Waking Life (2001)

Richard Linklater's Brilliant Animated MindTripper!!

Waking Life (2001) is a dazzling mess. There are probably more ideas generated in those 100 minutes than in all other movies currently playing around town combined, even if its over 10 years old. Richard Linklater's film is presented as one long hallucination by its nameless central character, an observer of conversations about existentialism, rebirth, free will, bereavement, warfare, technology, faith and, most of all, the nature of dreams themselves.

Like virtually any work that dares to ask big, unanswerable questions, Waking Life can be pretentious and even exhausting but you also get euphoria from its unquenchable curiosity about the world, like a skyfall.

As in Slacker (1991), Linklater's first film, there is virtually no conformist story, making it easy to lose yourself along the way. The imprecise rotoscoped animation only enhances the feeling of displacement but that's specifically the point. In other words, getting lost with Linklater is a lot more enlightening than being spoon-fed, hand-led and patronized by a lot of garden-variety filmmakers more concerned with filling the theater than filling your brain.

Brimming with references to Jean-Paul Sartre, D.H. Lawrence and countless others, Waking Life is at times encumbered by its assault of ideas; still, it stands in direct hostility to an entertainment culture where being "about nothing" is a insignia of respect.

Sure, it'd be nice if people in this movie occasionally just talked about baseball or the weather to balance things out. There's also no denying that some of the images in Waking Life are breathtaking but at length, many might feel that this is an agonizing exercise in hedonistic, snotty filmmaking, that will ignite arguments over its apparent intrinsic worth and, no doubt, be touted by some as a masterpiece.

Nonetheless, Waking Life sticks with you in a insightful way, its ideas buzzing through your mind like fireflies. And I was beginning to think the sheer possibility was but a dream.

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The Original Nirvana!

Still Smells Like Teen Spirit After All These Years!

These are busy days – insanely busy days but I have had Nirvana for company all through last week. Dunno why but Kurt Cobain has been a savior of sorts for me – first during my school, then my confused college days and now in my work life.

And the impact of one particularly magnetic song can never be undervalued. "Smells Like Teen Spirit" blasted out of the TV screen in 1991 and literally changed the entire world of music. As my friends and I listened to that song, none of us could really explain exactly why it moved us like it did. The lyrics were hard to recognize. The music was grandiloquent and powerful, but it really wasn't all that world-shattering to anyone already familiar with the Stone Temple Pilots, Alice in Chains, Jane's Addiction, Pearl Jam and others like them.

Still, we were drawn to that song. We took that song, and its struggle to describe the indescribable, and made it mean something more. We wrote into that song all of our own feelings that we just couldn't put into words. "Smells Like Teen Spirit" perfectly captured an angry artist questioning his life and circumstances. It was a song that wanted to ask the big questions but knew that doing so was pointless. The song defined a generation and a decade like few songs before it. Even now, after so many years since its release, I have a hard time explaining exactly what it meant to me.

Like so many other people my age, I eventually became a huge fan of Nirvana. I collected their import singles, tracked down hard-to-find indie releases, traded tapes of shows, and read everything about the band that I could get my hands on. I never saw them in concert though. Maybe I was not lucky enough. I also doubt if I could have endured seeing a crowd full of drunk frat boys singing along with "Come As you Are" or "Sliver."

It's easy to be jaded about the whole thing now, as I look back on how ridiculous things became. Flannel became fashionable, "Grunge" entered popular vocabulary, every half-assed band from Seattle got a record deal, heroin made a comeback, and everything on the radio and MTV or VH1 started sounding a heckuva lot like Nirvana. The copycats all got the basic sound right, they just couldn't add any real emotion or impact. Nirvana was the genuine article, and their music mattered so much more than anyone else's at the time. And that’s what still matters!

Youtube Video Link here!

Fly Away Home (1996)

An Outstanding Family Classic from the 90s

Hollywood may be a moral wasteland, the epicenter of cultural corruption, a modern-day Gomorrah driven by vanity and venality—but what the heck, it sure cranks out some nice movies (as it did in the 90s – 1996 to be specific).

Fly Away Home (1996) not only reminded that good movies still happen, but, following as it did on the heels of so many fine children's films, it makes me wonder if the early 1990s weren't the richest period ever for family movies.

In 1995, we saw the charming talking-pig movie Babe and the funny, innovative Toy Story. In 1994, there was the magical Secret of Roan Inish from John Sayles, and Gillian Armstrong's remake of Little Women with Winona Ryder—the finest version ever of the Louisa May Alcott warhorse and one of the best films of that year. Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Secret Garden and A Little Princess were given visually sumptuous adaptations, the first in 1993 and the other in 1995.

Disney, of course, still releases a major animated film each summer; although it’s recent efforts strike me as more tasteless. And these are just the cream of the crop. Add to those all the satisfying bread-and-butter and also fantastic kiddy films that come out every year, like Kungfu Panda, Smurfs, Rango, Cars, Hugo, Up or the more recent Adventures of Tintin, and we're talking profusion here. For this reason, I don't buy the argument that Hollywood has deserted family or moral values.

If you haven't seen Fly Away Home yet, I heartily recommend it. This tale of a Canadian girl who raises a flock of orphan geese is the kind of family film that functions on an adult level, so don't pass it up just because you don't have kids. At the risk of trashing my hard-earned standing as a killjoy, I have to say that I found the whole experience to be cheering and even inspiring.

The film is directed with complete self-assurance by Carroll Ballard, who, by my count, has directed only 6 previous efforts in the past 30 years. I skipped his Nutcracker (1986), but I enjoyed his other works: The Black Stallion (1979), Never Cry Wolf (1984), Wind (1991) and the superb african adventure Duma (2005).

Each is memorable for its natural scenery perhaps the decisive factor Ballard uses to choose his sporadic projects. One thinks of the magnificent coastline vistas in The Black Stallion, the breathtaking Arctic wilderness in Never Cry Wolf, the seascapes and desert country in Wind. For Fly Away Home, Ballard reteamed with Caleb Deschanel, his Black Stallion cinematographer, and their collaboration has made this film another rich visual experience. From macro photography of hatching eggs to funny ground-level tracking shots of goslings to dramatic aerial views of autumn landscapes in Ontario, this film offers constant visual diversity and some gorgeous imagery.

Composer Mark Isham, whose synthesizer-heavy soundtrack enhanced the otherworldly strangeness of the northern wilderness in Never Cry Wolf, contributes a traditional and enjoyable score to Fly Away Home. Fine performances come from Anna Paquin in the lead and Jeff Daniels as her father. And a special tip of the hat to the special effects team, who, through state-of-the-art composting and digital animation, create the illusion that we're flying alongside a flock of geese.

I find it fulfilling to see a film in which quality special effects are smoothly integrated to support a good story, as opposed to an adrenalized concoctions like Transformers (2007) or Twister (1996) where the effects become the film's raison d’être. This movie simply would not have worked if filmed before the 1990s or now in 2000s, because the crucial flying scenes would not have been convincing. In a time when we can expect to be swamped with films built around the new digital technology, Fly Away Home proved that you could put the digital tools to the right use without superseding the movie’s soul. Highly recommended.

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Lone Star (1996)

A Engaging, Multilayered Murder Mystery from John Sayles

John Sayles has worked as a screenwriter and script doctor in mainstream Hollywood, but when he creates his own films, he works independently, retaining total control over the writing, directing, and editing. Of the films of his I've seen, I've most enjoyed Matewan (1987), Passion Fish (1992) and Limbo (1999), but they've all been worth a look, because Sayles is that rare commodity: a major independent filmmaker who makes cinema by observing real life, not recycling other movies.

His City of Hope (1991) interwove several plot lines to create a portrait of corruption in big-city politics. Lone Star takes a similar approach, but the result is a more human and accessible film, one that holds our interest better with both a mystery and a love story.

In a modern-day Texas border town, the remains of a former sheriff are found in the desert. The current sheriff, Sam Deeds (Chris Cooper), sets out to investigate this 40-year-old murder, interviewing people from all over town, who in turn flash back to the past and introduce us to a previous generation of characters. The murder mystery serves as the MacGuffin, to use Hitchcock's word - the gimmick that propels the plot, like "Rosebud" in Citizen Kane.

Sayles himself has compared this film to a Raymond Chandler novel, in that the journey of the detective is what's interesting, not who did the crime. As the murder may have involved Sam Deeds's father, Sam's investigation becomes a personal quest. He moves among a myriad of characters--white, black, and Hispanic, past and present--sorting out a complex story and uncovering the realities behind the local myths, even when the truth becomes personally painful.

With just a few quick strokes of his ever-quotable dialogue, Sayles establishes one believable character after another. For the flashbacks, he goes against sepia-toned convention and uses a nifty transition device that emphasizes the immediacy and relevance of the past. As the people and their stories accumulate and dovetail, a mosaic of the small multicultural town emerges. That Sayles can interweave so many characters and story lines and still end up with a movie that hangs together demonstrates some tour-de-force filmmaking.

There's also some thematic unity holding the strands together. In interviews, Sayles has referred to the importance of "borders" in this film. The sheriff's quest takes him across every conceivable border, from the literal Texas/Mexico line to the town's unmarked borders of race and social class, to the symbolic boundaries between the sexes, between parents and children, between past and present, between myth and reality. The journey makes for a rich and fascinating film that rewards a second viewing. Also starring Matthew McConaughey, Elizabeth Peña and Kris Kristofferson.

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Jerry Maguire (1996) - Show me the Money!

Undoubtedly Tom Cruise's and Cuba Gooding Jr's Best Film Ever!

Continuing my coverage of great movies from 1996, here is my take on the universally loved crowdpleaser - Jerry Maguire by the eclectic Cameron Crowe.

Cameron Crowe, who began his career as a writer for Rolling Stone, made a brilliant screen writing first appearance with the teen comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), one of the best of its ilk. Later he wrote and directed Say Anything (1989), a delightful romantic comedy about high school graduates, which I enjoyed enough to add to my permanent film collection. Singles (1992), about twenty-somethings in Seattle, was less impressive but still worth a viewing. With the Oscar nominated Jerry Maguire, which he wrote, directed and co-produced Crowe advanced to a thirty-something hero and created his most charming film to date. (I am also rooting to see his forthcoming "We Bought a Zoo" starring Matt Damon, Scarlett Johansson and Thomas Haden Church). I haven't seen all the major movies from 1996 yet, but I'm guessing this was perhaps that year's best romantic comedy and a $270 million commercial hit worldwide.

As everyone knows, Tom Cruise plays the title character, a fast-talking sports agent whose life breaks down. He builds a new one for himself, on a fresh set of values, with the aid of Dorothy, an adoring single mother, and Rod, a flashy football player and loyal client. Now, if I were a skeptic, I'd point out that for a story about a slick agent trying to reinvent himself through candor and empathy, Jerry Maguire is an terribly slick film. I mean, any time I see a child actor as drop-dead adorable as little Jonathan Lipnicki, I know I'm being suckered. But in the face of so many amusing lines, funny sight gags, endearing performances, and expertly manufactured heart-tugging moments, how can I resist a movie like this? This is one of those times when I just drop my shields and let Hollywood make the magic. Besides, who can ignore the fantastic soundtrack featuring Tom Petty, Nirvana, AC/DC, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Neil Young and more.

The often used pitch "show me the money" isn't the only quotable dialogue from Crowe's superb script, and he has assembled a cast that does full justice to his screenplay. This is the most I've liked Cruise since Risky Business, and he gets great support from everyone, especially the Oscar deserving Cuba Gooding, Jr., as his client Rod, and Bonnie Hunt as Dorothy's wisecracking but helpful sister. Cruise, with his fame, glamour, and overblown sticker price, may have garnered the glory, but for me this film's secret weapon was relative newcomer at that time Renee Zellweger. Her performance as Dorothy, the romantic underdog who wins Jerry's affections, is so beautiful it hurts.

Speaking of things that hurt - there's a short-lived Tom Cruise butt shot in the movie. I thought I'd mention that, as I've learned it's important to a lot of you. I sat next to some women at a watering hole the other night, and all they talked about were male butt shots. Obviously, these are vital cinematic essentials.

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Rewind! Replay! Repeat!

Dissecting 3 Fav Rock Songs from 1993

Of late, I have been digging into my gargantuan collection of music and movies from the early 80s and 90s. Converting and archiving them onto my new pool of external hard disks and my cherished favorites onto DVDs and CDs (an extra precaution!)

I wish I could compile all my audio/video assortments into some sort of an exclusive WebSnacker anthology – an omnibus of say “Rock hits of 1990”, “The Best of John Carpenter”, “The Best of Pearl Jam”, “Teen Comedies of the 80s” etcetera. Well, but I never have the time..

Anyway, I was listening to this old dusty audio tape (on whose plastic case, I seem to have scribbled “the Rocketeer set - just don’t remember, what it originally meant?) and 3 first-rate rock songs stood out. I stopped, rewound the tape and gave myself an earful. Nostalgic aural bliss!!!

Has anything like this ever happened to you? I mean, songs that make them stand out in the middle of a TV commercial, or grabs your attention on the car radio while you're driving back home, or makes you listen to your MP3 player that much harder until you drain its battery.

So, what makes a good song? I suppose there's no definite answer because music affects everybody differently. It's about emotional depth, and the songs that sum up your life the instant you hear them. So the songs that make up the soundtrack of one person's soul might mean absolutely nothing to somebody else – your treasure, their trash! But the principles involved are the same from person to person, so I'd like to talk a bit about these three rock songs that have been near the core of my “rewind” music experience the last week or so.

1. "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" by the Crash Test Dummies (1993)

This No.1 Modern Rock hit single from the Canadian folk rock band has an unrepresentatively simple tune that is well put together and still seems wholly absolute. But when you actually listen to the silly lyrics, it becomes a song about the things that just don't fit. It's not just that the verses don't rhyme but they aren't really connected to each other in any reasonable way.

Each verse presents a particularly sharp, distinct image of an oddball. From the boy who got in the accident, to the girl with birthmarks all over her body, to the boy who goes to church, you get peculiar minute details that make each character stand out in the mind. And I always find myself asking what it is about these details - what do they say about their characters? Why does the boy's hair change from black to white? Why does the girl's rebuttal to change in the changing room seem so touching? The song only lets the listener in on certain niceties of the characters, but they are the kind of hazy details that leave more questions unanswered, even as the images loiter in your subconscious. YouTube Video Link

2. "Mr. Jones" by Counting Crows (1993)

This is a great hit track from the American alternative pop rock band whose songwriter and lead vocalist Adam Duritz obviously had an eye for impressive details.

Though many critics feel it’s a take on Bob Dylan's "Ballad of a Thin Man", I interpret it differently. From the opening line, "I was down at the New Amsterdam / staring at this yellow-haired girl," you feel as if you can see the 'narrator' of the song, hanging around in nightclubs, bars and clubs with his companion Mr. Jones. They "stare at the beautiful women" and wish that they had the nerve to approach them. And all the while, the character who is telling us all this, who seems unable to bond with one woman, wishes that he could surpass himself and become so famous that "when I look at the television, I...see me staring right back at me." When he's an image that everybody knows and loves, he dreams, he'll never be lonely again. In the meantime, he keeps looking at women and wondering if one will ever come along that will be right for him.

I guess that if I went into much detail about my personal resonances with this song, this blog post would spawn into maudlin self-pity, but the grand thing about this track is that, in my view, you never get sickened with how apologetic the character feels for himself. He always remains fascinating, probably because we can all identify how each of us, at one time or another, has watched TV or movies, or listened to the radio, and thought to ourselves, "God, I wish I was there."

After all, we live in a world where what's "real," what is often measured to be most significant, is what the media makes omnipresent. For example, never mind whether or not we actually have any real emotional union to the famous celebrity of our choice; we constantly see them, so they are forever on our mind, even when we don’t want to think about them. And sometimes, when making a real emotional connection with a different person just doesn't seem to work, it's easy to think about being connected to everything and everybody and imagine that it actually might mean something, even if it would really diminish you to nobody. YouTube Video Link

3. "Disarm" by Smashing Pumpkins (1993)

Perhaps Smashing Pumpkins’ most popular song, "Disarm," from their hit second album ‘Siamese Dream’ has a unique auditory experience, which involuntarily suggests a sense of poignant rush, of some primitive sentiment which Billy Corgan, the lead vocalist is letting loose - from the low strings to the timpani drum to the sly church bells, the track sounds insistent and forceful.

Merge that with the beautiful lyrics, which seem to portray a tormented young soul on the edge of life and you understand where "Disarm" is aiming for, and something in you suddenly just clicks. The chorus line, "the killer in me is the killer in you," seems suggestive of Jim Thompson's novel “The Killer Inside Me”, but even more than that, it suggests the vein of fatalism verging on nihilism that runs throughout most of Thompson's work, and so much of our in style “dog eat dog” culture.

The character "used to be a little boy," and then things went horribly wrong and now "what's a boy supposed to do?" It's a lingering image that runs through, among other places, even old Elvis songs like "In the Ghetto" and "Kentucky Rain,” Catcher in the Rye, Rebel Without A Cause, hardboiled detectives, Pink Floyd's The Wall, even in the Hong Kong action worlds of John Woo and Yun-Fat Chow

Lets be honest, the void calls to each of us, and yet we all are concurrently attracted to and repulsed by it, and when we are unable to admit this to ourselves, we selfishly revel in watching other folks, especially the fictional, dealing with this crisis. And if, in identifying with these texts, we momentarily blow our staid lives out of proportion. Well isn't that what great music is all about - taking the everyday and making it awe-inspiring, even if its just for a few precious minutes! YouTube Video Link

Best Halloween Songs of All Time

15 Superb Halloween Inspired Tracks (or Something like that)!!

With Halloween practically over by now, I know this post is at least a full one week late but that should not stop mortal souls like you from downloading this grand, splendid, impressive (well, I cant think of more superlatives) selection of superb Halloween inspired tracks featuring assorted genres.

Included in this truly ‘one of its kind’ (one more superlative) compilation are cool cover renditions of Halloween classics by Blue Oyster Cult, Alice Cooper, Iron Maiden, Eurythmics, Ray Parker Jr, Screamin' Jay Hawkins and the inimitable Michael Jackson. Watch out for BeatFreakz remix of Rockwell’s super hit “Somebody's Watching Me”, Matt Pond PA’s tuneful “Halloween” and Massive Attack’s eerie “Inertia Creeps”.

Time to relive the Halloween magic!!

15 tracks in playlist, average track length: 4:41

Playlist length: 1 hour 10 minutes 22 seconds

1. Apollo 440 - Don't Fear The Reaper (Blue Oyster Cult Cover) (5:28)

2. Aqua - Halloween (3:51)

3. Crystal Therapy - Welcome to My Nightmare (Alice Cooper Cover) (3:03)

4. Diesel - I Put A Spell On You (Screamin' Jay Hawkins Cover) (4:09)

5. Hoobastank - Ghostbusters (Ray Parker Jr Cover) (3:02)

6. Ian Brown (The Stone Roses) - Thriller (Michael Jackson Cover) (3:28)

7. Marilyn Manson - Sweet Dreams (Eurythmics Cover) (4:53)

8. Massive Attack - Inertia Creeps (5:54)

9. Matt Pond PA - Halloween (5:02)

10. Michael Jackson - Is It Scary (5:35)

11. Rockwell Featuring Michael Jackson + BeatFreakz - Somebody's Watching Me (3:22)

12. Shadowland - Scared of the Dark (6:07)

13. Trans-Sylvanian Orchestra - Tubular Bells (Mike Oldfield Exorcist Theme Mix) (5:15)

14. Washington - Halloween (3:50)

15. Yahel - Fear Of The Dark (Iron Maiden Cover - DNA Remix) (7:23)

Free Mp3 Download - 94.06 MB Single Zipped Folder – Link EXPIRED

THIS IS A NON-COMMERCIAL FAN MIXTAPE. IF YOU LIKE THESE ARTISTS, PLEASE BUY THEIR ORIGINAL MUSIC. You can buy original CDS/DVDs & Mp3s at Emusic, Amazon, Itunes, other online stores or your nearest music retailer.

A Small Piece Of My Cinematic Mind!

A Little Vitriol For My Detractors

My last post on “From Dusk Till Dawn” received a lot of nasty flak. One intimidating fan who was obviously livid with my review threatened me on email, flooded my Facebook blog page with hostile commentary and then reported it for illegal content! What the heck!

Anyway, to get down to the movie review business, my celluloid critiques are my personal babbles and private insights about the movies I see – I don’t get paid to do it nor do I have a hidden agenda when I rubbish a seemingly great piece of film making!

For those angry, stupid fans – here’s a little piece of advice: Some of you may discover that you've overlooked a great film and maybe, (just maybe), you might just read about it in my blog. You may then perhaps rush out, rent it, stream it or download it and possibly have a fulfilling movie-watching experience, and I'll have the satisfaction of given a little direction to your sad, aimless everyday lives.

Those of you who have already seen everything on my list (an impossibility) can still follow along and see how your bijou opinions compare to mine. You might also find it enlightening to print out my review and make notes in the margins. Next to each review, you could write an A for "I strongly agree" a B for "I partially agree" or a C for "This dumb fuck can’t write shit”.

When you get to the end of the column, total up your score. If you have more A's than anything else, it means you are a amazingly intelligent, perceptive student of the cinematic arts, and I would be glad to have you over anytime to view something from my super secret collection of the world’s most awesomest movies ever made.

If you wrote a lot of B's, you probably believe that Tom Green, Chuck Norris and Carmen Electra are underrated/undervalued actors but still you are not entirely beyond help. Keep reading my column and you should do fine but if you wrote mostly C's, you most likely love all the movies of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, the terrible duo behind unfunny spoof flops like the Disaster Movie, Date Movie, Meet The Spartans and other mindless miseries. In that case, you are living proof of humanity’s mental decline and what's known to medical science as a "dim-witted idiot," and I will be sure to alert you if ever I write a critical retrospective of “The Biggest Movie of All Time 3D” – the duo’s upcoming send-up on Avatar to be released in 2012!

From Dusk Till Dawn (1996)

Pulpy Hyper Violent Vampire Splatter, Tarantino/Rodriguez Style

The hidden plus point of a drained laptop on a long haul flight is that you get to do something different beyond your usual mundane office work. On a recent trip, I had the pleasure of watching “From Dusk Till Dawn”, the 1996 vampire actioner from that maverick 2 man team of filmmakers called Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez. Tarantino wrote it while his mexicano pal Rodriguez directed. Now that was a teaming of future titans.

In case, you didn’t know, Rodriguez was the wonder boy who made the tongue-in-cheek independent spaghetti western ‘El Mariachi' (1992) in Mexico for $7000 and then used it as a calling card to land a contract in Hollywood. And what was his first movie after joining the majors? 'Desperado'(1995) - a campy, outlandish rehash of El Mariachi. It starred babe-magnet Spaniard Antonio Banderas as a two-pistol gunfighter who, when he isn't shooting up drug thugs, spends most of the movie glaring idiotically through the long stringy hair that hangs in his face. At least, there was a beautiful Salma Hayek for company! Next, I saw him in Richard Donner's 'Assassins'(1995), opposite Stallone, where he played a two-pistol hitman with long stringy hair (again) hanging in his face. Well, he gets my vote as the least-welcome new sex star in the movies. (Fifty million women CAN be wrong.) Never was there an actor so desperately in need of a comb.

So anyway, Rodriguez then links up with Quentin Tarantino, Hollywood's man of the hour post his transnational success of Pulp Fiction, and this momentous mating of Desperado gives the world...From Dusk Till Dawn.

Beginning in the familiar Tarantino territory of Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction - the universe of comically exaggerated film noir - the plot concerns two bank-robbing brothers murdering and kidnapping their way across the border into Mexico. Then, the Mexican truck stop they think represents a safe haven turns out to be a retreat for blood thirsty vampires (with a seductive Salma Hayek as Satánico Pandemonium). And suddenly we're in midst of a tongue-in-cheek bloody splatter film like Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead or Peter Jackson's Braindead - as its unlikable cast of characters sets about dismembering a rampaging horde of wild vampires. And then it flaccidly ends.

While it does have its moments – some genuinely funny and some brilliantly gory, it bugs me to think that two hot young filmmakers, who, for the moment, had complete freedom to make whatever the heck kind of movie they want, could squander the talents of George Clooney, Harvey Keitel, Juliette Lewis, and Fred Williamson on this no-brainer. To me, it felt like a couple of 10-year-old boys thought it up one night in their tree house over a bag of Lays chips and Oreos.

I will however, say one thing very good about Robert Rodriguez. His film Desperado introduced me to Salma Hayek. And I fell for her! And I still very much do!

Free Streaming/Movie Download - Avi Video Link: VeeHD

Independence Day (1996)

1996's Helluva Summer Blockbuster!

Last night, I watched (probably for the 10nth time or so) 1996’s biggest summer hit – Independence Day. Apparently, it’s the 31st highest grosser of all time in Hollywood history with total mammoth box-office figures in the tune of $816969000 or more. So this movie was destined to end up among the most lucrative films of all time, in company with the likes of Spielberg's E.T. and Jurassic Park.

I remember rushing to see this in theaters in the first week of its release, and as someone who grew up on a staple of science-fiction and horror flicks as a kid, I found it to be good, old-fashioned fun (in spite of its shortcomings). Besides, there's something charming and pre-Watergate in the mentality of a film that portrays a U.S. president as an inspiring strong leader that the country could rally behind in a grave crisis.

One especially satisfying aspect of this film was the brilliant casting: A great lead in Will Smith and trustworthy supporting actors in the vein of Bill Pullman, Robert Loggia, Vivica Fox and Jeff Goldblum who provide the right support.

I'm guessing the producers wanted to put as much of the budget as possible into the special effects and let the spectacle be the film's big draw, so they chose not to divert $30 million or so just to get Bruce Willis or Tom Cruise above the title. In those days when star salaries spiraled out of control (they still do) and stars gained way too much power, it was great to see someone relatively new like Roland Emmerich to buck the system and score a big hit using nothing but a good idea and a script, the way Spielberg did with E.T.

Independence Day is a real crowd pleaser. And there-in lies my only serious reservation. It was carefully contrived to be a crowd pleaser, full of stock characters, clichéd scenarios, cheap comic relief (think of Randy Quaid's boozy crop-duster), despicable ‘out of this planet’ villains and jingoistic speeches.

As I watched, I couldn't help but imagine what a tougher filmmaker like James Cameron would have brought to it. Avatar was a colossal disappointment for me but in his best work, Cameron goes to great lengths to establish characters with some depth and a realistic milieu for them – think Abyss; as a consequence, when they suffer, you really feel for them. When I saw Independence Day in the theater, my deepest concern during the film's second half was not whether Will Smith and Co would save the world from the marauding alien invasion but whether I should blow more money on a refill of my popcorn and coke.

Free Streaming/Movie Download - Avi Video Link: VeeHD