THE GIANT SPIDER INVASION (1975)

Director: Bill Rebane

Writers: Richard L. Huff, Robert Easton

Producers: Richard L. Huff, Bill Rebane

Cast: Steve Brodie, Barbara Hale, Robert Easton, Leslie Parrish, Alan Hale, Jr., Diane Lee Hart, Paul Bentzen, Kevin Brodie, Bill Williams, Christiane Schmidtmer, Tain Bodkin, J. Stewart Taylor, William W. Gillett, Jr., David B. Hoff, Joe Thingvall (uncredited)

A meteor plummets to Earth landing in North Central Wisconsin. It contains geodes that bust open like eggs to reveal diamonds and hairy spiders. Some of the extraterrestrial arachnids soon grow to giant size and feed on cattle and humans. It’s up to a couple of scientists (Barbara Hale and Steve Brodie) and the local sheriff (Alan Hale, Jr.) to quell the panic and figure out how to destroy the monsters.

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Nowadays, horror movie titles usually have a the-shorter-the-better attitude. I guess that’s supposed to be more classy or evocative. Jaws (1975) probably set that standard, but it also effectively suggests what you’re getting while using a common word that is unusual for use in a film title. Only just the right word really works for that single-word-title technique. Everyone going to see Jaws already knew that it was a giant shark horror movie. It also helped that it was promoted by a major studio and based on Peter Benchley’s bestselling novel.

In 1975 we also got The Giant Spider Invasion. Now, that’s a title that says it all, doesn’t it? It’s an unforgettable title that tells its audience exactly what they’re going to get. Of course, such explicit titles today are also telling the audience that they’re getting something that is knowingly absurd. Nowadays, everything is so damned self-conscious that when a title spells out the bizarre content of the flick it must be intentionally ironic garbage, right? I yearn for the days when such a title meant unpretentious garbage such as The Giant Spider Invasion.

Garbage may be too strong a word to use from my perspective. I think this film is the movie equivalent of cold, day-old pizza from out of the fridge; nothing fancy or as good as it could have been, but it gives me exactly what I need sometimes. It is also seasoned with plenty of quirks, which always suits the taste of a quirky fellow like me.

According to star Robert Easton, the film’s original script by R.L. Huff was awful and dead serious. Easton convinced director Bill Rebane that he could salvage it by rewriting it as a spoof. However, original writer Huff was also the producer, so he removed a lot of the humor that Easton added with his rewrite. Easton still managed to sneak some gags past the humorless Huff, and it is probably Easton’s input that gives some characters their funny, uncouth edge. Perhaps it is that Easton-Huff conflict of intent that lends the film a bit of irreverent wit without it becoming the snarky kind of stuff that keeps anyone from engaging with the story. There is nothing thematically heavy going on here, but the horror of the situation is dealt with sincerely.

The premise is simple and plays out quite straightforward, except for the two scientists’ double talk to justify what the hell a meteorite is doing here with giant spiders coming out of it. Actors Steve Brodie and Barbara Hale (Della Street from the Perry Mason television series), as scientists Dr. J.R. Vance and Dr. Jenny Langer, strive valiantly to make it sound like there is method to this script’s sci-fi madness. It all has something to do with a black hole spewing out this spider invasion from another dimension. I don’t ever recall black holes getting any sci-fi movie mentions before, so I guess it sounded pretty advanced. Or maybe the sweaty, fire-and-brimstone revivalist preacher’s (Tain Bodkin) rant at the beginning of the film brings about this horrible phenomenon as a way to make those local yokels pay for their sins. Geez, maybe this flick isn’t quite as straightforward as I first thought.

As Sheriff Jones, Alan Hale, Jr. (yes, the Skipper of Gilligan’s Island TV fame), is fun. He is allowed a couple of light moments early on that break the fourth wall with the audience. I usually resent that kind of stuff, but I can excuse it in small doses in a movie that is as rambunctious as this one. I really get a kick out of Sheriff Jones taking an eternity to get away from that damned phone in his office to actually do some sheriffing. When he finally does, the town folk pretty much ignore him, which leads to plenty of casualties.

My favorite scenes are those dealing with the members of the Kester rural household. There is an unsavory aspect to them that really holds my interest. Since the Kester clan is the most interesting bunch of characters in the film, it probably explains why they are also the film’s best performances.

The unlikely bickering couple of loutish farmer Dan Kester (Robert Easton) and his gorgeous, alcoholic wife Ev (Leslie Parrish of 1959’s Lil’ Abner, 1962’s The Manchurian Candidate, and featured in the original Star Trek TV series episode “Who Mourns for Adonis?”) are amusing and sometimes a bit pathetic. That lucky bum Dan Kester landed this beautiful woman and has her cooped up in the middle of nowhere on his farm, but he is stepping out to screw around with a sexy, local waitress (Christiane Scmidtmer), despite his encumbrance of a very unflattering back support girdle. While Dan is out tomcattin’ around, his bored wife calls up the proprietor (Bill Williams) of the local cafe to deliver more booze, and, if he hurries, Ev will make it worth his while.

Ev’s scrumptious, younger sister, Terry (Diane Lee Hart), is living in the same house. When her boyfriend Davey (Kevin Brodie) comes to visit, Ev flirts with him while sucking up more booze. Fair’s fair though, as her philandering hick hubby Dan is soon propositioning Terry. He is trying to win her over with the diamonds he has found at the site of the meteor landing on his farm. Little Terry plays hard to get; she flaunts what she’s got to Dan one second and insults him the next, but she doesn’t outright reject him. She doubts the authenticity of the gem, but seems mighty interested in it just the same.

Upping the sleaze factor even more, Terry’s cousin Billy (Paul Bentzen) also tries to get some from her because, as he points out, they’re not related by blood so they can be “kissin’ cousins.” Because he’s not brandishing diamonds, Terry brushes him off in a hurry.

This film was originally conceived as an invasion of normal-sized spiders, but the distributor dictated that giant spiders were needed to seal the financing deal. Director Rebane managed to arrange for a local welder to help manufacture his monster spider on the fly with only $10,000 set aside for his special effects budget. Once the title menace of this movie shifts into gear, it is courtesy of a Volkswagen Beetle that was stripped down and outfitted with a hairy spider body and eight moving legs manipulated by a bunch of teenagers stuffed inside the contraption. Such is the stuff of low-budget monster movie legend. It looks quite effective during long shots in the hills and fields or behind a fleeing crowd. It’s a fun, gross effect to see victims get sucked up into the spider’s bloody maw, but nothing could be grosser than Ev’s Bloody Mary. Cheers!

While based in Chicago, Bill Rebane had started making his first feature length film in 1963. That sci-fi horror movie was originally titled Terror at Halfday, but when Rebane’s finances ran out, it was finished as Monster a-Go Go! (1965) by the notorious goremeister Herschell Gordon Lewis. In the late 1960s, Rebane purchased farm property near Gleason, Wisconsin and created a film studio he used for producing commercials and industrial films. He returned to feature film production in the 1970s and 1980s.

The Giant Spider Invasion was the second of Wisconsin-based producer-director Bill Rebane’s completed feature films. Although Rebane went on to make more horror movies in Wisconsin, The Giant Spider Invasion is certainly his best remembered one. It probably benefits the most from the writers-at-odds-with-each-other tastes in that oddball Huff-Easton script. Rebane gathering the starring cast of Alan Hale, Jr., Leslie Parrish, and Barbara Hale for a $300,000-budget movie shot in the middle of rural Wisconsin is quite a feat for a regional filmmaker.

As a kid, I lived in North Central Wisconsin when this creature feature was being made. The local media publicized its production pretty well before its local release. A monster movie being shot around my neck of the woods meant that I just had to see it. I was not disappointed. What really put this flick over for me was the delectable Diane Lee Hart’s split second of toplessness. This was pushing the PG-rated envelope, and I felt like I was really getting away with something as a shocked mother nearby hustled her kid out of the theater. I gotta admit that scene still does it for me. I suppose that makes me the world’s oldest 13-year-old.

FANGS OF THE LIVING DEAD (1969), aka MALENKA, THE NIECE OF THE VAMPIRE

Director: Amando de Ossorio

Writer: Amando de Ossorio

Producers: Aubrey Ambert, Rosanna Yanni

Cast: Anita Ekberg, Julián Ugarte, Diana Lorys, Adriana Ambesi, Rosanna Yanni, Gianni Medici (as John Hamilton), César Benet (as Guy Robers), Fernando Bilbao, Carlos Casaravilla, Paul Muller, Adriana Santucci, Juanita Ramírez, Aurelia Treviño, Keith Kendal

Model Sylvia Morel (Anita Ekberg) is notified that she has inherited Walbrooke castle and will be a countess. She leaves Rome to visit her new property and meets her strange uncle, Count Walbrooke (Julián Urgarte). He informs Sylvia that her lookalike grandmother, Malenka, was burned as a witch, but not before discovering the secret of immortality. Malenka made her husband immortal by turning him into a vampire. That vampire is actually the present day Count Walbrooke. The Count will not allow Sylvia to return to Rome as he tries to convince her that she is no longer fit to live with mortals.

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Originally titled Malenka, the Niece of the Vampire, Fangs of the Living Dead was Spanish writer-director Amando de Ossorio’s first horror film. Perhaps that explains why it is so uneven and confused in terms of its tone and its logic. Some of this is due to the ending being tampered with by the producer, yet that is no less satisfying than the main characters’ behavior at the finish of the film in its original form.

The gorgeous Anita Ekberg stars as Rome model Sylvia Morel. As simplistic as her character is and as nearly uneventful as her situation plays out, her beauty and some of her wild outfits do manage to maintain some interest.

For all of its faults, this flick certainly does not skimp on the feminine eye candy. Joining Ekberg in the cast are Euro-beauties Diana Lorys, Rosanna Yanni, and Adriana Ambesi. It is Ambesi who provides the most eroticism with the low-cut gown she nearly pops out of and the lesbian vibes in her character’s behavior when she first meets the rather submissive (and receptive?) Sylvia. With all of this pulchritude about, it is a shame that de Ossorio did not make this film just a few years later when the film market became more permissive. Whether these ladies would have been game for it or not, I am sure that de Ossorio would have contrived to have made things much more revealing.

Gianni Medici plays Sylvia’s fiancé, Dr. Piero Luciani. He’s the straight man alongside Max (César Benet), his tagalong best friend. It seems as though Max is around to send up the situations a bit, which just diffuses what little menace the story is trying to generate.

Julián Ugarte, having been featured in Paul Naschy’s debut horror film, Frankenstein’s Bloody Terror (1968), stars here as the main source of malevolence in the form of Count Walbrooke. He is always fine as a cold and aristocratic presence.

Speaking of Frankenstein’s Bloody Terror, that film’s great dungeon and some other castle interiors were also used in this film. These sets being actual locations lend a lot of authentic character to the Walbrooke Castle setting that much of the story takes place in.

Writer-director de Ossorio has some terrific assets to exploit in this film, yet his story does not seem willing to really let loose and provide the horror payoffs that the audience is expecting. He is trying to surprise the audience with his climax, yet along the way he rarely provides the thrills to sustain involvement in his story and characters. I am always willing to allow a filmmaker to confound expectations for a satisfying variation that may actually engage one’s attention, but de Ossorio seems to have taken all the bite out of this film’s premise. The final denouement, as originally presented, is dramatically limp. However, the producers-decreed, last-ditch-alteration ending is either totally contradictory, or meant to be a bit ambiguous. Oh hell, they were just trying to salvage this by tossing in a traditional terror tidbit that they thought the fright flick fans would swallow. It still doesn’t go down easy.

Director Amando de Ossorio will always be best known for his four Blind Dead films of the 1970s. The director would go on to become nearly as important an exponent of the Spanish horror film as Paul Naschy. His other horror efforts varied in quality and were often compromised by inadequate budgets, yet he wrote script after script that he kept ready for future production opportunities.

Amando de Ossorio’s Fangs of the Living Dead is chiefly of interest to his fans that want to see how he tentatively approached horror in his debut genre effort. All others should probably steer clear. Sylvia may be allergic to castles, and Max is allergic to garlic, but the most severe reaction will be suffered by an audience allergic to films with the ripe potential for Gothic horror spoiled by plot twists that result in a lot of illogical behavior.

THE INCREDIBLE 2-HEADED TRANSPLANT (1971)

Director: Anthony M. Lanza

Writers: James Gordon White, John Lawrence, Ross Massbaum (uncredited)

Producers: John Lawrence, Ross Massbaum (uncredited)

Cast: Bruce Dern, Pat Priest, Berry Kroeger, John Bloom, Albert Cole, Casey Kasem, Larry Vincent, Darlene Duralia, Jack Lester, Jerry Patterson, Ray Thorne, Gary Kent (as Donald Brody), Mary Ellen Clawsen, Mike Espe, Janice P. Gelman, Eva Sorensen, Andrew Schneider, Bill Collins, Jack English, Leslie Cole, Robert Miller, Carolyn Gilbert, Laura Lanza, William Bonner (uncredited), Phil Hoover (uncredited)

Dr. Roger Girard (Bruce Dern) has been experimenting in his home lab transplanting second heads onto various animals. The next step is to try human subjects. If a two-headed human transplant is successful, Dr. Girard will be closer to his ultimate goal: replacing the heads of brain-damaged people with the heads of those who are mentally sound but terminally ill. When insane killer Manuel Cass (Albert Cole) abducts Dr. Girard’s wife, Linda (Pat Priest), Girard and his lab assistant, Max (Berry Kroeger), follow in pursuit. During Linda’s rescue the murderous Cass is shot. Now Dr. Girard has a convenient opportunity to attach the dying criminal’s head to the body of Danny (John Bloom), the mentally handicapped giant staying in the Girard household.

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The title alone guarantees this flick its place in horror history. It also was the attention-getter that would get the drive-in crowd to pay up and pull in. If you were looking for sci-fi horror, The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant says that you need look no further.

The story is quite simple and depends on its Frankenstein variation to generate almost all of the interest. The rest of the interest is supplied by the luscious Pat Priest in an assortment of early ’70s outfits that scream, “I’m half-dressed with nowhere to go!” Priest is best known for replacing Beverley Owen as the beautiful blonde Marilyn in the classic TV sitcom The Munsters (1964-66). Her wholesome beauty is once again contrasted with monstrous characters, but in nastier circumstances this time around.

In retrospect, Bruce Dern’s appearance in this thing certainly elevates its curiosity value. Initially, he must have seemed like an odd choice to play a dedicated and ambitious surgeon. However, his past villainous roles have us braced to see him stoop to unethical behavior. He does give the role a sense of sincerity and never comes across as just a mad scientist. In the aftermath of a mental breakdown, Dern’s Dr. Roger Girard needs to prove his merit as a scientist to the world. That need for approval and redemption, along with the nagging of lab assistant Max, misdirects Girard’s moral compass. Girard is conflicted about what his experiment will do to the huge and innocent Danny, to whom he will be attaching a maniac’s head, but Girard overcomes that concern for what he thinks will eventually be for the good of mankind.

Every wannabe mad scientist worth his scalpel needs an unsavory lab assistant. Berry Kroeger plays Max, Dr. Girard’s scientific accomplice. He wants Girard’s transplant experiments to continue, regardless of any ethical considerations or criminal consequences. Former surgeon Max is frustrated by his damaged hands. Once head transplant surgery is perfected, the elderly Max wants his own head ported over to a new body that will allow him to perform surgery again. Geez, I think the guy really needs a hobby. However, it is Max’s mad science peer pressure that prods Dr. Girard onward to make a monster, so I guess I can cut the creep a little slack. After all, we don’t watch a flick called The Incredible 2-Head Transplant just to see two-headed lab animals munch their meals in cages.

Personally, I think the good Dr. Girard, if not mad, must have at least a few screws loose. How can any sane man spend all his time in the lab neglecting a wife who looks like Pat Priest? All Linda Girard wants is a little attention from her husband who locks himself away in his lab for days on end, yet she could become High Priestess of the Cult of the Bikini and have hordes of worshippers at her beck and call. Consider me for Chief Elder and Ogler in that congregation.

Famous disc jockey Casey Kasem, host of the music countdown show American Top 40 and voice of numerous Hanna-Barbera television cartoon characters, plays the role of Dr. Ken Anderson, a friend and confidant to the Girard couple. Dr. Anderson raises the ethical issue of Dr. Girard’s final goal: When replacing the head of someone who is brain-damaged with another head of a dying person, how is it decided who is truly more worthy of life? Kasem should have gotten stunt pay for managing to walk around beneath the crushing burden of his massive early ’70s collars and the biggest belt buckle this side of the WWE championship belt. I assume that his character’s specialty was not ophthalmology as he, and all those around him, run the risk of being blinded by the incredible tie he wears.

As insane killer Manuel Cass, Albert Cole seems to be having the most fun in this flick. He’s a wild-eyed, gap-toothed, laughing maniac who clearly enjoys his work. Slobbering all over Pat Priest is nice work, if you can get it. Cass may have awful manners, but he’s got great taste.

7’ 4” John Bloom plays the innocent, simple-minded Danny that gets the noggin of a maniac transplanted onto himself. The interaction between Bloom and Cole as two very different minds using one body is quite effective. The dominant head of the evil Cass berating and controlling his giant host is bizarre and amusing. Of course, the sadistic Cass makes the best of this bad situation and uses his huge and powerful new body to commit more murders. This is definitely a case of two heads not being better than one, except for horror fans. Bloom and Cole worked together the same year in a scene of director Al Adamson’s Dracula vs. Frankenstein (1971). There Bloom also played another product of mad science, the Frankenstein monster.

The success of The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant led to the consideration of a sequel. That ultimately became another unrelated two-headed transplant film called The Thing with Two Heads (1972). Over a decade earlier, The Manster (1959) pioneered the two-headed gimmick. However, it is The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant that has the honor of being the finest two-headed monster movie. That is an honor it truly deserves; the other movies don’t have Pat Priest in a bikini.

INDEPENDENCE DAY (1996)

Director: Roland Emmerich

Writers: Dean Devlin, Roland Emmerich

Producer: Dean Devlin

Cast: Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Judd Hirsch, Mary McDonnell, Randy Quaid, Margaret Colin, Robert Loggia, James Rebhorn, Harvey Fierstein, Vivica A. Fox, Brent Spiner, Adam Baldwin, James Duval, Bill Smitrovich, Kiersten Warren, Harry Connick, Jr., Ross Bagley, Mae Whitman, Lisa Jakub, Giuseppe Andrews 

A gigantic alien craft has taken a position in space between Earth and the Moon. It sends out 15-mile-wide flying saucers to hover over many of the world’s major cities. They use the world’s communication satellites to relay a coordinating signal that counts down to a moment for all the saucers to simultaneously obliterate the cities beneath them. A U.S. Marine pilot (Will Smith) and an IT engineer (Jeff Goldblum) join U.S. President Whitmore (Bill Pullman) and his staff to try preventing the extermination of mankind. 

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SPOILER ALERT! This review will reveal many plot points and the conclusion of —ah, to hell with it! It’s impossible to spoil a turd. 

Way back in 1996 when I first saw the trailer for Independence Day, I knew I was going to hate it. The ad immediately conveyed that the film would be loaded with special effects and “attitude,” which was the recipe for so many half-baked, roller coaster ride movies of that era. 

Very little has changed since, except that no one is awed by “way cool” effects anymore; we just expect them. That should mean that films stop being made just to showcase special effects. However, now that effects-heavy movies are referred to as a director’s “vision,” we are supposed to believe that CGI eye candy is meaningful. Usually it just pacifies an audience that can’t be involved anymore. 

I will give Independence Day its due. The story achieves an epic scale and has game performances to drive home the schmaltz. However, it is the fine special effects that are half the reason for the film’s existence. Of course since those very effects are merely adequate by our jaded, present day standards, we are left with the other even more obsolete reason for this film’s existence: pandering to the contemporary conceit of the 1996 audience. 

The filmmakers of Independence Day had only one objective: to make money with a sci-fi  blockbuster à la Jurassic Park (1993). That is the only “vision” they had in mind. They wanted to shovel another load of CGI effects-seasoned sci-fi slop into the entertainment trough hoping that the moronic mainstream masses would lap it up during the peak summertime movie season. If those filmmakers really had some balls, they would have immediately puked up another CGI-dinosaur movie instead to reveal their utterly mercenary, creatively bankrupt motives. 

Lest you think I judge director Roland Emmerich and company too harshly, I ask you: Why else did their sci-fi follow-up to Independence Day become another CGI-dinosaur movie called Godzilla (1998) with velociraptors in it? Moviegoers didn’t know the first frigging thing about raptors till they were shown Jurassic Park. But making Godzilla spawn those suddenly hip dinos would seem to be an oh so contemporary twist for the remake. While Emmerich and company weren’t quite so ballsy as to hand us another GGI-dinosaur movie right away, their Godzilla remake clearly displays their derivative and opportunistic nature. 

I have no issue with filmmakers making stuff that is of its time and popular. No commercial filmmaker sets out to make a film that is a financial failure. But when a film is made to simply regurgitate a well-worn plot, load it up with new effects, and then shoehorn contemporary gimmicks into the plot as an effort to seem hip, clever, and accessible to stroke the audience while destroying any logic the ripped-off plot already had, that is NOT good filmmaking. However, it may make money from the insecure dummies that will feel validated having their asses kissed by this acknowledgement of their contemporary interests. That is why I resent this film. Not only did the mainstream audience not deserve to have its ass kissed, but I also knew that, if Independence Day was a hit, we would be buried in an avalanche of more “high concept” crap. Director Emmerich himself was encouraged by this film’s success to feed us more CGI spectacles that are probably just as gag inducing. 

 

Emmerich and his accomplices must have decided that great big alien spaceships blowing up a lot of shit could be another profitable sci-fi spectacle. Thus, 1953’s The War of the Worlds gets a ’90s special-effects rehash. 

Above all, this movie needed to be seen as clever, so it was not called something as honest as War of the Worlds for ’90s Nitwits. It was called Independence Day. Boy, that sounds lofty, doesn’t it? There is a certain air of dignity and heroism about this whole half-assed, expensive endeavor now, isn’t there? Best of all, it would have a nationwide release the day before the July 4th Independence Day holiday, so the movie could be marketed with the oh so hip acronym of ID4. The word “four” does not actually appear in the film’s title, BUT if we are all really smart, (and if we can figure this out we must be and will just love this movie for engaging us on such an “intellectual” level) we will realize that the numeral four refers to the U.S. Independence Day date of the fourth of July. It also follows that ’90s trend of sticking numerals into titles and names of things that make them sound techy and make us feel so advanced for accepting numerals adorning titles and names for no good reason. Man, these filmmakers don’t miss a trick! They must be geniuses! Actually, they just know their moronic market and will pander to it shamelessly, as we shall see… 

Independence Day is just another alien invasion movie. British author H.G. Wells popularized that classic science fiction concept of mass destruction way back in 1897 with his novel The War of the Worlds, which has been the basis for adaptations in all forms of media ever since. Apparently, our familiarity with that story means we should be impressed when Independence Day puts its ’90s spin on it. Independence Day was hell-bent on being ingratiating to its audience. It knows that we “get it” being so “clever” and are made to feel relevant having an old sci-fi standard festooned with our contemporary interests. Those “hip” variations are anything but clever when they are not only forced, but they often blast holes in the logic of the plot. 

Remember when I told you that I hated this film immediately on the basis of its trailer? It trots out that ’90s movie trope of disaffected youth, represented by a cute stripper named Tiffani (Kiersten Warren), reacting to a television news report of a nearby, giant spaceship with an oh so disaffected exclamation of, “This is so cool.” Right. We all know that the nation’s youth are so worldly and sophisticated that they are above any sense of concern or panic. Well, actually that is only how the filmmakers think that the film’s young target audience wish to be perceived. So, Tiffani joins more of the cool crowd somehow holding a rave atop a Los Angeles skyscraper waving “Welcome” and “Take Me Away” placards right below one of the hovering UFOs. In one of many “hip” variations on the 1953 movie version of The War of the Worlds, instead of three local yokels waving a white flag becoming the first victims of the alien attacks, it is this group of thrill-seeking hipsters getting blasted who represent a large chunk of this movie’s demographic. Wow! Now it’s personal? Whatever. 

Why is another stripper named Jasmine (Vivica A. Fox) the girlfriend of Will Smith’s hero character? Because 1996 was apparently when strippers went mainstream. You could not watch prime time television that season without sooner or later seeing a promo for a stripper being featured in an episode of a network series. There is no reason for a stripper to be in Independence Day; it is just another hip ’90s gimmick. Hey, I love strippers! Bring ‘em on! But since this is a PG-13-rated movie, when we see this stripper at work she won’t drop the top, so what’s the point? Oh yeah, it’s still supposed to be cool in an oh so ’90s way. One more box has been checked off on the trend list. 

Independence Day makes a stab at sci-fi relevance by incorporating UFOlogy speculation about the legendary UFO that crashed in Roswell, New Mexico and the government Area 51 facility in Nevada that is supposed to be storing it. In this movie Area 51 contains an old scout ship from the alien race now attacking Earth. For 40 years the movie’s government eggheads have been studying this alien technology that is so advanced they understand hardly anything about it. Of course the awe that is supposed to generate is destroyed when our heroes must instantly master this technology. Nevertheless, since the ’90s sci-fi television series The X-Files used Roswell references, Independence Day dumps that into their sci-fi slop. At least this justified David Duchovny pissing on an Independence Day poster in the first theatrical film of The X-Files (1998). Truly an Oscar-worthy moment. 

Apparently, just about no one was more hip than Will Smith on the verge of superstardom in 1996. So, we need him to be the hip U.S. Marine hero Captain Steven Hiller. After bringing down one alien fighter craft, he knocks out the alien pilot with one punch and drags it across the desert to Area 51. It is never explained why this glass-jawed alien during a later surgical examination suddenly has the deadly ability to immediately decimate a room full of scientists. I guess the eggheads did not have any wiseass Will Smith-styled one-liners to defend themselves with. 

Eventually, in order to save the world, Smith has to fly the old, downed alien ship stored in Area 51. But just how the hell does he have instant prowess flying a forty-year-old alien craft so expertly that he can outmaneuver aliens flying their own new and presumably more advanced fighter vessels? Way back in the 1936 Flash Gordon serial, Buster Crabbe’s Flash had to at least watch Frank Shannon’s Dr. Zarkov pilot his rocketship all the way to the planet Mongo before Flash could fly such vessels himself. So much for the supposed advance of credibility and sophistication in the modern science fiction film. 

Remember that bullshit title to all of this contrived crap? Bill Pullman’s character of U.S. President Whitmore tries to justify this film’s pretentious title by delivering a troop-rousing speech before the big counter attack against the aliens. Very conveniently for movie marketing purposes, this is occurring on July 4th. Therefore, President Whitmore makes a ridiculously strained and patriotic analogy about this being Earth’s Independence Day. What the hell does once seceding from a monarchy have to do with resisting invasion and extermination? This is not about independence but survival. I guess “kill or be killed” doesn’t make the popcorn-munching morons want to stand up and cheer. 

Remember those government scientists in Area 51 that were studying that old alien vessel for 40 years and still can’t figure out how it works? Don’t worry because Jeff Goldblum (another popular box is checked using the star of Jurassic Park), as our IT hero David Levinson, shows up with his magic laptop. You see, back in the ’90s, the audience was infatuated with that new consumer craze for home computers. So, they would accept any plot point being glossed over by those gadgets. Computers were the handy trinkets that lazy screenwriters used to score with their audience. Here we are stroked with yet another “hip” variation on The War of the Worlds; instead of naturally occurring germs being responsible for the aliens’ destruction, a computer virus delivered via laptop saves the day. 

That is absolutely impossible! How does the virus get written that will communicate with an alien civilization’s computers? Remember that Earth scientists could not understand anything about that alien technology. So how the hell does Goldblum’s Levinson, who has no prior knowledge about the aliens, immediately cobble together a virus to interact with an alien technology that, once again, scientists were studying for 40 years and still understand almost nothing about? That means that they would not understand that alien computer language, much less be able to write code for it. 

Goldblum’s laptop had info about alien signals from his company’s cable television satellites that were being used by the aliens. Therefore, are we to believe that laptop somehow automatically wrote a virus with code that is understood by alien computers? Then why the hell did anyone ever bother to learn how to write computer code? The reason that most of our real world computer viruses did not infect both Apple Macintosh computers and other personal computers was because they have different hardware and operating systems. So, doesn’t it stand to reason that an extraterrestrial computer and its code would be even more incompatible with human computing code writing a virus? Should we assume, without any explanation in the film, that in a matter of minutes or hours, our hungover IT hero somehow invented alien-compatible code to write a computer virus? 

Believe it or not, computers are not magic. But they need to be for the purposes of this gung-ho, feel-good, ’90s perversion of The War of the Worlds. Can’t just let man be saved by the grace of God. Hell no! Gotta be sure that our salvation depends on our techno trends and consumer choices. Never fear! All is solved with a magic laptop. Did Apple and Microsoft bankroll this stupidity? 

This asinine aggravation just does not end, folks! This impossible computer virus is supposed to command the alien vessels to drop their defense shields allowing mankind’s missiles to strike them. Hotshot marine Will Smith, along with IT guru Jeff Goldblum and his magic laptop, must fly the old alien vessel from Area 51 into the aliens’ mothership. Somehow a giant leap of logic is made to assume that, once they dock, they will be connected to the mother ship’s computer system to download the virus. First off, this vessel that Smith and Goldblum are using is 40 years old. Why do the aliens not notice this antique arriving in their mother ship? If this alien race were so technologically sophisticated, surely their aircraft would have advanced one helluva lot over 40 years. Second, it was surmised that the aliens are telepathic. Then why is it when the Will Smith-piloted vessel docks in the alien mother ship, none of those telepathic aliens watching can sense that no member of their race is aboard that 40-year-old relic? 

Let us not neglect the sentimentality that is supposed to legitimize this coldly calculated money grab called Independence Day (not ID4, dammit). In a redemption setup that could be seen coming a light year away, the Goldblum character’s crusty father (Judd Hirsch) and ex-wife (Margaret Colin) see no merit in the tech guru’s line of work. Of course nothing could be more uplifting to a ’90s mainstream audience than seeing someone’s career path not only being justified, but also used to save the world. Great, now the wage slaves will feel validated marching back to the office to keep making the money to buy more stuff, especially computers. 

Having to force myself to watch Independence Day again for this review, I am not quite as hate-filled about it these days. I do see that a lot of technical and performance talent was poured into it, yet I am still opposed to its objective which is more about marketing than storytelling. I do not expect perfection, but I will condemn pretentious pandering full of illogical plot points. This expensive and ponderous display of fantasy could have been partially salvaged with just a few more sentences of that dreaded exposition to prop up its wobbly logic. That wouldn’t have cost one more lousy buck, but it may have required an honest effort. Just because Independence Day is ripping off The War of the Worlds does not mean it can’t be bothered to make sense of its contemporary tweaking. Paper costs no more for a good script than for a bad script. Since this turd cost $75 million and took four months to excrete, these feces makers could have made the effort to wipe. 

Whew! This alien autopsy was long overdue, but rest assured that it did not cost the American taxpayer a single penny, folks. I normally do not expend this much energy picking movies apart. There are plenty of fun flicks that have some narrative lapses, yet I may be able to reason out something not made clear and still celebrate a film’s merits. I love schlock, but Independence Day wants us to believe it is more than schlock, when it is actually less. An expensive production without originality or logic that aspires to be nothing more than trendy, state-of-the-art spectacle should be beneath contempt. Unfortunately, too many moviegoers got off on it, so I have been compelled to use this review to lance the boil of my contempt that has been festering for decades. Please excuse the mess.