'War' wins Fourth of July battle

Posted Tuesday, February 8, 2005 at 9:39 AM Central

by John Couture

Without a single shot being fired, Paramount and Dreamworks' War of the Worlds won the critical battle for the theatrical nirvana better known as the Fourth of July holiday weekend. Initially, Fox pitched The Fantastic Four on the same weekend, but they announced today that they are moving the comic book adventure back a week to make room for the Tom Cruise-Dakota Fanning-Steven Spielberg blockbuster.

War of the Worlds, a remake of the H.G. Wells novel made popular by a realistic radio broadcast by Orson Welles in 1938, opens on June 29th, the Wednesday before the holiday, and is expected to be one of the year's highest grossing theatrical releases.