Directed by Rich Lee — Screenplay by Kenneth A. Golde and Marc Hyman.
Only rarely is a movie deemed to be so bad that its reputation takes on a life of its own. In the case of Amazon Prime’s War of the Worlds, we have one of the most critically derided films released by a streaming service, maybe ever. Not only is it narratively unsound, a visual disappointment, and a poor adaptation of a well-known narrative, but the film as a whole also represents everything film critics, cinephiles, and film historians fear about the state of cinema and its future. This is a film with shameless corporate self-promotion on the part of the streaming service, which shows no appreciation for the material it is adapting or any apprehension about what they might treat their audience to. The Ice Cube-led War of the Worlds film from Amazon is, like you’ve heard, the worst film you’re likely to see this year. It is, at once, both embarrassing and alarming how faulty and ill-conceived it is.
Amazon‘s War of the Worlds, from director Rich Lee, follows government employee Will Radford (played by Ice Cube), a Homeland Security analyst, who spends his free time at work spying on his family members through a gross misuse of power. Both because of the nature of his work and the passing of his late wife, his relationship with his children has soured, and he struggles with his work-life balance. However, he also briefs the most powerful men in America on national security concerns, such as dangerous, disruptive hackers. When one day, enormous aliens from outer space attack Earth while he is on the job, our protagonist must juggle keeping his family safe and helping to protect the nation. However, when he and his family and friends start digging into what the government has been working on, he starts to question what kind of men he has been working for and exactly why the aliens have come to Earth.
This version of War of the Worlds takes the form of a screenlife film. The film was shot entirely during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, and, during this time, the so-called screenlife, or screencast, films were ideal productions to greenlight, given the isolation possibilities found in them. In these films, the entire narrative takes place on computer or phone screens or the like, and they’ve found moderate success since their inception, even though the very concept of having a screenlife film makes it difficult to have the film feel dynamic and fresh without jumping through narrative loopholes that are unearned. Now, to be honest, I’ve been a pretty big fan of several screenlife, or screencast, films (I highly recommend Aneesh Chaganty’s Searching, Nicholas D. Johnson and Will Merrick’s Missing, and Rob Savage’s Host), so I wasn’t immediately opposed to the idea that this film could work. But it really doesn’t. Despite only being roughly 90 minutes long, this film definitely runs out of steam early, and it is due to a wide variety of issues.
Although I have bigger problems with the film, my problems really start with the casting. Although I like Ice Cube in a great many films, his casting is a significant error. Never for a second do you buy into the idea that he is supposed to be this analyst genius behind the keyboard. This is partially due to Ice Cube having been tasked with delivering, frankly, eye-roll-inducing lines. In this film, you hear him say such lines as “move bitch, get out the way,“ “all right, all right, all right, did you miss?” as well as, time and time again, pressing a celebratory button to hype himself up whenever he catches a so-called bad guy. The problem is just that the lines are cringeworthy, and it also doesn’t help that every line is delivered in the most unnatural and forced way possible. As a side note, Ice Cube’s character is also a total creep, who uses government tools to spy on his family, so much so that it would seem like there’s no ethical boundary he wouldn’t cross. Though the writing and performance are not nearly as bad concerning Eva Longoria, both she and Ice Cube pull you straight out of the film for having been miscast. And, frankly, Clark Gregg’s casting feels a little bit too on the nose.
So, in addition to having the stars of the film be miscast, they are also let down by the writing. It also doesn’t help that the visual effects look a little bit too dated or unpolished for a 2025 film. Sometimes, I thought, some effects looked like dated PlayStation 3 graphics. Then, it has to be said, there are more leaps in logic and screenlife film cheats that this film is guilty of than I could possibly describe for you in this review without testing your patience. But let’s talk about some of them. For one, at one point, we see how the aliens targeted destruction (I’m being deliberately vague to not spoil) means that entire servers are ruined and so we see how Facebook pages literally disappear before our eyes, but this server deletion is bafflingly selective with Facebook going dark while YouTube and Twitter carry on as if nothing ever happened. Then there’s the annoying screenlife cheat of the film constantly and unnaturally presenting characters with AirPods in both ears, regardless of the activity they’re doing. Characters magically wear them while driving, apparently take time to put them on off-screen during an alien invasion, and things like that. There are even these oddly unnatural moments of what I’d call screenlife-type visual exposition, where, for example, we see a character unnaturally posting an article about someone’s accomplishments to the person who accomplished it in a text message solely for the plot to happen and so that a third person (who isn’t on the text chain but is spying on it), i.e. the protagonist, will see it and fill us, the viewers, in. I also thought there was a lack of clarity with regard to whose screen the climax of the film takes place on. I could go on, but this also brings us pretty naturally to the shameless promotion at the center of the film.
Now, you might say that some product placement is unavoidable in screenlife films, and if you were to say so, I’d likely agree. It didn’t bother me too much to see Zoom or Teams calls, or the use of Teamviewer, but it goes to another embarrassing level in the final act when our main characters explicitly state that Amazon Prime drone delivery is the future, have drone delivery essentially save the day, and then, at one point, get a homeless person to risk his life for them by offering him an Amazon gift card. I don’t mind small references, but the filmmakers slather on the product placement so thick that it’s like a sticky, chunky spread that would likely both get stuck in your teeth and bother your throat.
I think it’s notable that it’s generating a lot of attention for being bad, and it may, in fact, be the one film capable of testing whether all press is good press or not. Because, even though no one seems to really like it, the film has managed to get a lot of eyeballs on the streaming service. It may not be for the right reasons, but the negative word of mouth, to put it lightly, has done all the hard work that Amazon could’ve hired a marketing team to do for them. Time and time again, I’ve seen my fellow critics remark that “they’ve seen a movie so you don’t have to, “ and yet, it seems like everyone on TikTok or Instagram or Facebook, or whatnot, is being fed videos of this movie. Streaming services know that there is a value in what we choose to fix our eyeballs on, and even though this may be for the wrong reasons, Amazon potentially got more attention than any other streamer this last month for this film. But I digress.
Amazon’s Ice Cube-led War of the Worlds is almost sure to be the worst film of the year. It is miscast, poorly written, features a pretty significant screenlife plot hole, has an entirely unconvincing lead performance, features unpolished or downright shoddy visual effects, and is, clearly, designed to be one big ad for the products on screen and, especially, Amazon delivery. I found it to be jaw-dropping in the worst way possible, and, repeatedly, I voiced my displeasure as I was watching it. This version of War of the Worlds is a complete misfire, a stain on the careers of those involved with it, and an example of everything that can go wrong with product placement and the like. Yikes.
1 out of 10
– Review written by Jeffrey Rex Bertelsen.
I'm Jeffrey Rex 