ID4

As mentioned in previous Groderz lore, one way we can tell whether or not we agree with your taste in movies is by your assessment of the crap-fest Face/Off. If you liked that movie, we don't want you here.

Another, converse method is via your assessment of Independence Day.

If I was a Hollywood producer, and you were pitching me a movie, you could say "Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith smoke cigars together near the end." At that point, I wouldn't care if it was a docu-drama or a comedy or a horror film, I'd already be interested. If you told me that after they smoked the cigars, they launched a nuke right into the heart of the alien mother ship, I'd be totally stoked. If you then told me that all of this happened immediately after a scene where Randy Quaid, playing the same character he plays in the Vacation movies, drove a kamikaze fighter jet right into the main weapons systems of one of the alien battleships, I'd be on the phone to the Academy. The only thing left for me to add would be, "Make sure either Bill Paxton or Bill Pullman is in it." Making one of them play the President of the U.S. would just be unexpected icing on the cake.

Every time I mention ID4, someone wants to talk about how unrealistic the "virus" thing was. Whatever. If you can't suspend a little disbelief in the realm of computer science, you have no business commenting on modern cinema. ID4 is a wholly underrated marvel of filmmaking. In true Return of the Jedi fashion, they staged simulatneous multiple final battles on multiple scales, a feat that is remarkably difficult for a screenwriter to pull off. If you aren't on the edge of your seat in true, old-school, big-budget, action-flick apprectiation by the end of that movie, you just aren't a movie buff.

I first saw ID4 at midnight on July 4th, 1996. I thought it was one of the greatest movies ever. Yeah, it's got some cheesey-as-hell stuff in it, but even to this day I think it is a great movie.