Review of Independence Day (1996) by James R — 25 Jun 2016

So In preparation for the upcoming sequel that had a surprisingly long development at 20th Century Fox and currently being (unsurprisingly) bombed critically and with audiences: Independence Day: Resurgence, I thought it'd finally look at the movie that brought basically full on dumb hollywood at it's finest.

Case in point: Independence Day. Now this a film that, like i've said, is a film more admired for it's big spectacle, one liners, mass audience appealed story, and really for it's simple premise: Kick alien ass and chew bubble gum.

Now here's the thing, I went into this not really knowing whether this film would be the type of thing I could enjoy as much as others did. The main reason is because of one person who directed this film: Roland Emmerich.

Outside of this film, he is quite possibly the most egocentric, Spielberg wannabe, repetitive style filmmaker that i've seen since Uve Boll. And to answer the question on wether I enjoyed this film or not like everyone else did? .

...Well, not as much. Now look I don't mind films that rely more on it's spectacle and are just fun rides (Mad Max: Fury Road is a good example of this,) ok i'm not that cold blooded and cynical.

But a movie still needs to be a movie. And with Independence Day, for me it was hard to ignore the glaring issues it had with: Plot issues, some characters being stereotyped to the point of being insulting, non-rememberable characters outside of Will Smith & hell Jeff Goldblum, hit or miss characters, tired and old cliches, and with a very odd pace and clunky editing.

But with the cynical issues out of the way, I do wanna say that I at the very least enjoyed it to an extent with it's: Good visuals, great acting from it's main cast and more so with Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum, it's simple but yet enjoyable premise of humanity standing up to defeat alien ass, and, i'll admit it, a bad-ass speech given by the president himself that definitely holds the film together.

So yes while Independence Day is sadly a film I couldn't fully get into like others did, I can say despite it's shortcomings I can respect and see why others enjoy it's entourage of spectacle and it's simple premise.