Dammit, I'm reviewing "War of the Worlds" at 2am.

I promise you people too much and then go eat wings and drink beer instead of doing what I promise. What's wrong with me? Anyway, here's the review.

Y'know, I thought I hated Tom Cruise.

At least, I hate him nowadays. The media can make you hate someone so easily, can't they? Just throw them on repeat with whatever stupid crap they might happen to say and we're all riled up and marching on their house with torches and pitchforks. I'm a part of that club now, keep in mind. But what boggled me is that I own eight DVDs in which Tom Cruise appears. EIGHT! The law of averages would tell me it will end up this way, what with me owning over 600 DVDs and all, but I'm realizing now that it's not Tom Cruise the actor I hate, but Tom Cruise the persona. Even I can admit that the dude owned in Collateral and that I love Rain Man. But damn if his persona outside of movies is just an egotistical prick. At least he's an egotistical prick who seems to pick the right projects.

With that said, if you can't even accept Tom Cruise as an actor, you probably shouldn't go see War of the Worlds. Not just because he's in it, but because he's in literally every scene. And somehow, that ends up being the strength of the movie. We are there with him and his two kids through what amounts to a bloody worldwide apocalypse. It's not just that he's the typical Steven Spielberg absentee father. It's that he becomes the cipher for the audience as humanity is literally destroyed before our eyes. Short of opening and closing montages, we never see anything that isn't through his eyes. We learn to care about his kids as he does. We somehow get put in Tom Cruise's shoes.. And we don't mind. That's damn good film making. And that's what we really haven't received from Spielberg since those opening 25 minutes of Saving Private Ryan back in 1998.

In a lot of ways, this movie is more like Saving Private Ryan than Close Encounters of the Third Kind or E.T. Don't let the ads fool you. This is not some fun sci-fi adventure movie. This is not Independence Day with Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg making it. This is a goddamn war movie. This family, along with humanity in general, gets absolutely put through the wringer. As one of my friends put it, "at times, I felt like I was in Warsaw when the Nazis came through." It really does have the feel of a war movie filmed from the point of view of defenseless civilians. Except all of humanity is presented as defenseless civilians. We never get a larger world view of what's going on. We hear rumors of how the Japanese were able to fight back... We hear how Europe was wiped out. We hear how Europe were the only ones left untouched. We hear what we'd hear if suddenly our modern television and phones and internet were suddenly rendered completely worthless. All news is reduced to unconfirmed rumor. This movie plays everything as realistically as possible. Riots break out. People literally kill each other for a working car. Nowhere is safe. The movie fosters this paranoid, claustrophobic, defenseless feeling for a solid 100 minutes. And for 100 minutes, it's absolutely a top-of-the-line, best-thing-I've seen all-year 4-star movie.

And then they go and blow it by rushing the last 15. God, how I hate when this happens. The whole movie is like a top that's spinning perfectly, longer than any top you've ever spun. But in the back of your mind, you know it's going to have to end. And the only way it can end is to come crashing down. And that's pretty much what happens in this movie. We spend so long building up this feeling of no way out, only to thwart it with a cop-out which is made even worse by the fact that the humans actually learn to fight back only moments before. Then to not be able to use this knowledge in the end? It feels like a ripoff, and it is. Those who have read the book will know how the aliens are defeated. From what I've been told, it's as abrupt in the book as it is on screen. That's a damn shame.

The good? The acting is phenomenal (Dakota Fanning in particular), as are the effects. I'm somewhat surprised at the PG-13 rating, considering the carnage that is unleashed on a global scale. Let there be no doubt, though, this carnage comes on a very personal level, very quickly. The aliens appear not even 15 minutes into the movie, so rest assured that they have plenty of time to keep themselves busy. There's one shot in particular that still amazes me -- it involves a speeding minivan and some camera work that weaves in and out of the vehicle, circling the van and then going back inside. It's an amazing shot, just as impressive as the giant tripod walkers that emerge from underground and unleash chaos on a global scale. The sound work for them is phenomenal as well. Every cent of that monstrous budget is up on screen, and it shows.

The bad? Well, that last 15 minutes. Not that it's THAT bad. This isn't Signs, thankfully. It's just that it's rushed to a point of frustration, with some key dialogue inaudible, unfortunately. I didn't mind the last 5 minutes as much as some did. Having seen enough Spielberg films, I saw it coming. And to be totally honest, after what we'd been through, I was kind of glad that it did end that way. I can understand why this ending will drive some people absolutely bonkers, though. Can't say I blame them. One other small nitpick I have is that when we see the aliens, they look far too similar to the ones from Independence Day. They had a chance to do something unique with them and didn't. At least the way they move is unique, but in a movie with such a similar theme, you'd think they'd go a different direction.

The rating? 3.5 out of 4 stars. Everything that comes before is so good that I can only take a half-star off for the rushed ending. This is the type of film that needs to be seen on a big screen to be enjoyed, Tom Cruise be damned...