*sighs* Doughboy my man, Doughboy....what happened to you?
It is amazing to behold just how Amazon's War of the Worlds gets everything wrong- not just about what made the original presentation so compelling, but how this remake just flat out doesn't even understand proper filmmaking technique. Hey, I'm not opposed to a digital-based story framing in a film once in a while- the John Cho thriller "Missing" is criminally underrated, and the teen horror film "Unfriended" is camp fun. Ladies and gentlemen, War Of Worlds 2025, directed by Rich Lee (god bless his soul) ain't no Unfriended, and I think we owe the Tom Cruise version- flawed as it is- a sincere apology now.
As William Radford, a cranky HS analyst who's obsessed with monitoring everything and everyone around him (including his own family), Cube is busy mourning over his deceased spouse when Eva Longoria, his NASA contact, alerts him of chaos erupting worldwide, heralding what's eventually shown as an incoming invasion of angry people from beyond the stars. Mayhem and explosions abound, but it's hard for the audience to get a good sense of the impact since everything is viewed through Ice Cube inside his little bunker. The budget's too thin for him to peek outside and maybe see if his neighbors are all right.
What do they want? It's not made clear eventually, but there's a weird dangling thread of potential conspiracy that Radford inevitably has to unravel, although he maintains a notable level of stubbornness that prevents him from picking up on some odd things that are staring him right in the face. Henry Hunter Hall plays Will's equally tech-savvy son David, who's got the dirt on the government's interest in the aliens. Because as Jesse Ventura will tell you, there's always something under the surface with these things.
Also we have Devon Bostick here, whose talent is being ill-served as a comical but heroic- what else?- Amazon delivery boy. I can't believe it, a whole ass corporation made a movie and literally added in their own Mary Sue-character. Jesus, at least Mattel had Will Ferrell play their CEO as a complete goofball in the Barbie movie, and they satirized themselves as a bit greedy. Nope, Amazon's gotta help save the world!
Let's not kid ourselves: this thing is shameless and crass. I believe advertising, when done well, can be great art, but there's got to be some heart and wit behind it. This isn't a catch jingle or a funny thirty-second TV spot from your childhood; no, you need to get ready for 90-minutes plus of Ice Cube screaming "Run!" "Move!" and "Get outta there!" at what looks like PS3-quality cutscenes that one could find in your average Call Of Duty fantasy add-on. It's like one of the AI robots I guess they have back there at Amazon HQ spilled Mr. Bezos's coffee on itself, malfunctioned, and tried to edit an action movie. Or rather, imagine if Beavis and Butt-Head were playing with a camcorder, Beavis went on a sugar binge, turned into Cornholio, and they said "Uhhh, we'd like to shoot your movie, sir. Huh huh huh."
They can not hold the camera straight for ONE second. If the corny constant "last goodbye" speeches and contrived plot twists weren't headache-enducing enough, the camerawork's gonna do you in at some point.
In all honesty, Cube isn't the worst part of this film, the man's working with what he's given, and it's not much. He can be incredibly funny and captivating with the right material, why force him to just bark at a monitor for two hours? I get what they're going for with his arc, the overworking parent who's way too strict and comes off standoffish because they're too devoted to their job.
It's just that the execution is so weak and hamfisted, so there's no hope of the story's tender spot elevating the material. Also, the son throughout this story is proven to be a smarter and more clever than his dad is, and IMO that guy should have been the star. (Not that it would have helped matters much, but still.)
Now keep in mind, all that I just described is only going to be a deterrent if you're coming into this movie genuinely asking for it to legit good. As long as you turn on War Of The Worlds 2025 and you fully realize that this is a complete god damn fiasco, one of the most laughable piles of garbage yet in the streaming movie era, then you'll be more than able to appreciate the Ed Wood-level incompetence of it all.
Some people are saying this is one of the worst movies of all time, and...eh? That depends on what your criteria is, because I do feel it's one of the worst films of the online age, though your meaning on "the worst" could be for one person or another something that bored them, offended them, etc. I can see the sheer commercialism of this movie turning plenty of people off, but I was laughing my ass off at points because I couldn't believe the creative decisions being made here, so I wasn't bored.
Of course, "interesting" doesn't necessarily mean "good". This new War Of The Worlds is absolute ass, but I would still be willing to recommend it just based on how it's just that fascinating of a train wreck. I'm mainly so-so on the Barbershop films, but they're Frank Capra level movies on the Ice Cube Scale compared to whatever this was. And it's absolutely hilarious- just not for the reasons Amazon had intended.
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