As for the whole controversy about knocking Tim Robbins out or killing him, I would have tried to K.O. him first, if he survived, fine. But if he didn’t shut up and was still endangering my kids, I would have had no choice, him or us.

Independence Day was mindless fun, at least for me. But when they used a laptop to infect the entire alien network, all I could think of was ” If they can do this, why can’t we get Mac’s and P.C.’s to play nice together? ” Also, I guess the aliens have no teen aliens sitting around in the equivalent of their parents’ basemant coming up with viruses to make them feel important, so the aliens had no need of anti-virus software.

Kudos to Sean, both reviews are top notch and I really enjoyed them!

I guess this sounds like a petty complaint, but it really irritates me; such small details can ruin so much.

Meh.

You mention that conking someone on the noggin can be fatal, and that’s right. But it isn’t always, and interestingly, I’m living proof. When I was 7 years old I was run over by a bigger kid on a bicycle, causing me to crack my head on the sidewalk. I actually remember this. I turned around and saw the kid coming at me, and then everything went black. I woke up in the hospital with a concussion and, thankfully, no serious harm. 40 years later I’m still alive, so it wasn’t fatal. At least, not yet.

Finally, your comment also reminded me of a Clint Eastwood movie called Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, from 1974. In the last act Eastwood and Jeff Bridges are double-crossed by a bad guy who knocks them both out with a blunt instrument. Eastwood’s character recovers but Bridges’ suffers real damage, with spreading paralysis leading to death. Jeff played it really well and it was quite a powerful and awful scene.

Even if he had found a way to tie him up, gag him, and leave him behind (unless you’re suggesting he drag him along with them) without killing him outright, it would still be murder. The guy would die of dehydration, if he was lucky and the aliens didn’t find him first.

Speaking of which, when I first saw ID4 I thought that the computer virus idea was a clever update on H.G. Well’s idea of germs killing the invaders, and I approved. But then I read somewhere that Devlin and Dean got all huffy and claimed this was an original idea and that they weren’t referencing Wells. I didn’t see the need to protest, and looking back I think this points to their central flaw as filmmakers. I mean, neither of these guys are original or deeply creative, but they seem to crave respect for being so. So it appears to me that when they were dragged kicking and screaming into Godzilla, they completely ruined it with your “original take” on the project. Sigh. If there is any justice, they will spend a good amount of time down in Hell watching, and re-watching, what is possibly the limpest, dullest, dreariest mega-budget-monster-movie of all time.

—————————

From Review:

“Yet this car works. Because “everyman” Ray is our star and he figured
out how to fix them. So he told his buddy the mechanic, who fixed the
one Ray just jumped into. Great!”

Dennis responds:

Actually, there is a brief throw-away line from the mechanic as Tom
is walking downtown to see what’s going on. The mechanic mentions that they have
are in progress with replacing the car’s electronics which is what the
aliens fried in all the other cars that had them in place.

Sean replies back:

Yeah, there’s that scene – but didn’t Ray tell the mechanic, “Why
don’t you try blah blah blah?” – thus giving the mechanic the idea of
how to fix the car? And by the way, if it was so easy to fix cars,
why don’t we some a few others on the road?

————————

From Review:

“The icing on the cake is an icky little scene that suggests he might
put the moves on little Rachael”

Dennis responds:

I didn’t take it that way. I thought that he was trying to
replaced his dead child with a “new” daughter.

Sean replies back:

You know, it could go that way. It was kind of ambivalent, but as
with the earlier scene Spielberg keeps putting Rachel in threat from
other adults. And what with the news saturated by coverage of sexual
predators….

—————————————–

From Review:

“Unable to think of an alternative, like knocking Ogilvy out,
tying….”

Dennis responds:

He didn’t really have time to “think”? The guy was going nuts,
shouting, and banging away with a shovel in the other room and was
putting everybody in mortal danger. I thought that Ray made the only
rational dicision: Eliminate the threat to himself and his
daughter. He didn’t have the luxory of time to discuss it with him or think of
anything else.

Sean replies back:

Well, I stand by my, uh, stance, that Ray could have conked the guy
on the head without killing him – then tied him up and gagged him.

—————————————-

From the Review:

“It’s filled with all sorts of people who are periodically drawn into
the war machine itself – there to be drained of their blood.”

Dennis responds:

I thought the whole “blood as fertilizer” concept, altough provider
striking visuals, was a bit over much. I mean, c’mon! Blood as
fertilizer? What the hell? It would have made more sense, and been
even more disgusting, if they ground people up and used their bodies as
mulch.

Sean replies back:

Good point. And while I didn’t go into it in the review, if human
blood is a fertilizer than people would be a precious resource. So
why then do the tripods often vaporize scores of people with their
heat ray? Talk about a wasteful economy!

—————————————–

From the Review:

“I look at my watch and wonder how much more time I have to spend with
the murderer and his progeny”

Dennis responds:

Once again, I think you’re judging him way to harshly as a murderer.
What would you have done?

Sean replies back:

Conked the guy on the head, then tied him up and gagged him. (Or,
even better, I would have turned into the Incredible Hulk!)

—————————————–

Dennis responds:

Some more quick thoughts,

I never thought about the Iraq connection. Interesting, but I think
it’s too far of a leap.

Sean replies back:

It is kind of a stretch – but lots of people talked about it when the
film came out, so I included it in my review.

——————————————-

Dennis responds:

The “germ” ending had to be there, this _is_ a remake after all, even
though they took some artistic liberties in order to make it more
palatable to a modern audience. What other ending _could_ they have
chosen and still be “faithful” to the book?

Sean replies back:

Good question, and I have no easy answer. Usually I’m all for being
faithful to an original story – but at this point in the early 21st
century I simply can’t buy the assertion that super-advanced aliens
wouldn’t plan for earth bacteria. – Maybe Spielberg could have done
another invasion story?