Independence Day

In 1996 Roland Emmerich (2012, The Day After Tomorrow) brought us Independence Day, a thrilling tale of apocalyptic proportions.

This is a story about an alien invasion, to put it simply. It starts out with the aliens interrupting our signals, then their ships enter our atmosphere and take up positions, ready to blow up our major cities all over the globe. And no amount of attacking will get through their shields. So it becomes a battle to take down their shields and destroy the invading menace before they wipe us all out. Get ready for an explosive adventure!

This film is full of brilliant and stunning special effects, some amazing explosives (not joking…you see whole cities destroyed and burned to the ground) and some very crazy, but scary aliens. There’s also comedy, particularly in the characters of David (Jeff Goldblum) and Steve (Will Smith).

And though this film is just over two hours long it manages to keep you entertained throughout, almost, one might say, on the edge of your seat. Just when you think things are sorted something else gets thrown in and things get hairy once more. It truly is a well written plot line with enough twists and turns to put a maze to shame.

The special effects (plus the explosions) are what I really like about this film though. They are beautiful to behold. Some examples of this are the fire cloud seen in the skies just before the ships break through the Earth’s atmosphere and the explosion of the mother ship at the end, and later the debris of this ship flying through the sky in a meteor-like shower. Considering this film was produced in 1996 I am very pleasantly surprised by the quality of these effects.

For me, the very best scenes are: the plane that flies blindly into the ‘inferno cloud’ in the sky; The President (Bill Pullman) telling people to leave the cities in an orderly fashion, only for the next scene to show the complete opposite; the destruction of Washington DC, as this is the first one we see get destroyed…in fact its the only one we see getting destroyed and it’s pretty impressive, in a destructive kind of way; Captain Steven Hiller insulting the alien he manages to make crash…very funny; the alien attack in Area 51’s lab, as it was, to put it bluntly, complete carnage; the President’s very impressive and thought-provoking speech to the pilots who are to help in the very final battle against the aliens; and finally the scene where Captain Hiller, after dramatic background music plays, accidentally drives the alien ship backwards rather than forwards…again very funny.

And my favourite quotes from the movie are:

• ‘I gotta call my brother! I gotta call my housekeeper! I gotta call my lawyer! Na, forget my lawyer.’ – Marty (Harvey Fierstein)
• ‘You punched the President? God!’ – Julius (Judd Hirsch) to David
• *Punches alien in the face* ‘Welcome to Earth. That’s what I call a close encounter.’ – Steve
• ‘Forget about the fat lady. You’re obsessed with the fat lady.’ – David to Steve
• ‘We’re not hit! Stop side-seat driving!’ – Steve to David 

So there you have it :).

An 8.3 out of 10 from me.

 

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