Tom Cruise : Ray Ferrier
Dakota Fanning : Rachel
Justin Chatwin : Robbie
Miranda Otto : Mary Ann
Tim Robbins : Harlan Ogilvy
Directed by Steven Spielberg

It’s quiz time. Which of the following best describes the reason that Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds was produced:

A. The original movie wasn’t all that good and the new version improves on it.
B. The original movie was good but the director has a new take on the film
C. The original movie was good, but If we put out a new version we’ll make a lot of money

Let’s see it’s not A because the original version of War of the Worlds was actually a pretty good movie and the new version didn’t improve on it one bit.

And it’s not B because the new version tells the same story as the old version; the new version breaks no new ground.

So it must be…

You guessed it C. Dollar signs were apparently foremost on the mind of Spielberg and his DreamWorks buddies when they decided to produce this picture.

It’s not really a bad movie, it just wasn’t really needed. The 1953 movie had already told this story quite well and the 2005 version does absolutely nothing to improve on it.

In the original version, Gene Barry plays the …

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