War of the Worlds

Directed by David Michael Latt

2005 • R • English • 93 min.

Have you heard of the Asylum? It’s the production/distribution company infamous for “mockbuster” movies like Transmorphers, Snakes on a Train, and Alien vs. Hunter — movies with soundalike titles made to cash in on the ad campaigns for big budget studio movies Transformers, Snakes on a Plane, and Alien vs. Predator: Requiem, respectively. (The Asylum didn’t invent this concept — “B” movie king Roger Corman was making “mockbusters” before anybody had made up a punny name for them.) The company might be more infamous for their cheeky Sharknado franchise these days, but the Asylum is still in the “mockbuster” game — in 2021 they made movies to cash in on Jungle Cruise and Dune. The Asylum War of the Worlds was one of the company’s first “mockbusters” — it hit the home video market around the same time the Steven Spielberg/Tom Cruise War of the Worlds movie hit theaters.

Cast: C. Thomas Howell, Rhett Giles, Andy Lauer