A lot of fun.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Seeing this title in my Amazon Prime suggestions I jumped right away at giving it a shot. The idea of a mockumentary telling of the War between the Planets as a real event struck me as utter genius and gold. I was wondering if it would be something like World War Z (the book), as an "oral history" in the form of interviews with survivors after the fact in a world irrevocably changed by the events, or perhaps some manner of Alternate 1960s in which Earth has assimilated Martian technology and greatly advanced over the century far more than in reality, or perhaps even some manner of post-apocalyptic telling in a world dominated or partly destroyed by Martians using one of the last remaining video cameras. I appear to have gotten far ahead of myself in that regard, as what I got instead was a very safe re-telling of the actual novel War of the Worlds, almost completely by the book in the form of an uncovered 1965 interview with the last remaining survivor of the "war" itself. Given that it follows the book very strictly, there is little room to indulge in historical what-ifs, given that the "war" only lasts a few days/weeks before the Martians succumb to Earthborn illness and bacteria. This rather disappointed me, as I felt that so much more could have been done with the story. About the only thing new with this version is the framing device of a documentary, and nothing more. Not only is this an immense letdown, but it betrays what you begin to suspect during much of the prologue exposition and the interview itself, and which is painfully revealed in a postlude claiming that Bertie Wells, after surviving the War of the Worlds, went to America and became a war correspondent and served...... in World War I. So despite the literally species-changing event of an interplanetary invasion, one which has resulted in tens or hundreds of thousands of deaths, the destruction of multiple English towns and cities, and the remains of Martian technology left behind which could conceivably change all of human civilization unlike anything that had preceded it, far beyond that of even internal combustion, electricity, or the radio...... despite all that, Human history continues along basically the exact same path, with a World War I around the same time as real history, and the mere phrasing of it as World War "I" implying a World War II as well. This was perhaps the biggest disappointment of the film. Despite that, it was an interesting ride for what it was, and while a lot of the footage relied on documentary-standard re-enactments, most of the "actual footage" is sufficiently realistic looking, while used sparingly enough so as not to oversaturate the piece.

As a youngster, I read WOTW and was absolutely enthralled by it. I watched Hines' original movie and reviewed it (not entirely unkindly) on this bulletin board, and in doing so I noted that one of the major flaws of movie versions was to remove the setting of the story from the end of the 19th Century to "the present day" - which was one of the saving graces of Hines' WOTW I - keeping the time and place, in theory at least, of the book. My reasoning was that even as far back as the 1950s, when George Pal filmed the book, modern day man has reached a comfortable acceptance of at least the possibility of life elsewhere than on this planet, but to the average man or women of Wells' day, this idea was totally unthinkable, which, when the modern day reader accepted this, gave rise to an insight into the utter terror that would have been felt when his book was published.In WOTW II, Hines has done a very interesting piece of mental trickery to convince a modern day movie audience that the fear was more than just a simple fear of death - it was the complete overturning of the fabric on the mind. He keeps the viewer in two disparate worlds, that of the 19th Century, while still being addressed by a citizen of the 1960s. Whilst the method has been used before (eg Little Big Man) of using a participant in the events to relay their story directly to the audience, the device of mixing real footage with "re-enactment" is meritorious in this construct.I watched the movie quite happily until I was struck by an unbelievable error which completely spoiled the entire movie, and that was the episode of the Torpedo Ram "Thunder Child" failing to destroy any enemy. In the book (and indeed in Hines' previous film) this event was absolutely crucial to whole of the story, and indeed much of Wells other literature. Firstly, this gave the reader a burst of hope (as also in the destruction of Sheperton) by showing that as merciless and technologically advanced as the Martians were, they were nevertheless still capable of being destroyed.Secondly, in the book the ship destroyed two of the Martian fighting machines, once by ramming, and the second as the ship exploded, in a battle of human machine versus Martian machine - the humans and the Martians were present, but invisible, as the mechanical warfare was fought.Wells is credited with forecasting aerial warfare, the atomic bomb and armoured fighting vehicles ("The Land Ironclads"). He predicted the outbreak of WWII to within a year ("Shape of Things to Come"). In fact, having re-read "The Land Ironclads" after I finished WOTW II, I was astounded to see that when Wells describes how the "soldiers" in the tanks were killing their infantry opponents, they were within an enclosed space with a projected image of the battlefield, and targeted their victim by the seemingly simple action of using a device like engineers dividers and pushing an electric button. If the shot missed, the operator moved his device, re-aimed and fired again. Sounds remarkably similar to robot warfare of today with operators in remote locations operating drone aircraft to destroy their targets.So in removing the clash of the mechanical Titans in WOTW II, Hines has completely stripped much of Wells' vision of its power by doing what George Pal did (and presumably other film makers, but I've not watched any other versions) and that was to make the Martians supremely indestructible (except for the Shepperton action), thus removing any semblance of hope. "If only the humans could have worked together just a little bit more ... they just might have brought it off." But alas they stumbled almost within reach of the final goal.Apart from that one huge failure, I actually enjoyed the movie, modestly, and think it at least as good as WOTW I, and probably better.

Forget Tim's 2005 fiasco. This was a complete vindication. The story is told from the POV of the last living survivor, Bertie Wells, in a 1965 interview. Once you accept that premise, settle in for a fast moving pastiche of stock footage images blended with re-creations, ala the History Channel, with images of the Martian machines woven, fairly believably, into the ancient film. The SFX are very well done; not standing out like a sore thumb especially as the Martian machines make their march burning everything in their path. The dialog of "Bertie" are the exact words written by Wells in his novel and the actor brings a sense of authority and gravitas to his role. Yes, there are some niggling little things that history buffs and film nerds will be quick to latch onto (I saw Shirley Temple in one scene). But, that can be a source of fun when the Blue-Ray comes out. If you love the source material as much as I do, WotW:TTS is an excellent tribute to H.G. Wells' novel and I recommend that it be seen when it gets to your town. - Jim Corvill, Portland Science Fiction Society

...that at the 4th attempt, this film does nothing to raise Mr Hines from the level of a modern day Ed Wood. This is not a character assassination (although the actors do a good job themselves) of Mr Hines, this is my opinion after having purchased and watched all four versions of this film: the original three hour debacle, the director's cut, the 'classic' version and this, the 'True Story'.Plus marks do need to be given for the idea of making an eye witness documentary, for it was a good idea. Unfortunately, as with the previous efforts, the execution of said idea is very poor indeed.Despite claims previously made to the contrary, there is a large amount of footage form the previous films used. Not a massive problem but when (as previously stated) this was supposed to be a new, fresh, properly done version coupled with the fact that a lot of the old scenes seem to have been given the sort of filter effects that one could perform with basic video editing software, one such as I who has loyally bought all versions is left feeling rather robbed.Even the documentary/interview sections seem to have been processed with some dreadful and unnecessary effects in post.There is new CGI, a lot of which barely improves on the previous attempts, but the reason I have raised this from a 2 out of 10 to a 3 is that some time and effort has clearly been made on a new 'tripod' design. It does look very good, in a 'steam punk' kind of way.Perhaps if I was not a previously loyal (if demonstrably misguided) customer I would have marked this higher. Perhaps if I was a newbie and bought this film with no real expectations of greatness that had been promised I wouldn't feel so disappointed. Alas, I do, and I will not be spending any of my hard earned money on any future endeavours by Tim Hines. Still, it was nice to see that he included a bit of footage from his long forgotten film-that-was-never-made 'Chrome' as a video ident at the beginning.Actually, the music was pretty good, but alas whoever was in charge of final production appears to have the aural and mixing dexterity of a deaf baboon.So, what next for the half Ed Wood, half Walter Mitty? Frankly, I am not in the least bit interested anymore.Actually, I am raising this to a 4 out of 10, because after all it is better than the woeful Tom Cruise version and especially the dreadful version by Asylum.