6, 2005 "The 2nd level of interest to the film are the Jungian influences. Tom Cruise is not battling aliens with laser canons and mindless nonsense, he is battling his own ego, externalized in this movie by the alien invasion." I find it impossible to believe that the writer(s) really thought of this as they wrote the script. Writer: The script is done Mr. Spielberg Spielberg: Did you add in the second level Jungian influences? Writer: Oooops I forgot, sorry! Come back in a week and it will be there. After all there are some very smart viewers out there. :D R, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member drew_town Posted July 6, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 6, 2005 Oh come on, be serious.Can you imagine how the critics and the audience would have hated this movie if there was less "alien fluff"? After all, it's not titled "War of a guy trying to be a good father". Criticizing Speilberg has become an international sport. I'm not gonna build an altar to the guy, but let's just face the fact he REALLY knows how to make movies. P.S. The best part of the film was the engine block in the kitchen. I'll bet there are several of those in my neighborhood! MP <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Just saying, it's been done to death. A little creativity never hurt anyone. I would have liked it. And I'm not criticizing Speilberg. He didn't write it. I like most of his movies quite a lot. These are, however, the years of the remakes and sequels. Creativity seems to be running a little slim. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Louis Posted July 6, 2005 Share Posted July 6, 2005 I thought there was a problem with the visuals, and only the people here can help me pinpoint it: It seemed to me that throughout the movie, there was a really weird, blurry, featureless glow around certain areas of the frame, particularly faces, as if a really bad DI job was done. This was mainly towards the beginning. Having now read the AC article and finding out that Kaminski didn't even use a DI, I'm clueless as to what it could be. I saw the movie at a theater that has shown me bad prints before, but most of the movie looked just fine. Maybe a problem with just the first reel? Besides this one problem, it was obviously very well shot and well lit. It just kind of confused me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member David Mullen ASC Posted July 6, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 6, 2005 The film freely mixes shots made with a net diffusion with other shots made with a Classic Soft diffusion in the same scene, especially in the early section. Classic Soft sort of makes little "bubbles" around points of light, whereas the net creates sort of a star filter effect. Both soften the image. The most obvious use of Classic Softs was in the wide shots of the ferry at night. Despite the fact that the AC article does not mention a D.I., it certainly looks like a D.I. was used, similar to the one for "The Terminal". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Louis Posted July 6, 2005 Share Posted July 6, 2005 (edited) The film freely mixes shots made with a net diffusion with other shots made with a Classic Soft diffusion in the same scene, especially in the early section. Classic Soft sort of makes little "bubbles" around points of light, whereas the net creates sort of a star filter effect. Both soften the image. The most obvious use of Classic Softs was in the wide shots of the ferry at night. Despite the fact that the AC article does not mention a D.I., it certainly looks like a D.I. was used, similar to the one for "The Terminal". <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I'm not sure if that was the problem. I mean, would using different kinds of diffusion make Dakota Fanning's face at the beginning look like it had less contrast and less detail than the rest of the scene around her? That's what it looked like to me anyway. It's something that I seem to see only in movies that have used a DI, so I do think that you're right about the DI, and if so, I think that maybe the ENR process that Kaminski used created too much contrast, and after the resolution loss from the DI, he was left with very little detail in Dakota Fanning's face toward the beginning. Is that possible? Edited July 6, 2005 by Louis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member David Mullen ASC Posted July 6, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 6, 2005 I mean, would using different kinds of diffusion make Dakota Fanning's face at the beginning look like it had less contrast and less detail than the rest of the scene around her? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yes, heavier levels of diffusion can lower contrast and detail. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Patrick Neary Posted July 6, 2005 Share Posted July 6, 2005 The film freely mixes shots made with a net diffusion with other shots made with a Classic Soft diffusion in the same scene, especially in the early section. Classic Soft sort of makes little "bubbles" around points of light, whereas the net creates sort of a star filter effect. Both soften the image. The most obvious use of Classic Softs was in the wide shots of the ferry at night. Despite the fact that the AC article does not mention a D.I., it certainly looks like a D.I. was used, similar to the one for "The Terminal". <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Kaminski is a brilliant cinematographer, but i thought the filtration was very distracting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Filip Plesha Posted July 7, 2005 Share Posted July 7, 2005 It felt to me that the diffusion was totally out of place. A blockbuster movie with accent on effects and aliens, suddenly there are these shots with diffusion, it really felt strange The balls around the lights did look surreal and interesting though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michel Hafner Posted July 8, 2005 Share Posted July 8, 2005 Despite the fact that the AC article does not mention a D.I., it certainly looks like a D.I. was used, similar to the one for "The Terminal". <{POST_SNAPBACK}> There was no DI credit in the end credits, was there? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Most Posted July 8, 2005 Share Posted July 8, 2005 There was no DI credit in the end credits, was there? Steven Spielberg still insists on cutting his pictures on film. He is very traditionalist in his post production practices, even though he can embrace digital visual effects very effectively. Even "Minority Report," probably the most "stylized" of his more recent pictures, was finished photochemically. Ironically, "The Terminal," one of the less stylized, was the only one I can think of that went through a digital intermediate - and in that case, it was done more or less as an "experiment." David mentioned that it "looks like" a DI was used. As far as I know this is not the case, although it must be kept in mind that any shot that involves a visual effect undergoes a "DI" treatment, in that it is scanned, color timed, and recorded to film in exactly the same manner as a digital intermediate. In the case of War of the Worlds, I would guess that at least 50-60% of the picture consists of visual effects shots, so in the strictest sense of the term, it is a "DI", even though the final color timing might have been done traditionally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Landon D. Parks Posted July 9, 2005 Share Posted July 9, 2005 (edited) Just came back from seeing War of the Worlds and Star wars III.... I think both films combined where worth the $6.00 I had to pay to get in (cause I snuck into Star Wars! ha ha ha)... The first film I seen, War of the worlds: I went into this moving not expecting much, because as I have said before, I don't much like a majority of Spielberg films. I must say that I was surprised by what I saw, It started out slow, dragging and boring, an I was telling myself "This is gonna suck", but then the action kicked in. I think Dakota Fanning delivers the film, and Cruise made an attempt, but he fell WAY short of a good performance in my opinion (I never did much like Cruise either, though). I left the movie happy with what I saw, and will be returning to see it again soon. It was nothing great, but there is something about "Those Kind" of movies that if done right, can really give you an uneasy feeling, and this pulled that off. Sure, it started slow, and the beginning didn't make much sense to me, seeing as how the alien things showed up like 10 minutes into the movie (too soon)... It was like, is there gonna be any back-story to make you care for any of the Characters? In the end, the only Character I really cared about was Rachel, I guess because she is so innocent in the film. Tom on the other hand, I was kind of hoping they would take him :o .... I must say, it?s very "LOUD", and thanks to War of the worlds, I had to sit through Star wars with a pounding headache from all the sound FX and loud noises (combined with the theaters brand new sound system) :( I must say, I was kinda hoping someone would get butcherd by the aliens, but in the end, the whole family was reunited, which almost mad me cry (for some reason) but still I was kinda hoping for the drama of someone dying, or maybe everyone losing and them ALL dying... Maybe Im weird... But in the end, This film would have been worth the $6.00 alone, but when I seen that Star Wars was playing in the next auditorium over, and that it was starting just as I left War of the Worlds, I just had to sneak in, since I had not seen it yet, and I was not about the pay another $6.00 for a "Lucas" film.... Now on to: Star Wars: Lucas really surprised me. Had I know the film was so get (one of the best star wars I?ve seen), I would probly have paid an extra $6.00 for it... But you never know what kind of surprise Lucas has in for ya... The beginning was EXTREMELY slow, and filled with nothing but lightsabor fights, none of which I found very exciting to watch... However, once it was clear that Anakin (I think that?s how you spell it) was turning over to the dark side, Lucas really released all that he had, and to tell you the truth, he released enough to make me smile. It was weird to see the Anakin that we grew up with (ep 1 & 2) turn into someone so evil; I could have never seen it in him... HOWEVER, today seemed to be my unlucky day, because this movie was even louder that War of the worlds! And I'm sure John (our sound guy) had the volume yanked up to MAX, and with the new sound system (installed 2 weeks ago in every auditorium), and combined with Lucas choice of sound effects, my headache from War of the worlds only got worse... The moral of this story: Both films combined where more than worth the money paid to see them, and I'm glad to see that both Spielberg and Lucas made super-cool films this time..... PS) Try to avoid theaters with new sound systems, and a sounf guy that loves to yank up the volume, unless of course it dont bother you.... Edited July 9, 2005 by Landon D. Parks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Landon D. Parks Posted July 9, 2005 Share Posted July 9, 2005 PS) Probly the most emotional time in the movie for me was when Tom killed the guy that went nuts in the basement... That whole scene just worked for some reason... I think I WAS in tears during that part (but you didnt hear it from me) :huh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Kai.w Posted July 9, 2005 Share Posted July 9, 2005 PS) Probly the most emotional time in the movie for me was when Tom killed the guy that went nuts in the basement... That whole scene just worked for some reason... I think I WAS in tears during that part (but you didnt hear it from me) :huh: <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Honestly I see it just the other way. What do you mean the movie started slow? It hardly takes a few minutes till the thunderclouds arrive and those lightning appears which is probably the best and most spooky part in the movie. I really enjoyed the movie just till this basement scene. This one was really bad. Was one of the few times I just could not believe a performance of Tim Robbins. This whole part was really laughable and hysterical. Plus I'm usually not so hard on logics and stuff because in the end its just a movie. I guess only nerds would complain about this tentacle thing in the basement being dumb in not seeing them since sometimes they were barely hidden behind thin wood boards that did not cover them completely that it does not have any motion detection or infrared view technology and that it can be easily destroyed by an axe, etc. Thats alright with me. The fact however that the whole tension this thing is supposed to create for this scene is not based on the thing itself but rather on the fact that this is the mobile "eye" of one of those alien machines, and that one was not afraid of the thing itself but of what it is connected to... and what happens when the girl runs our of the basement screaming(!) and Cruise destroys it and follows here..? There is just nothing! No alien to be seen at all, no girl... Cruise has the time to run around through the garden shout for his daughter...still nothing.... so where the hell did this tentacle come from, what was I supposed to be afraid of all that time?... still nothing happens... then after a while it seemed by pure coincidence one of those tripods appeared and just in this moment the daughter that all the time had not answered to her screaming father appears frightened on the hill totally exposed in a nice wide shot... That was just too much spielberg for me and a good example for some other parts that really annoyed me so that I really though "give me a break". Other examples: The family conflicts coming up in of course the most inappropriate moments. Granted its probably realistic to assume this stuff breaks free in moments of heavy stress and yet it was so predictable and overdone to the extreme here. Probably because I felt those conflicts had no connection to the actual plot that I felt it was just too calculated in order to get some more hysteria... a good example was at that hill where the son wants to get to the army suddenly shouting and accusing the divorced father of not having been there for them while down the hill the daughter is about to get "kidnapped" and lets not forget the giant manslaughtering aliens attacking some tanks and helicopters and so on at the same time... All in all I felt really entertained by the movie. But there were just some parts where I really thought Spielberg overdid it... -k Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Landon D. Parks Posted July 9, 2005 Share Posted July 9, 2005 My other complaint with War of the Worlds is that it was not very "Epic", I mean there where hardly any wide shots, most of the shots seeemed really tight, and several times I got dizzy from the shaking of the camera so much in sone scenes. I was hoping Spielberg would use a lot of wider lenses in this film, to give it a more "Open" and "epic" feel rather than tight lenses and giving it a sort of "inclosed" feeling. All in all, the film was great... But as with most spielberg films, and most films in general, I have complaints about them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boone Hudgins Posted July 9, 2005 Share Posted July 9, 2005 I must say I enjoyed the movie. I liked forward moving storyline. I liked the fact that it was told from the point of view of one group of people, even though sometimes it seemed too convenient for that particular group of people. I also was satisfied that the arc of the movie was not in the tale of the aliens, but with the family. The ending on the sci-fi angle was a bit anti-climactic (just like in the book), but it was more important that the family drama was complete. It seemed to me that Tom Cruise's character didn't realize how much his kids meant to him. He put his career, his hobbies, and himself before anybody else, but through the movie, all that fell apart and he realized that the most tangible thing in his life was his family. I thought that was unique as far as action movies go anymore. It wasn't mindless action, nor did it try to be more highbrow than it actually was. I really liked the photography. It was really loose, but not in a vomit-inducing Shakey Cam kind of way that everybody's doing. It really felt appropriate to the story. The camera movement seemed as haphazard as Tom Cruise's attempts to protect his children. It wasn't an epic tale, and it didn't warrant grandiose shots. It was almost as if it was one step away from being in the heads of the people surviving it. And although there weren't a lot of wide shots, Landon, there was a lot of use of wide angle lenses, like most Spielberg movies. A lot of the moving shots were fairly wide. Most of the long lenses were reletively still closeups. I was a bit confused with the random changing of diffusion. I liked the netted look at the beginning, then all of a sudded it was the globby, Classic Soft look from The Terminal. Both looks definitely work fine, but it was kind of distracting. I guess you could say it was a bold look from Kaminski, I would expect nothing less. I really liked the contrasty interiors, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
K Borowski Posted July 9, 2005 Share Posted July 9, 2005 Funny, as one of the only people who actually watches the credits that roll at the end of a film, all the way to the end (I like knowing who the film loaders and negative cutters are), I noticed that there was a credit at the end for KODAK MP film. Why'd they have a credit at the end if it were shot on Fuji? Does any one (David Mullen ahem ahem) know what stock they shot this film on? I give it two tripods up as a great flick, with tasteful, well-done digital graphics that really impressed me, and didn't look FAKE like Star Wars I, II, and III. Regards. ~Karl Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member Justin Hayward Posted July 10, 2005 Premium Member Share Posted July 10, 2005 According to the recent American Cinematographer? Fuji Super F-250D 8562 Super F-250T 8552 Reala 500D 8592 Kodak Vision 500T 5279 ?Most of the day work was shot on Fuji film stocks, and we used Kodak (Vision 500T) 5279 for the night work,? says Kaminski.? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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