[poobear]

Do you work for Spielberg?

[Lokibob]

It is also free here.

 

Project Gutenburg has 16,000 free ebooks on line to read.  Web site here.

 

I copy them to Microsoft word and save them for later off line reading.  I also have put them on my PDA for reading at the docs office.

[ARCADIA]

Wells would have nothing of the leftist concept that it was useless to try to stop the enemy

I finally saw the movie last night and I didn't pick up on any of this. I would have preferred to follow the action rather then Tom Cruise's loser character, but the message was not about apathy at all. There were alot of plot goofs, and society seemed to melt into disorder way too rapidly (that was the real liberal bias in the movie); but, there was resistence all along. It would have been better if we could have pull back from the front lines once in a while to get a glimps of how the battle strategy was developing (the older kid would have made an excellent vehicle for this) but then Tom wouldn't have been able to keep his face in every scene, and we all know that is how his movies always go.

[Lurking in Kansas]

...I was able to read the entire 1898 novel "War of the Worlds" in 6 hours.

Thanks for saving me 6 hours, which I don't have. Good review and thoughts.

[KeyWest]

Outstanding post. Brought back a lot of memories. I cut my teeth on Verne and Wells and was hooked on SiFi. Have not seen the latest movie but your post will get me there.

It has been said many times, but yesterdays liberal is not like todays. Most "liberals" back then were interested in reform and the Church was with them. Today, the Church is still liberal in the old sense but one who says they are liberal are more socialist and against both God and country.

It is interesting how times have changed.

BTW, welcome to FR and I look forward to more of your exceptional posts.

[Ladysmith]

Well done! Some of your historical facts are new to me so the next reading will have more context to it.

Bookmarking.

[Jonah Hex]

I'll admit, the H.M.S. THUNDERCHILD episode struck a chord in me when I read the book as a kid, and still rings true to this day. Jeff Wayne's musical version of the WotW presented an excellent dramatization of the THUNDERCHILD's attack, success, sacrifice, and loss.

[7thson]

I read this years ago back in the 80's and I thought it was extremely boring. After your review, I may have another go at it.

[DBrow]

Black Smoke bump

[miliantnutcase]

People have to remember the movie wasn't about the aliens. It was about the characters and how they came to grip and survived the situation. Cruise's character being a jerk/wimp was able to come to a realization he had to get his daughter through the ordeal made it more realistic, more identifiable than if he was joe cool who had the situation under control.

[sonofatpatcher2]

"The planet Mars, I scarcely need remind the reader, revolves about the sun at a mean distance of 140,000,000 miles, and the light and heat it receives from the sun is barely half of that received by this world. It must be, if the nebular hypothesis has any truth, older than our world; and long before this earth ceased to be molten, life upon its surface must have begun its course. The fact that it is scarcely one seventh of the volume of the earth must have accelerated its cooling to the temperature at which life could begin. It has air and water and all that is necessary for the support of animated existence."

Wells was really ahead of his time...