Please Don't Give Me What I Think I Want
Boy, War of the Worlds was fun. Zero complaints with the action. But what was with the ultra-happy ending? Tom and Dakota make it to an untouched Boston cul-de-sac to find the townhouse standing, Mom alive, and... the older brother has made it home safely too?!
Let me make something perfectly clear: I don't want teenage boys to die. But when teenage boys run off half-cocked to valiantly-slash-stupidly join the losing side of a war, I'm prepared to say goodbye and make my peace.
What seems like a really happy ending actually made many of us unhappy. It feels like a cheat. It's too much to ask, and we know it. The kid having survived takes the sting out of his actions in the first place, and renders the world of this movie a lie... apparently, despite the random and overpowering force of this alien attack, it's possible for an entire family (split into three different groups) to survive. How many other families got this lucky?
Surviving should always come at some cost.
Boy, War of the Worlds was fun. Zero complaints with the action. But what was with the ultra-happy ending? Tom and Dakota make it to an untouched Boston cul-de-sac to find the townhouse standing, Mom alive, and... the older brother has made it home safely too?!
Let me make something perfectly clear: I don't want teenage boys to die. But when teenage boys run off half-cocked to valiantly-slash-stupidly join the losing side of a war, I'm prepared to say goodbye and make my peace.
What seems like a really happy ending actually made many of us unhappy. It feels like a cheat. It's too much to ask, and we know it. The kid having survived takes the sting out of his actions in the first place, and renders the world of this movie a lie... apparently, despite the random and overpowering force of this alien attack, it's possible for an entire family (split into three different groups) to survive. How many other families got this lucky?
Surviving should always come at some cost.
posted by Jennica at 1:00 p.m.
4 Comments:
I DO want teenage boys to die.
I don't think it's quite the problem you do -- yes, could have been set-up better, somehow, showing son has a skill or something that Dad has been supressing, and by letting him go, this will be letting him live...and making it clear this skill saved son's bacon ultimately. It' some nod to want/need/arc for TC's character...
...he WANTS to keep is family together, but NEEDS to let him go and be independent...
...so by serving that need, letting him go, he is then rewarded by the universe by his want in act III, intact and alive family. Yes, there's a difference between letting your son drive your car and letting him go during the apocalypse...but as a divorced dad, this made sense to me...well, I GOT it...tho' I felt a bit like you did at the final moment (see Kiss Kiss Bang Bang for a great gag on this type of story moment).
More troubling to me: the deus ex machina of the ending -- nothing any of the characters do get them out of that pickle...anti-climactic.
BUT: with you, mainly...gripped by a feeling of dread throughout, scary, bleak...well ahead of most movies.
chris
One of my problems with this flick was that the 'probe' came down into the basement twice. They couldn't come up with something else?
Ryan
I completely agree that the Tom's movie son should have died, he made his choice, and the audience had been given every indication that it should have resulted in death. I guess the divine power of Spielberg had to illustrate that rich pretty people can beat the odds and end up in a family utopia after much of the planet has been slaughtered.
The narration let the audience pull a bit of superiority out of the fact that the aliens died completely by chance, that had the creatures done their homework a bit more thoroughly all the humans would be dead. At least the soldiers didn't start chanting "USA! USA!" after they took down the dying tripod.
Aliens please incinerate Dakota Fannings character. Children who've learned enough to constantly be irritating and critical of their parents but are still cripplingly dependent on said parents really need a reality check from the martians. I know parents reap what they sow and all that, but the children from Jurassic Park where probably at least as neglected and way more useful.
Thanks for the interesting post PLUS the informative replies. I love this stuff! Front row with some folks in the Biz.
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