Tom Cruise stars in the main role alongside Dakota Fanning, Miranda Otto, and Tim Robbins, with narration by Morgan Freeman.

It follows an American dock worker who must look after his children, from whom he lives separately, as he struggles to protect them and reunite them with their mother when extraterrestrials invade Earth and devastate cities with giant war machines.

Divorced longshoreman Ray Ferrier works as a crane operator at a dock in Brooklyn, New York and is estranged from his children, 10-year-old daughter Rachel and his teenage son Robbie.

Later, a strange thunderstorm occurs, during which lightning strikes multiple times into the middle of a nearby intersection, causing an EMP that instantly disables almost all electronic devices.

Ray meets a wandering TV news team scavenging the wreckage for food, wherein a correspondent reveals that many tripods have attacked major cities around the world and that they have force shields that protect them from humanity's defenses.

She adds that the tripods' pilots traveled to Earth within the lightning storms to enter their machines, presumed to have been buried underground long ago.

Later, Harlan suffers a mental breakdown after witnessing the tripods harvesting human blood and tissue to fertilize the alien vegetation.

Producer and longtime collaborator Kathleen Kennedy notes that with War of the Worlds, Spielberg had the opportunity to explore the antithesis of the characters brought to life in E.T.

[11] J. J. Abrams was asked by Spielberg and Cruise to write the script but had to turn down the film as he was working on the pilot for his television series Lost.

[11] For the neighborhood plane crash scene, the production crew bought a retired Boeing 747 formerly operated by All Nippon Airways as JA8147, with transportation costs of $2 million,[22] dismantled it into several pieces, and built houses around them.

[11][24] In order to keep the realism, the usage of computer-generated imagery shots and bluescreen was limited, with most of the digital effects being blended with miniature and live-action footage.

[25] At the same time, the director wanted a design that would be iconic while still providing a tribute to the original Tripods, as well as intimidating so the audience would not be more interested in the aliens inside than in the vehicle itself.

[18] The visual effects crew tried to blend organic and mechanical elements in the Tripods depiction, and made extensive studies for the movements of the vehicle to be believable, considering the "contradiction" of having a large tank-like head being carried by thin and flexible legs.

[26] Animator Randal M. Dutra considered the movements themselves to have a "terrestrial buoyance", in that they were walking on land but had an aquatic flow, and Spielberg described the Tripods as moving like "scary ballet dancers".

[11] The IL&M crew admitted that the destruction of the Bayonne Bridge was the toughest scene to be made with heavy usage mix of CGI effects and live action elements,[27] and a four-week deadline so the shot could be used in a Super Bowl trailer.

[28] Costume designer Joanna Johnston created 60 different versions of Ferrier's leather jacket, to illustrate the degrees to which he is weathered from the beginning of the journey to the end.

One piece of Dakota Fanning's costume that takes on a special importance is her lavender horse purse: "I wanted her to have something that made her feel safe, some little thing that she could sleep with and put over her face," Johnston notes.

Williams added small nods to classic monster movie scores by having orchestras doing a "grand gesture" in scenes overlooking Tripods.

[34][35] An expanded "limited edition" soundtrack was released in 2020 through Intrada Records, with the full film score, a remaster of the 2005 album, and alternate cues as bonus material.

[37] Spielberg declared to Reader's Digest that beside the work being a fantasy, the threat represented was real: "They are a wake-up call to face our fears as we confront a force intent on destroying our way of life.

"[38] Screenwriter David Koepp stated that he tried not to put explicit references to September 11 or the Iraq War, but said that the inspiration for the scene where Robbie joins the Marines was teenagers fighting in the Gaza Strip⁠ —"I was thinking of teenagers in Gaza throwing bottles and rocks at tanks, and I think that when you're that age you don't fully consider the ramifications of what you're doing and you're very much caught up in the moment and passion, whether that's a good idea or not.

"[17] Retained from the novel is the aliens being defeated, not by men's weapons, but the planet's smallest creatures, bacteria, which Koepp described as "nature, in a way, knowing a whole lot more than we do".

[18] Lawrence Brown wrote: "Spielberg's decision to present the invaders' fighting machines as having been there all along, buried deep under the Earth, raises questions which did not exist in the original Wells book.

"[42] Spielberg admitted after keeping things secret for so long, there is in the end the temptation to reveal too much to the detriment of the story at the press conference of War of the Worlds.

[45] Paramount Pictures Interactive Marketing debuted a human survival online game on its official website[46] on April 14 to promote the film.

[48] Kazuhiro stated, "Our 'The Ultimate Visual Experience' campaign is a perfect match between Spielberg and Cruise's pursuit of the world's best in film entertainment and Hitachi's commitment to the highest picture quality through its digital consumer electronic products.

[63] James Berardinelli praised the acting and considered that focusing the narrative on the struggle of one character made the film more effective, but described the ending as weak, even though Spielberg "does the best he can to make it cinematically dramatic".

[65] Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan, who commended the film's special effects, stated that Spielberg may actually have done his job in War of the Worlds "better than he realizes".

Turan claimed that, by "showing us how fragile our world is", Spielberg raises a provocative question: "Is the ultimate fantasy an invasion from outer space, or is it the survival of the human race?

[68] About.com's Rebecca Murray gave a positive review, stating, "Spielberg almost succeeds in creating the perfect alien movie", with criticism only for the ending.