Once again, from me and Bill Pullman: Happy Independence Day!

I am an immigrant's son, and I get paid to go to the movies. Truly, this is the land of opportunity. And so, to celebrate the birthday of our great nation, I once again give you the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (potently played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Let freedom ring.

“Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world. And you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. ‘Mankind.’ That word should have new meaning for all of us today.

“We can't be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it's fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom... Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution... but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist.

“And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day the world declared in one voice: ‘We will not go quietly into the night!’ We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive!

“Today we celebrate our Independence Day!”

One mo' time: Celebrating Independence Day with Bill Pullman

I am an immigrant's son, and I get paid to go to the movies. Truly, this is the land of opportunity. And so, to celebrate tomorrow's birthday of our great nation, I once again present the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (potently played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Let freedom ring.

(And yes, I appreciate the fact that this fictional president probably would be more effective than the current Commander in Chief in uniting us against a foreign threat.)

Celebrating Independence Day again with Bill Pullman

I am an immigrant's son, and I get paid to go to the movies. Truly, this is the land of opportunity. And so, to celebrate the birthday of our great nation, I once again give you the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (potently played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Let freedom ring.

(And before you ask: No, I haven't seen the sequel yet. I've been waiting for today, July 4. Seems appropriate, don't you think?)

Next summer: Independence Day: Resurgence

Glad to see Bill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, Judd Hirsch and Brent Spiner back in the mix. And Sela Ward always is a welcome addition to any cast. I just hope Pullman gets as stirring a speech in this one as he did in the original Independence Day.

My July 4th tradition: Rocking with Bill Pullman and Independence Day

I am an immigrant's son, and I get paid to go to the movies. Truly, this is the land of opportunity. And so, to celebrate the birthday of our great nation, I once again give you the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (potently played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Let freedom ring.

From me and Bill Pullman: Happy Independence Day!

I am an immigrant's son, and I get paid to go to the movies. Truly, this is the land of opportunity. And so, to celebrate the birthday of our great nation, I once again give you the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (potently played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Let freedom ring.

Obama vs. E.T.?

I've always suspected that Steven Spielberg cast Francois Truffaut in Close Encounters of the Third Kind as a scientist who could communicate with extraterrestrials because... well, because of course Truffaut could have communicated with extraterrestrials, if he'd ever had to, because that's the kind of amazingly astute and sensitive fellow he was. In much the same vein, I'm not at all surprised to hear that most people believe Barack Obama would be better qualified than Mitt Romney to handle an invasion by unfriendly extraterrestrials. After all: The dude took care of Osama Bin Laden, right? 

On the other hand, I'm not sure even President Obama could do a better job of leading the human counteroffensive than... President Bill Pullman.

ID4 in 3D?

Must admit: The prospect of an Independence Day in 3D excites me much more than the possibility of a 3D Titanic ever did. If only because I would love to see this irresistibly rousing scene jump off the screen.

Independence Day

I am an immigrant's son, and I get paid to go to the movies. Truly, this is the land of opportunity. And so, to celebrate the birthday of our great nation, I give you the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (potently played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Maybe our current Commander in Chief needs to give a similarly rousing address to rally us against the latest threat facing us.

POTUS vs. ETs

The muddled remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still is pretty lousy – you can read my Houston Chronicle review here – but I must I admit that, while enduring a press screening earlier this week, I found myself fascinated each time Kathy Bates appeared on screen as an aggressively authoritative U.S. Secretary of Defense. Throughout this lavish but lumbering “reinvention” (yeah, right) of the 1951 sci-fi classic, Bates’ Sec. Regina Jackson more or less single-handedly commands all branches of the U.S. military (and the combined police departments of, oh, I dunno, maybe three or four states) in an all-out campaign to kill or capture the stolid extraterrestrial (played, stolidly, by Keanu Reeves) who’s threatening to save the Earth by annihilating earthlings. It’s not that Bates gives such a great performance. (Chalk it up as just another grab-the-paycheck turn by another under-employed Oscar-winner.) But I couldn’t help wondering: Why is the Defense Secretary giving all the orders while the unseen President and Vice-President hide out in undisclosed locations?

For that matter, why did another Defense Secretary (played by Jon Voight, another slumming Oscar-winner) have to take charge of defending the planet while an unseen (and, evidently, incompetent) U.S. President remain on the sidelines last year in Transformers? Did the filmmakers responsible for both these popcorn flicks assume that, at this particular point in our country’s history, audiences simply wouldn’t believe that a Chief Executive could really be an efficient Commander in Chief? Is this something else for which we can blame the incredibly unpopular lame duck currently nesting in the White House?

It wasn’t always like this, you understand. As recently as 1996, the charismatic POTUS in Independence Day played by Bill Pullman earned audience cheers with an impassioned call to arms – a rallying oration not unlike the St. Crispin’s Day speech in Shakespeare’s Henry V – before personally leading the last-ditch fighter-jet assault against alien invaders. But, then again, maybe folks found it easier to believe in a competent Chief Executive twelve years ago. Or ten years ago, when, in Deep Impact, a reassuring African-American prez (Morgan Freeman) kept hope alive even while a humongous meteor bore down on our planet.

All of which makes me wonder: Who’ll be leading the best and brightest of humankind against extraterrestrial terrors in movies made during the Obama Administration? Don’t laugh: Even the most fantastical of popcorn flicks make at least a token effort at credibility. And even the most (seemingly) apolitical of pop-culture trifles often can tell you a lot about the attitudes and assumptions of mass audiences at the time those trifles are pitched at the ticketbuying public.

Independence Day

In honor of the holiday, I give you the ridiculously corny yet tremendously affecting speech given by a beleaguered U.S. President (played by Bill Pullman) to rally a final push against invading extraterrestrials in Independence Day. Seeing this clip again reminds me that, as recently as 1999, you could portray the Commander in Chief as the take-charge hero of a summer blockbuster without inviting derisive jeers from mainstream moviegoers. Flash forward to today, and you have Michael Bay's Transformers, an even bigger blockbuster that depicts the U.S. President only fleetingly, as a mostly unseen doofus with bright red socks and a taste for Ho-Hos, while a grimly determined Secretary of Defense (Jon Voight, who played the heroic FDR in Bay's Pearl Harbor) does the heavy lifting. Gee, do you think this says something about how the makers of Transformers view -- and how they assume mainstream audiences view -- the current resident of the White House?