Finally, survival of an alien invasion is almost ensured if you have an emotional issue to work out with your family. Tom Cruise reunites with his estranged family at the end of Spielberg’s remake of “The War of the Worlds.” Will Smith’s familial relationships are affirmed at the end of “Independence Day.”

 

Susan Sontag discussed science-fiction films from 1950 to 1965 in her essay “The Imagination of Disaster.” As Sontag wrote, “For one job that fantasy can do is to lift us out of the unbearably humdrum and to distract us from terrors — real or anticipated — by an escape into exotic, dangerous situations which have last-minute happy endings.” So if you aren’t estranged from anyone, consider making it so.