Aliens in huge spacecraft approach Earth. Spacecraft enter atmosphere and aliens hover above the world’s major cities. Aliens use big lasers to destroy cities. Aliens then sit back and do nothing for several days. A Marine fighter pilot (Will Smith), a cable TV technician (Jeff Goldblum), and the President of the United States (Bill Pullman) use the aliens’ siesta to formulate a plan to kick the aliens’ asses.

CRITIQUE

By now you’ve undoubtedly already decided which side of the fence you sit on with regards to Independence Day. You either think it’s one of the dumbest movies ever made and don’t like it, or you think it’s one of the dumbest movies ever made and like it. I’m in the former camp; try as I might, I still find myself unable to shut off my brain and accept it on the level of unabashedly mindless entertainment. I’m willing to admit that some parts of the movie work, but these parts are outweighed and undone by rampant stupidity, lazy plotting, stock characters, and overwrought performances.

The movie starts off well enough. I like the buildup to the big reveal of the alien craft, but co-writer/director Roland Emmerich and co-writer/producer Dean Devlin play their hand too early and spend pretty much the entire remainder of the movie on autopilot, employing every cliché in the book and cribbing from a litany of previous science fiction films (George Lucas and the estate of H.G. Wells really should have sued).

The cute couple gets married. The estranged couple gets back together. The drunken fool gets a chance to redeem himself. (Speaking of, am I the only one who wonders exactly what’s so funny about an alcoholic who flies around with a canister of poison strapped to the fuselage of his plane?) The leader everyone thinks is a wimp proves his mettle during a crisis. It all unfolds like clockwork, offering no real thrills of surprises.

The movie’s visual effects won and Oscar, but the work is very uneven. The outer space shots look fine, but many of the Earth-bound shots look hokey. The spacecraft never look to be occupying the same space as the famous landmarks and cityscapes they hover above (it doesn’t help that we get so many shots of the craft just sitting there, nor does it help that people of my generation have no problem recalling strikingly similar shots from V, another sci-fi extravaganza that showed promise in the early going and then fell apart).

Furthermore, the F-18 fighters have obviously been digitally duplicated. The sequences in which hapless victims run from the waves of destruction caused by the aliens’ super-lasers look especially ridiculous; the people are surrounded by matte lines so thick you couldn’t cut them with a chainsaw, while the buildings behind them look like burning shoeboxes.

But what bothers me most here is the threat itself. Why did the aliens have to be so damned dumb? They use the moon to mask their arrival, commandeer our communications satellites for their own nefarious purposes, blow the hell out of every major metropolis on the face of the planet, and then just sit there, leaving our heroes ample opportunity to formulate a counterattack.

In fact, they’re practically asking to get their clocks clean. And what are we to make of a race that has devised interstellar travel yet apparently hasn’t developed its own version of McAfee or Defender Pro? You’d think the latter would come before the former, but who’s to say how technology (or evolution) proceeds on other planets? Could be these guys also devised the internal combustion engine before they learned to make fire.

Note: Although a slightly longer version of the movie was released on DVD (usually seamlessly branched from the original cut), this Blu-ray disc contains only the theatrical cut of Independence Day. If you’re wondering why the longer cut wasn’t included, just remember which studio we’re dealing with here.

THE VIDEO

There are no real major flaws in the 2.35:1/1080p transfer, but it’s easy to see how it could have been improved. The movie’s look has always been inherently soft, especially in interior scenes, but there are moments when the video here is just a bit too soft, with some scenes noticeably flatter than others. Exterior shots are often razor sharp, with a nice sense of depth and a very film-like appearance.

Black levels aren’t quite as strong as they could have been, but they’re still above average. Digital noise only becomes a problem in one scene (Smith’s trek across the salt flats), and aside from a few of the darker scenes, grain is never excessive (the combination of extensive compositing work and Super 35 photography had me worried about that one).

This is by far the best the movie has ever looked on a home video format, but those hoping for an unqualified home run should adjust their expectations.

THE AUDIO

Although it lacks the refinement and finesse of a more recent blockbuster mix, the DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 track nevertheless delivers all you’d expect. Dialogue comes through clearly and the (frequently overbearing) music swells nicely. The low end pushes incredibly deep (you’ll experience this the moment the opening titles appear); all of the action sequences deliver the goods, with planes, alien fighters, laser blasts, and explosions filling the entire soundstage.

A Spanish Dolby Surround and a French Dolby Digital 5.1 track are also included. English, Spanish, Cantonese, and Korean subtitles are available.

THE EXTRAS

No surprise here, but not all of the bonus material extras from the standard-def releases have been ported over. Despite the fact this Blu-ray disc contains more than enough space to support them, all of the video-based extras have been dropped.

The commentary by Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin makes for a good listen, even if the former filmmaking partners are a little too effusive in their love for their creation. It’s an animated discussion of the movie’s genesis (I believe them when they say it took only two weeks to write the script) and production.  

The commentary by Special Effects Supervisors Volker Engel and Doug Smith will likely only appeal to die-hard effects junkies. If you’re interested in hearing about the minutia involved in the process of blowing up a scale replica of the White House, this is for you. But if you’re not, stay away.

The trivia track is another of Fox’s pop-up factoid tracks. Most of the info centers on the visual effects, although there is the occasional actor-centric anecdote or reference to one of the movie’s cinematic influences.   

The Search Content option provides an exhaustive list of topics related to the movie, allowing you to select a topic and then be taken to a scene associated with that topic. For example, if you scroll down the list and select “White House,” you’ll be taken to one of the scenes set at that location.

Alien Scavenger Hunt is another of Fox’s waste-of-bytes Java-based interactive games. In this one you use your remote to control a set of crosshairs, which you move around the screen and utilize to zap a dozen objects over the course of the movie. It’s slow and clunky, quickly becoming annoying; you’d have to be a masochist to play the entire game.

Closing out the extras are a teaser and three theatrical trailers.

Finally, the disc is enhanced for use with D-Box Motion Control Systems for anyone with compatible equipment.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Given that Independence Day is one of Fox’s biggest box office hits, there’s no way this will be the only next-gen release the movie receives. It’s a safe bet a more elaborate edition will eventually see the light of day, one that (hopefully) contains the extended cut, a better selection of extras, and an improved transfer. With that in mind, unless you absolutely must own this release, I say rent this one and hold out for a more definitive edition.