On Prime Video now, War Of The Worlds sees Ice Cube fight aliens from the comfort of his computer. Eva Longoria and Amazon also star. Our review:
If you’ve ever wondered how rapper and actor Ice Cube might react if aliens were to invade, War Of The Worlds has the answer. In an air-conditioned government building, he peers at the unfolding catastrophe on his computer screen, his face scrunched up in a ball of disbelief.
“God damn,” Ice says.
This is the latest adaptation of HG Wells’ seminal sci-fi novel War Of The Worlds, but not as we know it. The directorial debut of Rich Lee, it’s the latest in producer Timur Bekmambetov’s ‘screenlife’ movies – a peculiar subgenre that has previously given us the low-budget horror Unfriended (2014) and the thrillers Searching (2018), Run (2020) and Missing (2023). Like a tech spin on Dogme 95, these movies give themselves a creative limitation: all events must take place on a computer screen, meaning their stories are told through video calls, WhatsApp messages and the like.
The difference with War Of The Worlds is that Ice Cube plays a National Security Agency analyst, meaning he has full access to all of North America’s communications network. Cube’s character, Will Radford, also has the creepy habit of using his security clearance to spy on his own family, including his heavily pregnant eldest daughter Faith (Iman Benson) and his young son, Mark (Devon Bostick).
Writers Kenneth Golde and Marc Hyman try to explain Will’s voyeurism through a tragic backstory involving his late wife. Deep down, Will’s essentially a good dad who wants to look after his kids, the story suggests. But then we see how Will reads his daughter’s personal texts, eavesdrops on personal conversations, and even uses his hacking skills to coerce his offspring into playing fewer videogames and eating more healthily. Whichever way you slice it, that’s pretty creepy.
Sure, you may think, but what has this got to do with alien invaders? As the first 15 minutes are spent watching Will boss his kids around and help the FBI track down an Anonymous-like hacker called The Disruptor, this writer was wondering the same thing. But then Eva Longoria’s NASA scientist calls up in a panic and tells Will that weird things are happening with the weather; meteors are streaking across the sky and satellite systems are going down.
“Wow,” Will says.
Within minutes, the entire planet is under full-scale assault, and its governments are forced to coordinate in order to fend off the alien war machines. “This is humanity’s last chance,” the US President (Jim Meskimen) says over a video call. “I see no other option but to initiate this war of the worlds to save us all.”
What happens next, and the invaders’ somewhat muddled reason for attacking us in the first place, is too good to spoil here. In fact, if you haven’t seen the trailer yet, and you have Prime Video, go and watch the movie. It’s one of the most breathtakingly odd things you’ll see this year.
On paper, Mr Cube is an odd choice to play a somewhat beige security specialist. In practice, he’s the film’s best asset: War Of The Worlds is, in effect, a 90-minute reaction video, focused almost entirely on an actor whose line readings read like the first letter of each word begins with a capital letter. As alien war machines descend on the world’s landmarks – all relayed through shaky mobile phone clips and news footage – Cube’s expressions of horror are absolute comedy gold.
Some of the best include (but are not limited to):
“Oh. My. God.”
“SHEILA!”
“Dayum.”
“Woo, hell yeah!”
And perhaps best of all:
“They blew up my house, man. I don’t have alien invasion insurance!”
Eva Longoria, meanwhile, has the thankless role of explaining the latest plot developments – sometimes twice, just in case we were too busy looking at our phones to listen. The upside for all involved appears to be that they could make the movie without leaving their homes. War Of The Worlds was shot about four or five years ago, with Cube and Longoria able to record their performances while the pandemic was still raging. Former Marvel star Clark Gregg also shows up for a scene or two in his sweaty gym gear.
In a weird sort of way, this makes War Of The Worlds a companion piece to Ari Aster’s Eddington, in that they’re both enmeshed in how the planet reacted to the Covid-19 outbreak. Like most of us in 2020, the characters in War Of The Worlds are all huddled inside, reacting to a sudden calamity through their smart devices. There’s fear and paranoia as everyone wonders where the threat came from and exactly how it can be dealt with.
Thankfully, War Of The Worlds is much funnier than the pandemic was, and shorter. Its events also appear to unfold in real time, making this a kind of sub-90-minute alien invasion speedrun. It’s also one of the shakiest-looking alien invasion movies this side of an Asylum production; the three-legged war machines have a neat, spindly design that riffs on Steven Spielberg’s adaptation from 2005 (with a possible nod to producer George Pal’s adaptation from the 1950s), but the shots themselves barely look finished. If the likes of Gareth Edwards and Neill Blomkamp made the blending of real-world footage and VFX look effortless, then War Of The Worlds makes their efforts look downright miraculous.
This may be a side effect of its production; Universal Pictures was originally going to distribute – meaning this incredible artefact may have been destined for cinemas – before it was sold to Amazon MGM. Hence its quiet Prime Video debut. On a Wednesday.
The streaming giant’s involvement also explains why there’s repeated product placement for its products and services from beginning to end. One character works as a delivery driver for Amazon, and spends the entire film in his uniform, emblazoned with the firm’s logo. Will repeatedly invokes the company’s name when scolding people (“You risked our whole lives to spy on our Amazon carts?!”. When another character tries to get a member of the public to help in a moment of crisis, someone yells, “Wait, give him an Amazon gift card for a thousand bucks.”
Presumably, Amazon decided to cast itself as humanity’s saviour during War Of The Worlds’ lengthy post-production period, with the scenes described above added later; it’s hard to imagine why Universal would want them there.
Whenever it came in, the blatant advertising still isn’t the most distracting thing in the movie. There are so many baffling creative decisions, clumsy lines, wobbly effects shots and confused messaging (mass surveillance is bad, but also really useful) that War Of The Worlds unfolds like a fireworks display of madness.
Presiding over it all, perhaps channeling the ghost of HG Wells, looking at what the 21st century did to his key text, is Ice Cube.
“That’s crazy, right there,” Cube says, observing another terrible VFX shot. The rest of us can only nod in agreement.
War Of The Worlds is available to stream on Prime Video now. Get your friends. Open a beer or two.
