Independence Day (1996)

Last fall [1996], Hezbollah, or the Party of God, issued a statement calling the film "propaganda for the so-called genius of the Jews and their alleged concern for humanity." Warning Muslim believers to boycott the movie, which was directed by Roland Emmerich, who is not Jewish but German, Hezbollah reminded fellow Muslims that paying money to see the film would "reward the bloodsuckers of Qana," a reference to Israel (which bombed Qana, a U.N. camp in Lebanon), and Israel's protector, the United States. But according to a Fox executive who keeps track of international sales, Hezbollah's warning did not hurt box office revenues in Lebanon, which has an estimated four million people. Quite the contrary. Between Sept. 20 and Dec. 12, the executive said, some 98,000 people went to see Independence Day in Lebanon; the film grossed almost $600,000 — an impressive showing for any film. "I respect anyone's religion," Mr. Goldblum said in an interview, "but I think Hezbollah has missed the point"[.]" Hezbollah's anti-Jewish crusade, he added, "does not sit well with me."

— Judith Miller (The New York Times)

I will propose the alternative to the say-nothing hypothesis, that Independence Day wants in the worst way to say something, and that it does so by morphing into entertainment fantasy the two exterminatory culminations of World War II, one from European and the other from the Asian theatre. In the name of multiculturalism but against its actual contemporary exemplars, and with Jew, black and public-spirited WASP as its front men, ID4 re-fights World War II as virtual reality. Bringing up to date the the Cold War liberal, military, post-industrial, enfotainment complex,m and using body invasion to electrify the body polic, Independence Day is the defining motion picture of Bill Clinton's America.

[…]

Russell [Casse] has broken down, rumour has it, not from Vietnam post-traumatic stress disorder but from alien sexual abuse. Independence Day replaces troubling earthly histories of Vietnam veterans — as POW victims and illegitimate fathers —with the fantasy of extraterrestrial abduction. The disorienting address, 'Your father', that first connects the Chcano teenager to the redneck cropduster is clarified, in the film's psycho-logic, by alien carnal aggression. The alien-Casse liaison, moreover, fills the space of the missing Chicana mother.

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Independence Day gratifies the wish for apocalyptic triumph aborted when the Cold War 'empire of evil' ended not with a bang but with a whimper.

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Urging Hiller to break off with the stripper if he wants to be accepted into NASA, Jimmy kneels down and mimes kissing his buddy's ass. Discovering the engagement ring Hiller plans to give his girlfriend, Jimmy, still on his knees — siezes it and pantomimes his own gay marriage proposal. Surprising them in the act and pretending to have stumbled on a love scene, a third pilot mimes a version of Clinton's 'Don't ask, don't tell.'

[…]

When Russell's release mechanism jams, on the Dr. Strangelove model, he also refuses to abort his mission. 'Tell my children I love them,' says the American kamikaze, redeeming one set of aliens by destroying another.

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Birfurcating the two maternal orifices at its climax, Independence Day allies anal penetration with death, escapes maternal power and rescues heterosexuality. The return of the Jewish-black alliance also saves Clinton's Demoncratic Party, menanced by the defection of southern whites, for the anal explosion wipes out not only the aliens but also the Reagan Democrat [Russell Chasse], the good old boy (Randy Quaid had played Lyndon Johnson in a television miniseries) who had illegal congress with them.

[…]

Aliens are imaginary, and no one really gets killed in Independence Day. Exporting virtual rather than actual war, the film-makers see themselves as meeting the modern hunger not for violence but for myth.

— Michael Paul Rogin: BFI Film Classics: Independence Day (1999)