War of the Worlds Vs. ID4

War of the Worlds is now $7 million behind where Independence Day was after being out the same number of days. And that's not compensating for 9 years of inflated ticket prices since ID4's release in 1996.

In 1996 Will Smith had yet to carry a movie on his own. Tom Cruise is, well, Tom Cruise. In 1996 the director of ID4 hadn't done a film anyone had seen. Spielberg is, well, Spielberg. And not only did WOTW get better reviews than ID4, it was released on more screens -- almost a thousand more --and on the exact same weekend.

So, what happened? This. That's what happened.

Hollywood needs to wake up. Their chic anti-Americanism is costing them a fortune -- especially in the new blogosphere world where a creepy screenwriter can no longer get away with making an indefensible comment to a fringe publication knowing the MSM will protect him. There is no reason the combination of Cruise, Spielberg, H.G. Wells, and a huge Summer action sci-fi extravaganza shouldn't be crushing a ten year old movie. None. Except of course when the public learns the film's a $200 million love letter of encouragement to our enemy.

And dare I point out ID4 was unabashedly patriotic and pro-military? Even pro-nuclear? That it made you feel good to be an American? Is it possible that's what brought people back for the second and third showings WOTW is not benefiting from?

It's a whole new world Hollywood. The word's gotten out you hate us. We're just hating you back.

Hat tip: Glenn and Mickey

UPDATE: Welcome fellow Kausfile addicts. Thanks Mickey.

And... I agree the film is doing well. Just not anywhere near as well as it could have.

Comments

[RFTR]

I don't know if you're a fan of Stargate Atlantis, but the opening episode of the second season of that series (which aired on Friday) was a perfect contrast.

The aliens came--they were beating the snot out of humans at an alien outpost. Just in time, additional American military showed up (it was actually the airforce flying a space fortress of sorts) and they overpowered the enemy invaders.

And you know what? I would rather stay in on "Sci-Fi Friday" to watch Stargates SG-1 and Atlantis than keep paying high prices to see bad movies that attack me for being American and proud of it.

[Doug in Colorado]

I hope you're right about people staying away in droves because of the anti-american rantings, but I'm not sure they got enough coverage in this case to account for the lackluster performance of WOTW. It may be that despite the heavy credentials and big names, it's just one more (yawn) remake and the word of mouth is that it's nothing special.

...Independence Day was a real Kick-some-Alien-butt-for-the-whole-human-race fun fest, still a fun movie, a modern day Sci-Fi "Casablanca" with no piano player.

[Fielding Mellish]

I think the ID4 guys also made StarGate the Movie...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0111282/

So they've got a better track record than you mentioned.

Your point still stands, though, in my opinion.

[JJay]

Like the old Marxists, the people who run Hollywood have a ideological shield that prevents them from perceiving reality. That and the fact more than half of movie profits are made overseas where pro-American movies are not popular account for the current situation. The domestic market would have to drop quite a bit more and a diversity of opinion force its way in for Tinsel Town to mend its ways. Or we can wait for the Warren Beattys and Timn Robbins to die, taking the Sarandans and the other boneheads with them.

[werner]

I´m not so sure the patriotism of ID4 was meant seriously. Its German director also made "The Day after Tomorrow". When he was promoting that movie, he said some pretty nasty things about the US in general and President Bush in particular - but only to German interviewers, of course. You don´t even want to know what Will Smith said about 9/11 when doing interviews for "I, Robot" in Germany.

[Mike G]

You know, I don't dismiss that David Koepp (whom I'm sorry to learn is a leftwing dunderhead; admittedly Chronicles of Riddick supported the dunderhead part, but its picture of an interplanetary nihilist cult was pretty staunchly anti-Islamofascist) may think that WOTW is an anti-Iraq War movie.

I'm not convinced, however, that Steven Spielberg thinks so. WOTW is loaded with both 9/11 imagery and Holocaust imagery, and seems to be strongly suggesting that ordinary Americans are like the Jews having to escape implacable fascist destruction. (Or to hide in their crawlspaces from it.)

It also features an archetypal debate between a self-indulgent boomer who thinks someone else should do the fighting (admittedly, not quite in jibe with the bluecollarness of Cruise's character otherwise) and the Gen Yer who hears duty calling.

And last but not least, Tim Robbins gets to spout off about what the enemy is motivated by. And he is portrayed as f'in' nuts, and finally shut up with the back of a shovel.

All that added up to a firmly rightwing 9/11 movie to me.

[John Marino]

Hollywood today is what it will be until some new blood takes over and changes things. Spielberg is a product of the left wing hippie generation and he will add his leftist views no matter what. He cannot help himself because his ego and that of the rest of these mega filmmakers, have sold their souls to this American love affair with socialism/Atheism/and thier hated for the America, that their parents created.

If these nitwits had any brains, they would be making a 100 times the profits, if they follow Mel Gibson's lead. If Speilberg and the rest of his peer group, made films that promoted GOD & COUNTRY the public would come out in droves and these jack-offs would be breaking box office records.

However, if they did that, then they'll have to admit that everything they've ever believed in and their whole life was a fraud.

[JJ]

I have to disagree with your hypothesis. WOTW is doing poorly because of the Tom Cruise freak show that has been going on for the last month and a half. When a bankable star jumps head first into the crazy pool, he no longer is a bankable star. His former publicist kept his crazyness under wraps, but his new publicist (his sister, another Scientologist) doesn't find him to be crazy so she is letting him run amok. The supposed ant-American bias in the movie has not made news, Cruise's crazyness has. Occam's razor people. I know that you can't make a political statement that fits your agenda about Cruise's crazyness, but you're really reaching here.

[Jeff Osman]

I think you are overestimating the power of the internet and blogs in influencing the general public. Let's face it, most people will never engage in this discussion because it is too far in the weeds for them. I agree, though making a lot of money, WOTW's performance is not standing up to supposed inferior movies like ID4. I think it is because the movie, although compelling most of the time, careens in to many directions and never satisfyingly ties it all together. It is a good movie, not a great movie, which is a lot less than we would expect from Cruise and Spielberg. I saw the movie and I am in the military, I in no way connected what I saw on the screen with the overseas comments made by the writer. I would expect as much by the general public. WOTW's performance, or lack there of, could probably be chalked up to most people's reaction, and mine, after viewing it. When recommending it I say, "Wait 'till it comes out on DVD." I think the Cruise freak show has merit, too!

[harkyman]

Saw the movie, despite the fact that it stars Cruise, on the recommendation of a good friend who indicated that it's good enough that you don't care that it's wacko-boy playing the lead. In my opinion, my friend was right. As for Koepp's statements? That sure wasn't the movie I saw.

Of course, that may be the last movie I see in a theater, as my set up at home is almost as satisfying, and I don't have to deal with the obnoxious loud people who feel the need to talk the whole way through the movie. Well, sometimes we still have to deal with that at home, but in that case it's just the kids and we can make them button it.

I'd say it's a combo of people being sick of Tom Cruise and his CoS rantings, and people having back moviegoing experiences, vis a vis both price and clientele.

[Jake]

I think some of you are reading too much into the movie. The basic plot and theme are faithful to the 1898 Wells's novel, and I doubt Wells was writing anti-imperialist allegory then. I sense paranoia amongst the critics. The main problem with the film is that the Cruise character is so stupid and unlikeable, you end up despising him for his nannyish behavior and his stupid desire to head to Boston while the earth is being destroyed. You don't have to have much intelligence, in both senses of the word, to realize the Martians will attack densely crowded places first, like crowded ferry landings and big cities.

[LN_Smithee]

Years ago, Steve Martin had a comedy special in which file footage of Ronald Reagan was edited to make it appear that there was a secret law that the President was prohibited from going to the bathroom in the United States. In the video, then-President Reagan, who couldn't hold it in at a press conference, excused himself and got aboard Air Force One. He lands in Toronto, gets in a limo, and goes to a Canadian gas station. Then he returned to the White House to resume the press conference.

It seems like many Hollywood figures are very much like the fictional depiction of the President. They have odious, foul things to say about the United States in general (or just its leadership) but they dare not drop their load within the borders of the nation; they dash off to England, France, Switzerland, wherever, and open their mouths in the presence of a European reporter. Usually the reporters are the type that won't refer to Al-Qaeda figures as terrorists -- anti-American stuff coming out of Americans is like spells like a rose to them.

I am surprised that Koepp -- whose work I enjoyed in the first Spider-Man flick -- is such an idiot, although I really can't tell you why I was surprised. As for Roland Emmerich, who directed ID4, I knew there was something wrong with the guy when he made noises about "Starship Troopers" being a metaphor for marketing of war as cool, or something like that. I disagree with Leo about ID4 being supposedly pro-nuke; bug-eyed Jeff Goldblum's fey techie character kept his head throughout the alien arrival and hovering threat overhead, but once President Bill Pullman decided the only way to prevent the extermination of the human race was to nuke the murderous squids (Prez: "What do you want us to do?" Alien: "Diiiie."), what was Jeff's reaction? He got stinking drunk, as if being slaughtered by the billions was preferable to using a nuke on the slaughterers.

[Lexington]

Hrm...

Something strikes me - when one does publicity for a Hollywood movie, one is under fairly tight restrictions from the studio as to what can and can not be said, and I'm fairly sure these restrictions don't just melt away when one crosses international borders. So, it can be assumed that the studio was okay with what Koepp's been saying about the film, and may well have encouraged or ordered it. After all, a metaphor about the Iraq War which shows Americans as the unwarranted aggressors does play well to many those increasingly-important foriegn audiences.

Makes more sense to me than a movie with no apparent connection to the war being intended as a metaphor for it.

[Joe Smith]

Just as an FYI Spielberg said he envisioned the Americans as Americans and the aliens as terrorists. I agree that the anti-military ramblings of the writer are ridiculous, but lets be fair: It isn't all of Hollywood, just too much. Also, I think that the lackluster performance had more to do with Tom Fatigue after he lost hos freaking mind. Also, Scientology is a creepy evil cult and should be treated as such.

www.wikipedia.en.org

Look up "Fair Game" as related to Scientology if you want to be a little scared