Trivia: According to the Director's commentary, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation did not want the film to be released under the title "Independence Day" to avoid legal complications (specifics weren't disclosed as to what the problems might be, but it's also why the abbreviation "ID4" was used). Roland Emmerich (director/writer) and Dean Devlin (writer) needed to justify the title, so they added the rousing bit right at the end of President Whitmore's speech at the hangar when he ends with, "The 4th of July will no longer be known as an American holiday...today we celebrate our Independence Day!"
Trivia: When Charlie and Fulton go to the amusement park, an arcade attendant jokes with them about playing hooky. The man who plays the arcade attendant in this movie also played an unnamed celebrity at Coach Bombay's party in D2, and the same man played a lawyer in the first movie. He also happens to be the movie's screenwriter, Steven Brill.
Trivia: The look of the movie is based on a collection of Topps trading cards.
Trivia: When the Gecko brothers are at the hotel and George Clooney returns, the bag of food he's holding is from Kahuna Burger, the burger joint talked about by Samuel L Jackson in Quentin Tarantino's other movie, Pulp Fiction.
Trivia: I was reading through some of the entries concerning the Borg in the Star Trek Encyclopedia, and came upon a comment they had about Wolf 359 - it's the name of an actual star in space, it makes up part of the Constellation Leo. It's also the site of the first major fleet battle between StarFleet and the Borg. Take your mind back to the scene where Zef and Lily first walk out of that bar, and Lily sees a speck of light that is actually the Borg Sphere, and asks Zef what it is. He replies "That, my dear, is the Constellation Leo". Now, obviously he didn't see what she was pointing out the first time around, but we could probably assume that from their point of view the sphere was in the general area that the constellation occupies in the night sky. Nice coincidence that the first attack on Earth by the Borg came from the same direction as the major battle between Starfleet and the Borg.
Trivia: A projectile hitting the air at near the speed of light" (about 334,800,000 MPH) would instantly vaporise in a huge, blinding flash from the ridiculously intense frictional heating that would occur at such an enormous velocity in the atmosphere. The energy released would probably kill the shooter and anyone standing anywhere near him. Makes for a good movie effect though.
Trivia: The unit that was portrayed in the tank battle was to be the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment because they were actually in a friendly fire incident. During the shoot, someone showed the director the 2nd ACR's patch and he thought that was better looking.
Trivia: John Woo wanted Hale to die in the film, but the studio was against it because of Slater's popularity with younger audiences.
Trivia: When Stanley introduces himself, Mason replies with "but of course you are". James Bond said the same thing to Plenty O'Toole in Diamonds are Forever, and both Bond and Mason were played by Sean Connery.
Trivia: The film as originally intended was longer and more violent, had a non-linear narrative and a much darker ending. The studio forced director Tim Pope to re-edit the film to follow a structure more akin to the first film in order to capitalize on its success and also made him delete a number of key scenes. This lead to he and writer David Goyer disowning the film. The original workprint of the film that represented Pope and Goyer's vision was well over two hours long, as compared to the theatrical cut's anemic 84 minute run-time.
Trivia: This was originally supposed to be the sequel to the first Darkman movie. When Larry Drake said he would like to appear as Durant, Die Darkman Die became the third film with the second film being Darkman 2: The Return of Durant.
Trivia: In the scene where Kamil the dog attacks the drunken guy at the crotch, no protection was used in order to make the scene as real as possible, but the dog had been specially trained for weeks beforehand to bite the area, but to not clamp down or force itself down. In the first take of the scene, where Barb Wire makes Kamil sit down, the guy used timed it badly, and forgot to bend down as the dog did. As you can imagine, this was painful.
Trivia: Early in the film, Tom Mullen mentions the name "John Smith." Mel Gibson provided the voice of John Smith in "Pocahontas."
Trivia: The names of the dragonslayers hired by the Queen are Uhlric, Cavan, Ivor, Tavis, and Trahern, according to the novelization of the film by Charles Edward Pogue. None of the dragonslayers are listed in the credits.
Trivia: Scriptwriter Shane Black is a huge believer in recycling. Check out how much the moment when Jackson is captured by Bierko resembles Rigg's capture by McAllister in "Lethal Weapon". Black's 3 biggest movies - "Lethal Weapon", "The Last Boy Scout" and "The Long Kiss Goodnight" all involve a major character's daughter being kidnapped (to say nothing of all beginning with an "L").
Trivia: "Last man standing" is actually the third remake of the 1961 Kurosawa film "Yojimbo" (Japanese for "The Bodyguard"). The second remake of the film was in 1967 called "A Fistful Of Dollars", starring Clint Eastwood. Yojimbo had the exact same plot as the other two, except it was about a Lone Samurai. The other two films just took the exact same story and put it in a different time period and setting.