Excellent first hour let down by Yankee doodle dandy cheesiness in the last act

Rating: 7/10 (4 June 2003)

******Warning, Spoilers*******
This blend of 50's alien visitation flick, 70's disaster movie and 90's UFO paranoia has received a huge amount of criticism on this site. Undoubtedly some of it is merited, but much of it is unfair. Firstly, for it's first hour Independence Day is excellent. It comes closer than any other film to showing what the reality of massive alien ships suddenly turning up would actually be like (a mixture of mass panic and euphoria) while at the same time plays like a military technothriller, with lots of tense scenes in command centres, submarines and the White House. The shots of the alien craft arriving over New York, Washington and LA are hugely impressive and ominous, while the frequent use of TV news broadcasts lends the whole thing an air of believability (for more of this check out the 10 minute mockumentary on the DVD). Also, a great sense of tension is built up by Jeff Goldblum's character's discovery of the countdown signal.

The payoff of all of this is the second reason the film is worth a look, namely some of the most impressive visual effects you are ever likely to see. Even seven years on the shots of the White House and Empire State Building being obliterated are astonishing (although undoubtedly helped by the fact that they taker place in darkness). The effects throughout the rest of the film are excellent as well, and use a nice mixture of CGI, models and puppets, rather than being a total CGI fest.
So far, so good, and if the film had continued in this way it could have been a brilliant, dark sci-fi epic. Unfortunately, the last half of the film is crammed full of some of the most jingoistic, cringeworthy, America-saves-the-day dialogue you are ever likely to hear. To be honest, most of it is so bad that it's not even offensive, just hilarious - it's impossible to keep a straight face when Bill Pulman's President gives his 'Our Independence Day' speech. The English public schoolboy RAF pilots are equally good, for all the wrong reasons - "About bloody time, what do they intend to do?" - absolutely priceless!! Thoroughly bloody good chaps, all of them!
While it is possible to just laugh at the above examples, some of the other scenes towards the end of the film really do grate. I'm thinking here specifically of the downright patronising shots of arabs and africans celebrating the destruction of the alien ships courtesy of the good ol' US of A. The rest of the last hour is littered with dialogue which may not be particularly offensive, but is just plain cheesy.
As for other criticisms which people have mentioned, well, yes, the plot is full of holes, but so are the plots of films like The Empire Strikes Back and Raiders of the Lost Ark (how does the Falcon get to Bespin without a hyperdrive? How does Indy survive the journey to the Nazi hideout on the outside of a submarine?). The fact is that it's a tribute to 50's B-movies, and therefore like Star Wars and Indiana Jones it's plot shouldn't be scrutinised too closely. It has a sheen of reality, and that's enough. And as for saying that it started the trend towards big budget special effects at the expense of acting and story, well that's been said since King Kong came out.
As for the rest, the acting is OK, nothing special (although Will Smith does have some pretty funny one liners), with the music serving it's purpose without really being memorable. This film is very much a product of it's time - REM are on the radio and the X-Files is namechecked. This means of the course that the World Trade Centre is still a part of the New York skyline and it's a little disconcerting, post 9/11, seeing famous New York landmarks being obliterated. Still, the film is worth a look - just enjoy the excellent first hour, then pause the film, go and have a few beers and proceed to kill yourself laughing through the cheesy awfulness of the second hour!
Rating - 7/10