The 1990s were simply a better time. The promise of the internet was just developing, but nobody had ruined it with social media just yet. Western civilisation was at its zenith, before the establishment became obsessed with sorting us all into little boxes and highlighting our differences. It was a time of excellent music, decent drugs, and even the world of cinema was in fantastic shape.
The 1990s were a blockbuster cinema machine, way before blockbuster cinema became drenched in the political messaging of the creatives and used as a stick with which to beat you into cultural submission.
Back then, anything was possible, even the President of the USA personally leading humanity’s fightback from the cockpit of his own F-18.
Because there are modern summer blockbusters, and then there’s Independence Day.
Independence Day
A day that holds no meaning to anyone outside of the USA suddenly became engraved in the minds of cinema-going audiences all over the world. Independence Day was to modern summer blockbusters what Jaws was to the original summer tentpole. It didn’t just define the modern blockbuster era; it kicked the door open, lit a cigar, and yelled Will Smith noises at us until we surrendered.
Words cannot quite describe the level of hype that surrounded this movie. Only people who can remember Bat-Mania in 1989 can really appreciate what it felt like out there in normo world as that summer of 1996 approached.
Today, watching Independence Day feels like finding a time capsule full of Mountain Dew, JNCO jeans, and unfiltered American optimism. It’s a monument to an age when aliens were evil, computers were magical, and we solved intergalactic war with teamwork, courage, and a laptop that didn’t have Wi-Fi.
Back in the mid-90s, the internet was basically a collection of chat rooms for people arguing about X-Files theories. Even without social media, Independence Day managed to break through and dominate every corner of pop culture for one, single, glorious summer.
The teaser trailer alone – just the White House getting vaporized – landed with such impact that marketing people still talk about it today.
Way before Star Wars prequel trailers, people bought tickets to see other movies just to catch that trailer. Fox dropped it months ahead of release, way further out than was normal at the time.
The marketing blitz that followed was biblical. There were Taco Bell tie-ins, collectible cups, video games, TV specials, and so many commercials that by the time July 4th rolled around, ID4 wasn’t just a movie – it was an event.
Humanity’s Dumbest Hour
Look, we know that we have bought lumps of cheddar from the grocery store that are significantly less cheesy than Independence Day, but by the time you are into the movie, you simply stop caring.
Plot holes the size of canyons present themselves, computers are a 1990s kind of magical, and every single cliche of the genre is ticked off as if from a list, and none of that matters.
You know the story by now. Aliens arrive in ships the size of cities, hovering ominously over the world’s biggest landmarks. They don’t send messages. They don’t phone home. They just hang there, blocking sunlight and scaring the crap out of everyone, except for the usual bunch of hippy-types who think this is all wonderful and all aliens are welcome, no matter what. This suddenly feels allegorical.
Then they do what every good movie alien does: blow up everything. Absolutely everything. New York – gone. L.A. – gone. The White House and Washington – gone. These sequences were the hallmark of the entire film and they still stand up today.
Enter humanity’s only hope, the standard ragtag group of unlikely heroes. There is Captain Steven Hiller (Will Smith), a fighter pilot with levels of swagger that can be seen from space, and David Levinson (Jeff Goldblum), a nebbish cable repair guy who is an under-challenged genius about to turn world-savior via laptop.
They are joined by President Whitmore (Bill Pullman), a US President who makes you want to stand up and salute your TV instead of pointing and laughing, and Russell Casse (Randy Quaid), a crop-duster with PTSD and the energy of a man who’s been waiting his whole life for this single moment.
The plan? Shoot shit until they can upload a magic virus from a laptop. It shouldn’t work, but it does, and it is awesome.
The Movie Gods Smile
Will Smith was coming off Bad Boys, with The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air behind him and a music career developing, but make no mistake. Independence Day made him a movie star.
He is the center of the movie that will see him go from opening his front door to see a 15-mile-wide UFO, to punching an alien in the face and dragging it across the desert. He also gets most of the best one-liners, all seemingly crafted to make their way onto a t-shirt:
“That’s what I call a close encounter.”
Jeff Goldblum was having the ultimate career moment. Just a couple of years before, he had starred in Jurassic Park, so he was occupying the kind of blockbuster sweet spot other talent could only dream of. Goldblum is full Goldblum here. He talks fast, looks perpetually confused, and still somehow seems like the smartest guy in the room.
Bill Pullman plays “The President of the Century” and probably ruins every single real-life President that came after him. It is important to remember that this was pre-Iraq War II. Unless you were living in a cave in Afghanistan, or running a theocratic Islamic dictatorship, or French, then everyone still loved America back then.
You could play the clip of his motivational speech at a funeral, and people would start chanting “USA! USA!” It is completely absurd, and 100% perfect. Pullman just sells it.
It is the law of cinema that any fight against either giant bugs or invading aliens needs an unhinged wildcard, enter Randy Quaid’s Russell Casse. He claims aliens abducted him, and nobody believed him. Well, nobody is laughing now.
His final kamikaze run into the alien ship’s core is pure cinematic catharsis. A shining moment of sacrifice delivered right into your cinema-loving veins. Once more, you drown in cheese and don’t care one little bit.
Bringing Down The House
Independence Day still holds up visually today because a surprising amount of the VFX is actually practical. Fighter jets and spaceships duelling in canyons were actually done with real miniatures and explosions. Even the White House explosion wasn’t digital – it was a 1/12th scale model that they actually blew up while shooting at 300 frames per second with multiple cameras.
The explosion took 8 seconds in real life.
What it is hard to appreciate, if you weren’t there, was the sheer level of noise around this film. There were toys, model kits, lunchboxes, and a tie-in video game for PlayStation 1 and Sega Saturn that played like a flight sim designed by someone who’d never flown a plane… or even seen one.
Fox even branded the film ID4 to make it seem cooler.
The movie made over $800 million worldwide, back when that was an insane amount of money. It outgrossed both Twister and Mission: Impossible in a summer of massive hits, where it was possible to simply live in a movie theater.
Let’s just not talk about the sequel. If the original Independence Day was a rock concert, the sequel was a PowerPoint presentation.
Fallout
After Independence Day, every disaster movie tried to copy it. Armageddon, Deep Impact, The Day After Tomorrow were all variations on the formula. The movie also boosted UFO mania in the late 90s. X-Files fans went feral, tabloids ran “REAL AREA 51” stories weekly, and alien abduction conventions sold out. For a brief, glorious window, aliens were bigger business than even back in the days of ET and Close Encounters.
Nearly three decades later, Independence Day remains peak summer cinema and, viewed today, feels like a distant last gasp of a Hollywood that believed spectacle and sincerity could coexist without the need to lecture you through it.
There’s no irony. No grimdark tone. No forced franchise setup. Just two hours of pure popcorn joy. The aliens show up. Humanity gets its act together. Jeff Goldblum uploads a virus. Bill Pullman gives the greatest speech ever written. Roll credits.
And that’s why we love it.
Rating: 5 out of 5 exploding White Houses. Long live the King of modern summer blockbusters!
