mindless junk

Rating: 3/10 (22 February 1999)

When I saw the early trailers for ID the first thing that came to mind was " War Of The Words " which is one of my favorite SCI-FI films. I was unfortunately suckered into seeing this over-commercialized over- hyped pile of mindless junk. Forgetting that this is the 90's and during the summer special effects and action are all that's required to draw people to the theaters. A plausible well written story with good drama, tension and excitement are not necessary for the brain dead of our society who continue to throw away money on this junk every year which means we will continue to see more garbage like it every year. This film is not that bad and I wouldn't detest it so much if it didn't earn so much money. I keep hoping people will tire of these films and spend their money on something better or will never see the end of junk like this. The first half is not too bad and the image of the huge spaceships that cover entire cities is quite scary and does have dramatic impact. Once we get to the underground secret lab and the hidden space ship the film goes down hill faster than you can say ID !? The clichés pile up starting with the millionth time since Watergate on film that our Gov. is keeping secrets from the people even the Pres., then of course we have to have at least 1 gooey slimy gory alien surgery scene and as far as the special effects I saw nothing in this film new or impressive that we haven't seen since Star Wars which is now over 20 years old. Then we're expected to believe that as advanced as this allien invader is their technology has not improved in the last 40+ years that they wouldn't detect one of their old spaceships is manned by man and infiltrating their brain center and that we could learn to fly it in a very short time or that it would still even fly !? It's too bad the producers couldn't find some creative writers to find a more scientific or imaginative way to destroy the invaders. I'll take War Of The Worlds, When Worlds Collide and Colossus The Forbin Project 3 far more entertaining end of the world dramas and watch them over and over again rather than every sitting through ID which should stand for Idiots Donate !