H. G. Wells

The War of the Worlds 1898 & 1964

My Commentary

I have enjoyed this film since it first came out, being a big sci-fi fan, and knowing somewhat of HG Wells, I think George Pal did a first rate job in making this film. There are some notable changes from book to film. The biggest difference is in time and location, the book centers around the time of World War I in England, the film version is updated to 1960's and take place in the United States. For what its worth, the film is entertaining, with religious overtones especially at the end (a theme George Pal used in all his films) this is my page to War of the Worlds.

About the Film and Book

War of the worlds was written in response to several historical events. The most important was the unification and militarization of Germany, which led to a series of novels predicting war in Europe, beginning with George Chesney's The Battle of Dorking (1871). Most of these were written in a semi-documentary fashion; and Wells borrowed their technique to tie his interplanetary war tale to specific places in England familiar to his readers. This attempt at hyper-realism helped to inspire Orson Welles when the latter created his famed 1938 radio broadcast based on the novel. 

There was a specific event that inspired Wells. In 1894 Mars was positioned particularly closely to Earth, leading to a great deal of observation and discussion. Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli had reported seeing "canali" on Mars, meaning "channels," but the term was mistranslated as "canals," leading to much speculation about life on the red planet. [Although scientists were able eventually to photograph what seem to be large stream beds on Mars, these are on a much smaller scale than the blobs and blotches which misled Schiaparelli into thinking he had seen channels.] One of the 1894 observers, a M. Javelle of Nice, claimed to have seen a strange light on Mars, which further stimulated speculation about life there. Wells turned Javelle into Lavelle of Java, an island much on people's minds because of the explosion there in 1883 of Mount Krakatoa, which killed 50,000 people and drastically influenced Earth's climate for the next year.

Wells became famous partly as a prophet. In various writings he predicted tanks, aerial bombing, nuclear war, and--in this novel--gas warfare, laser-like weapons, and industrial robots. It was his tragedy that his most successful predictions were of destructive technologies, and that he lived to experience the opening of the atomic age in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Wells was to become famous as a socialist and a utopian, but his science fiction novels are almost uniformly pessimistic about human nature and the future.

In the 1953 film of War of the Worlds, the narrator was made a single man and the curate replaced with an attractive young woman. 

• Reportedly, George Pal wanted to do the final third of the movie in 3-D, starting with the sequence in which the atomic bomb is used unsuccessfully against the Martians. The project was secured by Paramount in 1934. Both Cecil B. DeMille and Alfred Hitchcock were considered for directors. Orson Wells, who rose to prominence with his "War of the Worlds" radio broadcast of Halloween, 1938, was pressured into making this his first feature film, but he wanted no part of it. Filming was halted briefly, two days into filming, when Paramount discovered their filming rights to the novel had expired. It was quickly resolved through the kind permission of H.G Wells estate.
• Originally, the Martian War Machines were supposed to "walk" on visible electronic beams. This was attempted by having electrical sparks emanate from the three holes at the bottom of the machine. This was quickly abandoned for fear of it becoming a major fire hazard. The shot of the first war machine emerging from the gully has this effect. During filming, the actors were under the impression that they were dealing with the walking tripod machines of the book. This explains the farmhouse scene when Gene Barry says, "There's a machine standing right next to us."
• The Flying Wing depicted in the movie is the Northrop YB-49. Two were built and both crashed. Stock footage was used in the movie.

• The Martian machines were models suspended from wires. For the final sequences where the machines "die", they are shown crashing into telegraph poles - this allowed the film makers to hide the suspension wires with the telegraph wires.
• This film had a budget of $2,000,000. Of that sum, $600,000 was spent on the live action scenes while $1,400,000 was spent on the extensive and elaborate special effects.
• Albert Nozaki based his designs of the Martian machines on the shape and movements of the swan.
• The estate of H.G Wells was so pleased with the final production that they offered George Pal his choice of any other Wells' property. Pal chose "The Time Machine".
• The prologue of the film shows paintings of the other planets in the Solar System which the Martians examined and rejected as being unfit for habitation, finally selecting the Earth. The planet Venus, however, is neither shown or mentioned.
• The two Martian machines that crash in Los Angeles are really the same machine from a different angle with the film image reversed.
• When Major General Mann first meets Dr. Forrester, he refers to an earlier meeting in Oak Ridge. This refers to Oak Ridge, Tennessee which was the home to three Manhattan Project plants which enriched and refined uranium in WWII for use in the atomic bombs that ended the war. Two of the three are still in operation today.

Goofs for
The War of the Worlds (1953)

• Revealing mistakes: When they first investigate the crashed meteorite, Gene Barry looks at the camera while talking to one of the cops.
• Crew or equipment visible: Wires are visible from the Martian war machines.
• Incorrectly regarded as goofs: The reporter records a description of the events on magnetic tape, even though we know that the heat ray generates a magnetic field which would destroy the recording. But there's no reason to believe the reporter knew this, and no evidence that the tapes are ever played back.
• Plot holes: The ray also disables electrical devices but a police car still manages to drive up to the dancehall to tell people about the problem.
• Audio/visual unsynchronized: During the riot scenes, Dr. Forester's comments when he's pulled from the truck are dubbed over.
• Continuity: Blonde woman on top of the bus during the looting scenes is seen twice.
• Revealing mistakes: After Forrester chops off the Martian electronic eye in the farm house, a wire can be seen pulling the neck through the roof.
• Revealing mistakes: When Salvatore tips his hat back you can see the line on his forehead where the makeup stops at the hat line.