War Of The Worlds – The Extinctive Cut

“Its not enough to survive... One has to be worthy of survival. “ Commander William Adama.

Sadly, such a notion is not universal. That might explain the survival of repellent lead characters. After two hours of the original, viewers will likely root for the alien raiders to capture, consume and silence our ordinary fellow humans.
Boon is biting off a lot here, trying to paint lipstick on a cancerous pig, attempting to carve the crap without leaving behind a corpse.

Video: MPEG 720 X 480p. Let’s get this out of the way. Once you hit PLAY and have to choose which version of CBB’s edit, Extinctive is transposed to Extincitve. Oversight that should have been caught long ago.

In both Extinctive and Purist cuts, once past Chapter 10, resolution is poorer. This seems more noticeable in Extinctive, especially with blacks and deep shadows.

Audio: 2 Channel AC3. Subtitles - yes! Sound is really good here, with a nice dynamic range.

Narrative: I watched both versions, and both are cohesive and logical. Extinctive ending held an unexpected surprise. Can’t say that I bought it from a logical point of view. Questions about how long a future time frame are we looking at? Food supplies? Water? Politicians? Still, it might be taken as a Hollywood 70s ending. The Purist was OK and I had no problem with omitting the microbial aspect.

Enjoyment: Did someone say extras? Man, Boon is generous with the goodies! Trailer, Deleted Scenes, the shack with and without Robbins, a chunk of CBB edits to boot.

If one means “enjoying the actual film” - I disliked the original and my dislike for the edit is only marginally less. Problem is with source material. Characters you can’t wait to get killed. Blame script or directing. And Spielberg has a curious history of terrorizing children into screaming. Not judging, just saying. There is less of that in this edit, and CBB reimagines Robbie’s path well.

Recommended to fans of the original. Naysayers will still be displeased.

Review by veggieguy12 — March 13, 2011 @ 2:40 pm

As the reviewer above wrote, “I’m giving this a 7/10. Not Boon’s fault at all… I greatly *admired* this fanedit, I wish I could say I *enjoyed* it as well.”
There was a vast improvement, and if Boon was in the editor’s role for Speilberg and the studio, this could have been awesome – though Tim Robbins would have gotten no paycheck.
Editing: 9/10, Movie in Fanedit Form: 7/10

Review by shadowland — August 3, 2009 @ 6:32 am

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by blueyoda — August 4, 2009 @ 4:59 am

*MILD SPOILERS AHEAD*

The great thing about this fanedit is that the movie feels much, much more like an old Spielberg movie. That great sense of timing, that great eye for detail and that sense of rhythm that the once great director has now mostly lost.

This fanedit gave me that feeling of awe I had as a kid when I watched Jaws, Duel or Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Ray is no longer a superhero but an average Joe trying to cope with extraordinary events and sometimes failing miserably. The removal of Tim Robbins has much more impact than I originally thought it would; the cellar scene is now much more suspensful and like I pointed out above, now feels like a good old Spielberg movie. The whole thing not only flows much better but also makes a lot more sense both on an emotional level and on a “realistic” level which is much needed in a movie about aliens from outer space destroying the human race.

If I had to nitpick, I’d say even more scenes could have been removed; Ray’s character “dramatically” throwing a peanut butter toast at the window should have been cut; it’s a scene right out of an Austin Powers movie and absolutely doesn’t work. And what I like to call the zombie attack on Ray’s car should have been cut or trimmed as well. It’s simply ridiculous. A couple of other moments had me cringe but the overall impact of the changes that were made drowned out the gripes I had and I was quickly drawn back into the movie.

The movie comes with two endings thru seemless branching; the extinctive cut and the purist cut. The former is a brand new ending for the movie created from scratch but unfortunately did not work at all for me. The change in narrative style is too drastic and clashes with the rest of the movie. I can see what the editor tried to create but it simply fails at its mission as it was impossible to pull off. Only a close approximation could be created, and this is what we got. The purist ending works much, much better; it’s the original ending re-edited to make sense in the context of this fanedit and again in observance of early Spielberg brilliance. This is the ending you should watch, in this reviewer’s eyes.

The DVD is a typical CBB release, which means its presentation is flawless. Great menus, a choice of subtitles and extras (which include a fascinating comparison of the shack scene) all make watching the whole thing an experience rather than just watching a two hour movie.

8/10

Review by spelledaren — August 4, 2009 @ 1:51 pm

Thanks, great work on this one.

Not too fond of every change of scene, but then, how often does that happen? Really liked most that was done.
The movie, for some reason, doesn’t feel really -complete- to me, as if something’s a bit off. Wonder why.

8/10 for me, improving upon the original.

Added ratings for the categories. Entertainment down to 7.