Grim timing inspires Pullman, By TRALEE PEARCE, Ottawa Sun,July 4, 1996

NEW YORK -- A change of place was just what Bill Pullman needed to get into his latest role -- as an American president faced with an alien invasion in Independence Day (ID4).

Filming for the movie began in Wendover, Utah, in August last summer . "It was the 50th anniversary of the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima," says Pullman, whose recent films include While You Were Sleeping, opposite Sandra Bullock, and Sleepless In Seattle with Meg Ryan.

"Wendover was where they trained the pilots -- and where the Enola Gay took off from. By the time we were there, it was in all the magazines -- discussions about (former President Harry S) Truman's decision to drop the bomb and `What did he feel like when he made that decision?' " "I didn't have to go to the library to do my research -- just picked up the paper and here's today's scene."

In ID4, the president grapples with whether to use nuclear weapons against the belligerent planetary invaders -- and risk fallout over his own country. The script alone, Pullman says, was full of "rock 'em-sock 'em techno talk" which didn't give the actor any insight into the inner turmoil such a decision would spur.

"When I encountered the gravity of (Truman's decision to drop the bomb) it really located me in a way that changed my voice and my posture. That was the beginning for me.

"Lucky, too, man. Cause we were startin' the movie whether I was ready or not."

Pullman's president is a Clinton-esque man who happens to be a former fighter pilot. "He's a man of real action. I bet it'll be hard to have a story as flamboyant as this. Even (the upcoming) Air Force One, starring Harrison Ford, is reality-based.

"In ID4, the world is going to be destroyed and it's up to us guys," he says. Although he delivers a number of speeches throughout the film, a particularly rousing "rally the troops" pep talk near the end takes on mythic proportions.

Pullman says he's not sure what he'll be filming next -- except that a disaster movie is a no-go, because he wants to keep moving.

"It's a lingering thing," he explains. "With While You Were Sleeping, it was so much fun and such a Cinderella story, that I didn't want to do another romantic comedy. I wanted to do the opposite. "ID4 felt like so completely the best disaster movie to be in -- so brilliant and unusual. The whole premise of doing a flood or lava ... I just go the other way."