The War of the Worlds [Criterion Collection] [Blu-ray]

Director: Byron Haskin Byron Haskin

Overview

H.G. Wells's War of the Worlds had been on the Paramount Pictures docket since the silent era, when it was optioned as a potential Cecil B. DeMille production. When Paramount finally got around to a filming the Wells novel, the property was firmly in the hands of special-effects maestro George Pal. Like Orson Welles's infamous 1938 radio adaptation, the film eschews Wells's original Victorian England setting for a contemporary American locale, in this case Southern California. A meteorlike object crash-lands near the small town of Linda Rosa. Among the crowd of curious onlookers is Pacific Tech scientist Gene Barry, who strikes up a friendship with Ann Robinson, the niece of local minister Lewis Martin. Because the meteor is too hot to approach at present, Barry decides to wait a few days to investigate, leaving three townsmen to guard the strange, glowing object. Left alone, the three men decide to approach the meterorite, and are evaporated for their trouble. It turns out that this is no meteorite, but an invading spaceship from the planet Mars. The hideous-looking Martians utilize huge, mushroomlike flying ships, equipped with heat rays, to pursue the helpless earthlings. When the military is called in, the Martians demonstrate their ruthlessness by "zapping" Ann's minister uncle, who'd hoped to negotiate a peaceful resolution to the standoff. As Barry and Ann seek shelter, the Martians go on a destructive rampage. Nothing-not even an atom-bomb blast-can halt the Martian death machines. The film's climax occurs in a besieged Los Angeles, where Barry fights through a crowd of refugees and looters so that he may be reunited with Ann in Earth's last moments of existence. In the end, the Martians are defeated not by science or the military, but by bacteria germs-or, to quote H.G. Wells, "the humblest things that God in his wisdom has put upon the earth." Forty years' worth of progressively improving special effects have not dimmed the brilliance of George Pal's War of the Worlds. Even on television, Pal's Oscar-winning camera trickery is awesome to behold. So indelible an impression has this film made on modern-day sci-fi mavens that, when a 1988 TV version of War of the Worlds was put together, it was conceived as a direct sequel to the 1953 film, rather than a derivation of the Wells novel or the Welles radio production.

Product Details

Release Date:	07/07/2020
UPC:	0715515248617
Original Release:	1953
Rating:	G
Source:	Criterion Collection
Region Code:	A
Language:	English
Time:	1:25:00
Sales rank:	8,361

Special Features

New 4k digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack; New alternate 5.1 surround soundtrack, created by Sound Designer Ben Burtt and presented in DTS-HD Master Audio; Audio Commentary from 2005 featuring filmmaker Joe Dante, film historian Bob Burns, and author Bill Warren; Movie Archaeologists, a new program on the film's visual and sound effects featuring Burtt and Visual-Effects Supervisor Craig Barron; From the Archive, a new program about the film's restoration featuring Barron, Burtt, and Paramount Pictures archivist Andrea Kalas; Audio interview with Producer George Pal from 1970; The Sky Is Falling, a 2005 documentary about the making of the film; The Mercury Theatre on the Air radio play of The War of the Worlds from 1938, adapted by Howard Koch and Directed and Narrated by Orson Welles; Radio program from 1940 featuring a discussion between Welles and H.G. Wells, author of the 1897 novel The War of the Worlds; Trailer; English Subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing; Plus: An essay by film critic J. Hoberman

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Lewis Martin	Pastor Matthew Collins
Robert Cornthwaite	Dr. Pryor
Sandro Giglio	Dr. Bilderbeck
Paul Birch	Alonzo Hogue
Jack Kruschen	Salvatore
Vernon Rich	Col. Heffner
Houseley Stevenson Jr.	General's Aide
Paul Frees	Radio Announcer,Radio Announcer
Gene Barry	Dr. Clayton Forrester
Ann Robinson	Sylvia Van Buren
Les Tremayne	Gen. Mann,Actor
Henry Brandon	Cop
Carolyn Jones	Bird-Brained Blonde
Pierre Cressoy	Man
John Mansfield	Man
Eric Alden	Man
Nancy Hale	Young Wife
Virginia Hall	Girl
Patricia Iannone	Girl
Walter Sande	Sheriff Bogany
Charles Gemora	Martian
Alex Frazer	Dr. Hettinger
Ann Codee	Dr. Duprey
Ivan Lebedeff	Dr. Gratzman
Robert Rockwell	Ranger
Alvy Moore	Zippy
Frank Kreig	Fiddler Hawkins
John Maxwell	Doctor
Ned Glass	Well-dressed Man During Looting
Cliff Clark	Australian Policeman
Edward Colmans	Spanish Priest
Jamesson Shade	Deacon
David McMahon	Minister
Gertrude W. Hoffman	News Vendor
Freeman Lusk	Secretary of Defense
Don Kohler	Colonel
Sydney Mason	Fire Chief
Peter Adams	Lookout
Ted Hecht	KGEB Reporter
Teru Shimada	Japanese Diplomat
Herbert Lytton	Chief of Staff
Ralph Dumke	Buck Monahan
Edgar Barrier	Prof. McPherson
Wally Richard	Reporter
Morton C. Thompson	Reporter
Jerry James	Reporter
Ralph Montgomery	Red Cross Leader
Russ Bender	Dr. Carmichael
Douglas Henderson	Staff Sergeant
Anthony Warde	MP Driver
Bud Wolfe	Big Man
Jimmie Dundee	Civil Defense Official
Joel Marston	MP
Bill Meader	P.E. Official
Al Ferguson	Police Chief
Rudy Lee	Boy
Waldon Williams	Boy
Gus Taillon	Elderly Man
Ruth Barnell	Mother
Dorothy Vernon	Elderly Woman
George Pal	Bum
Frank Freeman Jr.	Bum
Hugh Allen	Brigadier General
Stanley Orr	Marine Major
Charles J. Stewart	Marine Captain
Fred Zendar	Marine Lieutenant
Jim Davies	Marine Commanding Officer
Dick Fortune	Marine Captain
Edward Wahrman	Cameraman
Martin Coulter	Marine Sergeant
Hazel Boyne	Screaming Woman
Cora Shannon	Old Woman
Mike Mahoney	Young Man
David Sharpe	Looter
Dale Van Sickel	Looter
Fred Graham	Looter
Cedric Hardwicke	Narrator
Bill Phipps	Wash Perry
Russ Conway	Rev. Bethany
Houseley Stevenson	Actor
Leith Stevens	Composer

Technical Credits

Barré Lyndon

H.G. Wells

Chesley Bonestell	Special Effects
Ivyl Burks	Special Effects
Jan Domela	Special Effects
Fred Graham	Stunts
Byron Haskin	Director
Walter Hoffman	Special Effects
Gordon Jennings	Special Effects
Wallace Kelly	Special Effects
Paul K. Lerpae	Special Effects
George Pal	Producer
Irmin Roberts	Special Effects
David Sharpe	Stunts
Dale Van Sickel	Stunts
Barré Lyndon	Screenwriter,Screenwriter
H.G. Wells	Screenwriter
Cecil B. DeMille	Executive Producer
Gene Garvin	Sound Effects
Mushy Callahan	Stunts

Editorial Reviews

A science-fiction classic, The War of the Worlds, based on the H. G. Wells novel, is a mesmerizing Hollywood entertainment -- a solid B movie that holds up better today than most of its big-budget contemporaries. Introduced in the style of a newsreel, the narrative concerns a respected scientist (Gene Barry) who becomes the man of the hour when killer Martians invade Earth. Suddenly, the entire planet (Earth, that is) finds itself on the defensive and on the brink of certain apocalypse. The Martians are more technologically advanced than Earthlings, as evidenced by their indestructible flying machines and firepower. But they have one problem -- a frail immune system that has trouble with an invisible enemy: bacteria. The film may be an unconscious reflection of its era's cold war hysteria or perhaps a warning about the runaway dangers of technology. Whatever the case, the visually stunning production design and hypnotic special effects -- for instance, that eerie techno-cricket chirp that issues from the Martian spaceships -- make The War of the Worlds an irresistible gem.

Barnes & Noble - Monica McIntyre

This 1953 film ranks as a sci-fi classic for its brilliant pacing and stunning special effects. The story line is simple: Martians have arrived and they mean to annihilate the world's population with fire-breathing spaceships protected by invisible shields which no missile can penetrate. Earth is helpless. Doomsday is nearing. Although the dialogue is pedestrian at times, it is lean and short-winded. Consequently, the plot moves like a frightened gazelle: leaping, dodging, sprinting. Producer George Pal's special effects are outstanding, even by modern standards, as spaceships roam for quarry in Asia, Europe, and America. The lead actors -- Gene Barry as mild-mannered scientist Dr. Clayton Forrester, and Ann Robinson as a mild-mannered teacher of library science, Sylvia Van Buren -- wisely cede the starring role to the suspenseful action. They recite their lines, neither overacting nor underacting, then let the plot takes its course. In a memorable scene, Forrester and Van Buren huddle in the dusty ruins of a building while a Martian optical probe pokes through windows to find signs of life. They escape, of course -- just barely -- then try to discover the Martians' Achilles' heel, to no avail. The visual effects -- featuring stampeding crowds and spaceships zapping landmarks and whole city blocks -- provide plenty of thrills all along the way. Cedric Hardwicke's resonant British voice opens the film to set the scene and delivers the final lines during the wonderful surprise ending. Because the film debuted at a time when Americans feared communist infiltration of the U.S. government and its society, some moviegoers of the 1950s viewed the Martians as communists -- and went home wondering what Stalin was up to.

All Movie Guide - Mike Cummings