The Spiegel illustrates the problem with disaster movies made in Hollywood. In an interview with Spielberg and Cruise about their upcoming ‘War Of The Worlds’ movie, the following fragment sticks out:
Spielberg: We wanted to make a film in which people join forces, across all borders and despite all their differences, in order to fight against an enemy who is not of a human nature.
SPIEGEL: But the film is set almost exclusively in the United States. Does it really describe a global catastrophe?
Spielberg: It describes a global catastrophe from a subjective point of view. The audience experiences the war from the perspective of Tom’s character, from the point of view of an American docker. But we leave it in no doubt that the entire Earth is threatened.
Pure entertainment.