Independence Day (1996)

 

Fox picked this one for their 75^th Anniversary set, no doubt based on the continued popularity it has enjoyed since its release over 20 years ago. (They even tried to reboot it as a franchise in 2015.) Let’s see if it’s meritorious…

Independence Day was Fox’s most hyped-up release for the 4^th of July weekend of 1996 (Coincidence? I think not.) Without a whole heck of a lot of competition, it became in instant commercial hit. Fox must’ve breathed a sigh of relief; after al, it had been quite a while since we had a real bona fide alien invasion movie. One, of course, calls to mind the classics from the 50s – The Day the Earth Stood Still and War of the Worlds – films loaded with political metaphor but yet a lot of cheesy fun. They had all the trademarks f the decade’s sci-fi genre: stilted acting, dime-store sets and effects, incredible-but-we-don’t-care storylines, and tongue firmly planted inside cheek to make the whole thing work.

Independence Day is a sci-fi film, yes, but it’s hardly cheesy. It’s a 100-million-dollar extravaganza that takes itself seriously, very seriously. I mean, we’re pretty much talking about the end of the world here, and we get explosions, explosions and more explosions to drive the point home. The aliens have arrived and they don’t even have the time to send a cute robot like Gorp to send a message. They arrive with enough firepower to decimate every city on the globe, and America has to respond with everything its got – cruise missiles, fighter jets and even (gasp) nuclear weapons. This is what a visit from aliens’ looks like in 1996: nothing short of World War III.

And actually, when you look at it, Independence Day isn’t really like those sci-fi films fro the 50s at all. It’s structured more like a war movie, a big ensemble war movie like The Longest Day or Tora, Tora, Tora or The Winds of War, or for that matter a big disaster movie with a cast of thousands. (You know the kind with a movie poster that has all those boxes at the bottom? Oh, sorry millennials, you don’t remember.) In the beginning we get about six or seven story lines involving a dozen people or so from all across the nation, and then they come together once the shit hits the fan. I remember some critics attacking Day’s absence of any kind of dynamic or even characterized villains, but quite frankly it’s an irrelevant criticism. Independence Day has no desire to flesh out its baddies any more than most old WWII epics distinguished the Nazi’s, or than Irwin Allen personified a raging skyscraper fire.

So then we must judge the film on its own merits. How does it do as a modern day example of one of those “box” movies?

Meh.

I mean, it starts out promising. We start juggling stories right at the very beginning, and they are:

·   Jeff Goldbloom, a MIT scientist, who has discovered a signal from outer space, which he determines to be some sort of countdown. With his father (Judd Hirsch) in tow, he gains access to the Oval Office thanks to his former wife, a White House Communications Director.

·   Bill Paxton, the President of the United States, who has the awesome responsibility of keeping the country cool and composed whilst a mega-monolithic mothership hovers perniciously over the nation’s capital. He is aided by a straight thinking general (Robert Loggia) and sniveling, ill-advising Secretary of Defense.

·   Will Smith as a US air force pilot engaged to a stripper living in Las Vegas.

·   Randy Quaid as an alcoholic, crop-dusting Vietnam Vet on the outs with his biolgica children but making an attempt to reconnect. The town laughs at him and even makes him believe he was once abducted by aliens.

Well, remember that countdown? It’s not to ring in the New Year; the aliens use it to calibrate their mass destruction of every major American city, and millions perish in the ghastly infernos. The president has his crew narrowly escape aboard Air Fore One, and Smith’s stripper wife and children avert death themselves (the First Lady isn’t quite so lucky). Time for a counterattack, but the US armed forces discovers it’s firepower is no match for the aliens’ more advanced technology. Even nuclear weapons have no effect (yup, they used them, despite Goldbloom’s admonitions). The White House starts the blame game, and Hirsch even invokes Roswell as evidence that the government knew about the aliens’ last visit but did nothing about it. Wait a minute!

It turns out that not only did this happen but it could be of some use in the current situation. The daffy scientist in charge of the Roswell case has kept intact the original spaceship, and now has access to a live E.T. thanks to Smith. He seems a little too weird and a little too “excited” with all this chaos, so you know he’s gonna perish soon (he does, when he tries to operate on an alien that… put it his way… does not want to be operated on. But Goldbloom hatches a plan to use the Rosewell craft to infect the aliens with a cold virus, thereby debilitating their shields for just enough time to launch a full-frontal attack. The plan works, culminating in a Quaid’s self-sacrificial attack on the mothership, rendering the rest of the alien fleet completely powerless. The pres decreees that Independence Day shall henceforth be celebrated as a worldwide day of freedom, not from tyranny or oppression, but from annihilation. Hmmm, isn’t that just called…. survival?

Independence Day has a lot going for it. It’s well-paced and does a good job of shuffling back and forth through its bevy of stars. And it’s definitely highlighted by some noteworthy performances. Pullman plays a remarkably good job of playing the president as everyman – a regular Joe trying to lead the Free Word with all the foibles and insecurities of you or I. In one scene in which he must comfort his dying wife by lying, he transcends, and elevates, the material. And the double-team of nebbish Jeff Goldbloom and his kvetching dad as played by Judd Hirsh offers just the right amount of idiosyncratic charm to alleviate the intensity of their situation at just the right movements.

But for all of its aspirations and lofty intentions, Independence Day just feels empty. At the end of its bloated 2 ½ hour running time, and the fireworks are popping and the flags are waving, you’re left with the feeling of not feeling more. Sure, you can blame the predictable outcome or the mostly flat and sometimes overwrought characterizations, but I think this particular shortcoming has more to do with direction. Roland Emmerich, at the helm, lacks the sense of urgency that a director like James Cameron could impart (and it doesn’t help that his special effects look mostly shoddy either). Ironic, given the fact that most of the earth is destroyed here, but it’s destroyed by nameless slimeballs, and no real reason is given for their havoc, either (it’s briefly explained that they want to use up our natural resources). Sure, this counteracts my claim that their namelessness shouldn’t matter, but maybe it does for the sake of creating a hateful villain. All In know is, I wasn’t exactly as white-knuckle as I wished I were.

Still, it’s watchable, but it won’t go on my list of classics. See it once and get it over with, and don’t expect too, too much.

Rating:  ***

Waiting To Exhale (1995)

This is a Fox selection, doubtless for its female, African-American cast  (you can tick two PC boxes with this one). But it was also a pretty eagerly awaited Christmas release in ’95, and it made money, not to mention giving us the smash Whitney Houston single “Shoop, Shoop.” But is it artistically meritorious? In a word… meh.

The film Waiting To Exhale was based on the bestselling book by Terry McMillian, and it was one of those books that so connected with a demographic – African-America females – that it pretty much became their bible for a good ten-year stretch. It was so thunderingly resonative because it depicted, in great, emotional detail, the conundrum of the modern black relationship: how can you find a good man when they’re either deadbeats or married? And why do affairs with the married ones always lead to heartbreak in the end? Ultimately, you turn to each other, and it’s this sisterhood, this unique social bond that you’re apt to find in beauty salons or sleepover parties, that dulls the pain, ant least for awhile. Exhale gave the rest of America a taste of this culture – in essence affirming, “We are here, and we got man problems like the rest of you!”

And now, the movie – Fox made damned sure it got the special treatment, hiring actor Forrest Whitaker to direct, and pop sensation Whitney Houston to play one of four lead heroines. Her role is Savannah, a TV producer who has man troubles – she’s falling head over heels with a married man who’s promised to leave his wife soon, very soon. Savannah’s mom thinks the guy is just peachy, but daughter dear just isn’t so sure. And the there’s Robin (Lela Rochon) who has.. man troubles. She’s just left one married man and now finds herself attracted to another. But will he leave his significant other? And is she – gasp! – pregnant too! And then there’s Gloria (Loretta Devine), who has… man troubles after finding out that her ex-husband is gay, thereby negating any chance of reconciliation, and finds hersef head over heels in love – apparently true love – with a new neighbor (Gregory Hines). And finally we have Bernadine (Angela Bassett), who has (oh, never kind). She’s pissed – I mean really pissed – that her husband has just announced he’s leaving her for a white woman and plans to keep everything in the divorce. But now, at rock bottom, she’s just found a sweet man (Wesley Snipes) whose wife is dying of cancer, and together they forge a platonic relationship (so far) of mutual love and respect.

First the good news. Whitaker does a fine, fluid job of shuttling throughout these four stories, allowing nearly equal time for each and having enough scenes of them together to foster a nice “touching base” sort of effect. And he sets a pitch-perfect tone too - we begin on New Year’s Eve as a radio DJ sets a smooth, slowjam type of vibe that imbues the film with at least one theme – slow down and relax, and your troubles will often take care of themselves. It undercuts a lot of more intense moments in Exhale, and makes it, well… entertaining for the most part. We damned well need a soulful Aretha song after Angela Bassett burns every living reminder of her slimeball husband in the backseat of his sports car.

Several of the performances are noteworthy too. Bassett has the showiest part – her Bernadette gets to storm and sneer and sniffle, often within the same scene. But she also excels at the quiet stuff too – notably during her scenes with Snipes where she often just stares at him, letting her reacting do the acting. And newcomer Rochon isn’t bad as a sexy single who starts out blithely content wiih her lifestyle, before it dawns on her that all those beddings fail to provide the peace in her life that she so desperately requires. Her funniest scene – a not-so-erotic tryst with a Ton-Loc wannabe, which starts out comic and then turns to a quiet, revealing moment. She becomes instantly likeable after this.

But despite its general success as entertainment there seems to be something missing from this work, particularly when you consider it as feminist tract. We’re just not getting the significance here, or, for that matter, a purpose. Individually, these women have stories to tell, and they each offer a tale about their woes in dealing with the opposite sex, but together they drift off into the ether, and it doesn’t help that none really has any sort of conclusion. (The last scene is a shot of all four gazing at New Years fireworks, just after commenting about a Roberta Flack song in the car.) Two of the stories are nearly identical in plot – Savannah and Robin’s respective not-leaving-my-wife love interests – and so neither comes off as strikingly important. Only the Bassett/Snipes story seems like it has something to say, but it lacks a third act – we don’t really know where they’re going, nor do they tell us.

This most likely wasn’t the case with the book, as literature is a medium in which the author, as a direct storyteller, is better able to impart a message. But with movies it’s the characters, and their speech and actions, which must do that. And despite a lot of soul-searching talks between the women and some fiery arguments between the men and women, the film version just simply fails to rise much above an ensemble chick-flick. Oh, it’s a well-done chick-flick, but a chick flick nonetheless.

And I’m sure that was not their intention. But if you go in with moderate expectations you’re likely not to be disappointed. And you’ll get to see at least a couple of fine performances. Oh, and don’t forget that soundtrack.

Rating:  ***