be it possible to give a movie no star . i suppose not . however many star imdb display this just think zero and you will get my drift . director and photographer timothy hines do not have much of a budget compare to spielberg herculean effort with the same material ( rumor to be the most expensive movie ever make ) and but that need not be an insurmountable handicap . i have see some wonderful work do on a comparative shoestring ( soldier and saint be a recent example ) . with hard work and integrity and and above all and talent it be certainly possible to realize a faithful rendition of well novella and at fraction of what be spend by dreamworks on it war of the world . unfortunately and hines fail in all these department . even if he have have spielberg budget and tom cruise sign for the lead his movie would have stunk just as badly a this barnyard animal he foist on u . primarily and hines seem unable to tell a story . thanks to digital video technology he can record image and sound and but he show little aptitude for assemble a narrative with what he record . a guy walk down a country lane and a lot . he talk badly ape receive english to some other guy . then he walk down the same lane and only shot from the back this time to show he return clever and eh . walking and talk and for nearly an hour that all that happen . ok and i will grant that one extend excursion from the main character house to the impact site on horsell common to show that it a considerable distance from one place to the other might be useful ( a first year film student could storyboard a more economical and more aesthetical establish sequence than this and btw ) and but half a dozen time . back and forth and back and forth and et cetera and et cetera with some yakkity yak in between . remarkable . the only explanation for this surfeit of redundancy other than total artistic ineptitude be a desire to pad out thirty minute of wretchedly amateurish cg work into something that could be offer a a feature length film . finally the martian fighting machine appear and the walking and talk becomes run and talk and or shriek . later we get staggering and wail for dessert . thankfully and much of the dialogue be lift straight from h. g. well text while else we would have no idea what be go on . but be it not the whole point of cinema to illuminate a text and to realize what word alone can not convey . if a film relies on dialogue or monologue to tell u what we see or how to feel and why bother . why not do a radio play . orson welles make himself a household name do just that . however and hines think he a filmmaker and so he content to mouth the word and swallow the meaning . secondly and hines be able to buy some cg effect of a sort for his movie and but he have no idea how to use them . now i for one have no unquenchable sweet tooth for eye candy . i believe good science fiction cinema doesn not need dazzle technical effect . some really potent sci fi have flourish on virtually none at all . but the war of the world a film require a certain baseline effort . well tell a story that hinge on thing can be see and hear and even smell . the effect do not need to be complex while they can even be crude ( e. g. fight machine on wire glide over miniature street a see in the george pal or byron haskins 1953 version ) and but they must be handle well . unfortunately hines effect be both crude and incompetent tripod fight machine high than a cathedral spire stomp around make a noise like a pogo stick bounce on linoleum martian squidoids even though oppress by four time the gravity of their native world scurry and flit about without perceptible effort skeleton totally denude of flesh and muscle writhe and scream the same damn horse and buggy greenscreens it way across the foreground a dozen time ( flipped left for right occasionally in hope that we might not notice ) and on ad nauseum . crude technique be forgivable . so you have a cg fire effect that less than convincing . fine and we can work around that . just do not use it too often and only show glimpse of it . that stomp woman sequence look more like a crushed plum . throw it away . it not necessary . you say your martian flyer look like a toy on a string . if you must use it and go ahead and but please do not show it twice . but no and hines would not listen . we get the bad look stuff use again and again . get ta get those 180 minute somehow and boy . next we have act and or more precisely too much act . whether in a speaking role or just pay to die on queue everybody in this film be act his little heart out . evidently hines think he get a bargain more fleeing in terror over there . you and quake behind that tree and let have a real conniption fit this take . you call that writhe in agony . nonsense and my grandmother can writhe good nevertheless the cast a a whole and individually stink . they aren not even good amateur . but this needn not prove fatal . many a good movie have be make with rancid act . that what director be for . and editor . which bring up another point who the hell let tim hines edit this cheese factory . if america butcher be a adept at meat cut a hines be at film cut your next hamburger would be all finger and no beef . in spite of the near three hour run time there be lot of stuff miss from this movie not sequence and but single frame and create a herky jerky effect that nauseate to watch . maybe hines intention be to simulate the effect of a hand crank cine camera of the 1890 . if he be i can say he doesn not know how to do it .