Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Tom Cruise, Dakota Fanning, Miranda Otto, Tim Robbins
Have I Seen it Before: Yes.
Did I Like It: Recently, I’ve been reading up on UFOlogy, for reasons. A chapter in the book I’m looking at currently (which isn’t very good) takes a turn into the War of the Worlds broadcast of 1938. Naturally, I have some thoughts on that subject. However, in this book I was kind of mystified that the incident was only looked at through the prism of its effect on mass hysteria, which is incidentally somewhat disputed in recent discussions of the incident… That doesn’t really have anything to do with UFOlogy, so why are they discussing it?
Then again, that preceding paragraph has nothing to do with the film we’ve come here to discuss. Why am I bringing it up? The author of that book brings up actor Frank Readick, but not Orson Welles? I mean, really?
This film is far more in tune with the most famous adaptation of the original H.G. Wells novel. That’s the connection. Welles put his Martian invaders in the heart of New Jersey, and so does Spielberg. I like that a lot. Otherwise, the film is that interesting beast of being two seemingly disparate things. It is after the original era of Spielberg’s heyday. Let’s call it the true Amblin era. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982). Jurassic Park (1993). He now almost exclusive works in prestige drama. Schindler’s List (1993). Amistad (1997). The Post (2017) comes to mind as a recent example. This film, along with his other Tom Cruise collaboration, Minority Report (2002), takes place in that later era, but is still high-concept genre entertainment.
It’s almost as if this film is the spiritual successor to Close Encounters, now that I think about that. The earlier film featured a man shedding all parental obligation in light of visitors from another world. Every interview I’ve ever seen with Spielberg on the subject of Close Encounters indicates he regretted that move, and this is his atonement*.
*I’m very tempted, but ultimately thought better of ending this review wondering if he will ever atone for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), especially now that he won’t be directing the next film in the series. It felt too snarky, especially in the context of a review for a film I legitimately enjoyed. Also, that film would be an example of a full-throttle attempt to go back to the Amblin era, and we all know how that worked. So, now it will be a footnote.