War of the Worlds: Goliath

I went to go see this movie because Kevin Eastman's name was attached to it. Kevin Eastman just in case you don't know created the Ninja Turtles with Peter Lard and is also the publisher of Heavy Metal Magazine. Whenever I think of Heavy Metal magazine I always think of hotly drawn scantily clad girls, and was expecting that in the adult themed animation, but of course adult does not just mean nude girls. Lucky for me this movie did not disappoint when I realized that.

In fact, only one woman was featured in this all-star cast made up of actors from the TV show Highlander. Elizabeth Gracen, who played Amanda on the show and its spin-off, The Raven, played the one woman, while the highlander himself, Adrian Paul toke a side step as a supporting charter. Also Jim Brynes who played Dawson on the show, and is a voice-acting veteran by now, also has a part in the film.

It's a really awesome premise. The movie acts as a sequel to War of the Worlds taking place 15 years after the events of the H.G. Wells novel in a steam punk influenced world where the human race creates an organization to train solders to prepare for another Martian attack just in case it happens. In a time and place when the "issues" that would lead to the First World War are causing conflict with the solders in this organization, which consist of men and women from every country in the world, the solders come together to train in war games only for the Martians to pick that time to attack again.

The movie has a slow start as it tends to run on with it's explanation as to what's going on in the world, but form the beginning the movie was awesome to look at as the animation, which was a blend of traditional animation and CGI and the art design, especially that which focused on a steam punk vibe was as good as the stuff in Heavy Metal Magazine.

Thought the 3D is not worth the price the action is. The battle scenes in the movie were great, not just from the animation point of view but it was very dramatic in it's story telling.

A total thumbs up!

I don't know where this "style" of animation comes from. No, seriously, I don't know. But it seems like a lot of similar stuff was cranked out back in the eighties in shows like "He-Man" or "GI Joe." Every man a steroid-abusing lunk, every woman an astringent big sister. Is that how the world looks to eight-year-olds? I don't know.

I do know that what we see here is an alternative Earth where Martian steroid technology was adapted by Nicolai Tesla to enable all men to be gigantic muscle gods. Or something. But the 'roids also cause them to have bizarre behavioral changes--including constant teeth-clenching, weird grimmacing and a propensity to engage in suicidal fights--with each other, with Martians, with inanimate objects. All the actors spit out their lines like they are The Pharaoh cursing the Israelites. "Where're my pancakes!" sounds like a call to battle in this demented world where everything is macho and nothing is...well, um, "un-macho"?

It's all about the booming and the bashing and the hitting and the smacking, with unintentional comic relief provided by the tiny (of course)"girl" who has one heck of an anime hair-do. Anything--anything would have helped this dead whale get off the ground, except what they did. In this demented world, everything is based upon the social structure and skills of eight-year-olds. Conflict? Fight! All it needs is music by Metalica to be a perfect example of why maturity is a good thing.

Give this one a pass.

Please forget all the "professional" critics who are disgusted by any movie without strong social and political commentary. This is not such flick. This is not movie about weak characters and their development. This is just a non stop steam-punk battle in alternative history. If you want to enjoy father who just wants to hide in a basement, be my guest and watch the War of the Worlds with Tom Cruise. You know it is pretty cool as well.

This movie is "just for fun", more for the anime / scifi / steam-punk fans. The plot is somewhat weak, it is very linear - but what? The setting is pretty amazing, the alternative 1914 looks pretty cool and the battles are hardcore. The violence is here but is is actually mild so this movie could be even fun for older children.

In a summary: Not great but good enough and fun enough. Thumbs up!

Before we start, lets explain a bit about where I'm coming from. I grew up with parents who were fans of the Jeff Wayne War of The Worlds album and rapidly grew to like it myself. Hence, when the opportunity to read the novel came up at school I leaped at the chance and have since remained a fan of both of these works.

It has given me a cynical eye, however, hence pretty much every attempt to adapt the story has come up short in some way or another. So when I learned about this "sequel" I had to give it a shot, especially when I took a look at the cast list.

All in all, I was pleasantly surprised. Its certainly not what I would have expected, was was good fun and respectful to the source material in many ways and whilst I wasn't a huge fan of the Martian tripods, I could at least see how much they had drawn inspiration from the novel, so well done there.

Whilst most of the main characters a vaguely engaging, the stand-outs tended to be the supporting cast, who I got a blast out of and really made the movie shine and setting the whole thing in the run-up to the Great War was a similar moment of inspiration.

Its not perfect though. The story feels perhaps a bit too episodic, rather than feeling like more natural chapters - to the extent I found myself wondering if perhaps it wasn't originally slated to be a TV series and I was watching the first few episodes back-to back. As has been mentioned elsewhere, the dialogue sometimes also feels a little stilted but that clears up for most of the movie.

I also need to add that their choice of opening theme had me hooked from the word go.

So, overall the film is a decent package, not as sophisticated in its storytelling as some of its animated contemporaries, nor as polished as others. But its a good package and a welcome return to animated action, which seems to have fallen by the wayside in recent years (indeed, it reminded me in some ways of Titan AE, which seemed to herald the beginning and end of the last resurgence of animated action movies).

I'd guardedly recommend it, I know it won't be everyone's cup of tea, but it is certainly worth a look, especially if you have any interest in the original story, creative anachronisms or steampunk/dieselpunk tales.

This is not a great movie, but it is a good one. Pearson sets out to tell the story of the second Martian invasion, with humanity using salvaged Martian technology and advances in their own to defend the world more actively than last time. He sets this against the dawn of what in our world would be the First World War. That serves only as backdrop, though. The incipient conflict in Europe, the problem of Irish home rule, and other issues get forgotten partway through the movie. That's okay. They were distractions, and would have detracted from the main story. This is a war movie, not a political drama. It has all the requisite elements of Japanese, American, and British war movies, all the tropes, all the conflicts, and manages to deliver them without becoming a muddle. We have the heroic yet damaged young officer proving himself and overcoming his past. We have the somewhat inappropriate relationship between comrades in arms. We have explosions, heroics, self-sacrifice, and triumph but at a terrible cost. The story of the initial invasion is told briefly, in the credits, ending with an atomic shadow on a wall in a burning city. Pearson moves straight from there to the action getting rolling, and keeps the pacing fairly tight, letting the audience catch their breath but just barely before throwing in the next assault. The film contains what it says on the tin. There's a lot to be said for that.

And hey, any movie with Theodore Roosevelt firing a heavy machine gun while riding atop a walking tank scores points with me.