What Sets "Independence Day" Apart From Other Doomsday Movies

The fourth of July is a great day to lounge around and watch a few movies, whether it’s your favorite, nostalgic midsummer flick (looking at you, “Jaws“) or a film that is made for the holiday. If opting for the latter, what could be a better pick than the 1996 film “Independence Day“? A box office hit, “Independence Day” sometimes gets lost in the rubble of doomsday movies that don’t quite live up to Roland Emmerich‘s film. So what sets this alien invasion thrill ride apart?

A video essay by Lessons From The Screenplay aims to answer this question. Revisiting the screenplay, there’s a different vibe than just ensuing catastrophe. Even the opening shots of the film set the oncoming events slowly. When the alien crafts appear, they’re like a looming space specter, completely dwarfing earth. The visuals of crawling shadows are one thing, but as LFTS reads from the original screenplay, it feels more menacing.

Beyond the care of setting up this epic antagonist, the screenwriters take care in building their characters. This movie has roughly twenty-plus characters the audience knows by name. With small quips and line setups, the film asks us to care about these people. More than just vehicles for our sympathy, they become humans the aliens are aiming to destroy, and we care.

While “Independence Day: Resurgence” lost these techniques of its predecessor in favor of an all-out space battle spectacle, the 1996 film combines a level of drama and elicits some form of empathy here and there. This isn’t to say the movie is perfect. “Independence Day” has its fair share of cheesiness and unrealistic happenings. But this aside, over twenty years later, fans still return to the film every July 4. What better way to celebrate the country’s independence than watching Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum take on an entire alien force?