Misunderstood

Rating: 8/10 (22 November 2005)

My, doesn't that title sound like a pop album. Anyway, this movie was misunderstood. First and foremost, it is a movie. Yes, it is unbelievable, but it is a movie! Second, America is usually considered the strongest country in the world, which I'm sure will be getting many arguments there, and the movie was made in (gasp) America, so naturally the focus would be in America. When you see a British film, where does it tend to take place? Uh... Britian? And who tends to be the protagonist? A British guy? Now, I know this may shock many people, but this was a good movie. It was very entertaining, suspenseful, and actually pretty clever (for what it was, don't worry). The special effects were amazing, and the acting was bearable (which is all you need in an action movie). They weren't trying to make a deep, philosophical movie, or important one for that matter. No, they were trying to make a movie. A summer blockbuster, and that is all. They exceeded that and made one that is still remembered 5 1/2 years later. Now tell me that isn't something. Name another movie from 1996 off the top of your head. I'd have to think about it, but this would be the first one to come to mind.
Everyone probably knows the story by now, but just in case: Aliens invade Earth and blow the crap out of everything in existence there, well, except for some pretty people, and the world must stand against them. This movie does include other countries, granted it is for one scene, but many like this don't as if America is the only country in the world, i.e. Mars Attacks. The Americans have an alien ship, via the Roswell incident, and because of this, CD's and those crazy com-put-er things were invented. But also because of this, Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum (who is the best actor in the movie, I don't care what you say, he seems more like a real person than Will Smith or Bill Pullman, and he is a good actor. Oh no! This Craig guy is crazy for thinking that!) fly the ship to the mother ship, which is above the moon, and blow it up with a nuke. It is not the virus that destroys it, it is the nuclear missile that is shot inside of the ship. The virus just shut down the shields.
The virus: It actually does make sense. The aliens took over using the satellites that we had for TV and such, so everything involved with them was not working well. Because they were using the satellites, all Jeff Goldblum had to do was hack into the satellite and that would let him into the alien's internet provider (which, ironically, was Earthlink) and give them a direct connection. So they emailed a virus to the aliens and bam! it destroyed their systems. Ever had a virus? It can be that bad. I believe Jeff went into the future and got the real Y2K virus, not the one that actually went out, the one in the crappy TV movie that made computers explode into people's faces and kill them. So the virus, which could have just as easily been uploaded by a PC, made their computers crash. The Technical guys could not come in time to fix it, because all they had was a few minutes to fix the computers, and they had to have their Starbucks or their day would just suck. And then, BOOM! Jeff and Will barely escape before the big explosion, Earth wins, and a firework show ends the movie. The End.