Review of Independence Day: Resurgence (2016) by Patrick L — 17 Aug 2016

"We waited twenty years for that? Thanks for nothing Roland Emmerich!".

Movie Review: Independence Day: Resurgence.

Date Viewed: June 25 2016.

Directed By Roland Emmerich (The Day After Tomorrow, Independence Day, 2012, Godzilla (1998) and White House Down).

Screenplay By Roland Emmerich, Dean Devlin, Nicolas Wright, James A. Woods and James Vanderbilt, Story By Roland Emmerich, Dean Devlin, Nicolas Wright and James A. Woods, Based on characters created by Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin.

Starring: Liam Hemsworth, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Jessie Usher, Judd Hirsch, Maika Monroe, William Fichtner, Brent Spiner, Travis Tope, Patrick St. Esprit, Angelababy, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Joey King, Sela Ward and Vivica A. Fox.

20 years ago, "Independence Day" redefined the event blockbuster movie in a big way, today the long-awaited "Independence Day: Resurgence" defines the term unnecessary in new extraordinary ways. Why did it take 20 years for the aliens to come back? It seems so routine for a big threat to come back 10 or 20 years later. Why not 11? 12? 13? 14? 16? 17? or 18?. The first film not only became the top grossing film of 1996, it also put Will Smith on the map. Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Judd Hirsch, Vivica A. Fox and Brent Spiner are among the returning players in "Resurgence" but Smith is absent from the sequel because the studio (20th Century Fox) and director Roland Emmerich thought he will be too expensive to bring back. Instead of bringing him back, they decided to kill off Smith's character and let his now grown-up son (Jessie Usher) fill in for his shoes.

As for the movie itself, it is 100% rehash of the original, 100% not nutritious, 100% bloated, 90% loaded with special effects and 100% not imaginative. The story is beyond confusing and there is little character development compared to the first film which sort of made fun of the disaster movie tropes. "Independence Day: Resurgence" doesn't bring out 4th of July fireworks, it just brings out a lot of headache-inducing mayhem.

Two decades after the devastating alien invasion of 1996, all of the countries of the world (including Iran and North Korea) have united with the United States in salvaging the remains of the alien technology and use it to rebuild their planet. The United Nations even set up the Earth Space Defense (ESD), a global military research program that serves as a warning beacon for any incoming extraterrestrial threats. Our new top gun is Jake Morrison (Liam Hemsworth), a young cocky pilot who is the fiance of former President Whitmore's daughter, Patricia (Maika Monroe). Jake's parents were killed in the 1996 alien invasion so he lived in an orphanage with long-childhood friend, Charlie Miller (Travis Tope) and they enlisted themselves in flight school and became pilots for the ESD. He also has an estranged relationship with former friend and and ESD captain Dylan Dubrow-Hiller (Usher) whose father of war hero Steven Hiller (Smith) who was tragically killed during a training exercise. REALLY!?! After all of those heroics from the first movie and Hiller got killed during a training exercise? That's hard to except.

Meanwhile, former President Whitmore (Pullman) is still having dreams about the aliens possibly coming back and Dr. Brakish Okun (Spiner) awakens from a twenty year coma, what a fascinating coincidence!

Goldblum's Dr. David Levinson arrives in the provincial African state Republique Nationale.

D'Umbutu where he finds an intact alien destroyer. He discovers that the ship was drilling a hole into the ground as part of the aliens' distress call for their defeat.

As U.S. President Elizabeth Lanford (Sela Ward) and the country celebrate the 4th of July and the 20th anniversary of the alien invasion, a big alien ship arrives just in time and causes enormous devastation to our planet... AGAIN! After the alien mothership wipes out the entire Eastern Seaboard with it's gravitational pull and takes out President Lanford and her entire cabinet, Levinson and Okun devise a plan to use the planet's other extraterrestrial arrival, a giant white sphere with artificial intelligence and transmit it's signal as a decoy to capture the mothership.

Oh yeah, Levinson's father, Julius (Hirsch) is also added into the mix where he gets saved by a group of Florida kids led by Samantha (Joey King) who lose their parents in the new invasion. Even after surviving a boat crash, he still acts like Levinson's father who says such words like "schmuck" and "putz" because he's you know Jewish.

It's also hard to believe that the world became a united front after the first alien invasion. Did Iran, Russia and North Korea had any disputes with the U.S. and other countries in this alternate universe? This is a major spoiler here but I'll give it away anyway, when the humans defeat the invaders again, we get a glimpse of Paris where every building gets demolished except for the Eiffel Tower. Levinson said "they like to get to landmarks" but how come the aliens didn't wipeout the Eiffel Tower. The aliens in the first movie had a lot of pleasure in blowing up the White House but they didn't have the guts to blow up the Eiffel Tower what is wrong with these aliens. It also proves that Levinson's own honesty betrays him.

Goldblum gets a few funny lines here and there but the new and young characters are nothing but stiff, cardboard cutouts. "Independence Day: Resurgence" was directed and co-written by Emmerich who also gave us the first movie, "The Day After Tomorrow" and "2012", the three of which I liked. However, he also gave us epic clunkers such as "Universal Soldier", "Stargate", "10,000 B.C.", the gay rights drama "Stonewall", "White House Down" and the 1998 "Godzilla". The special effects are once again breathtaking but we are stuck with an idiotic script that took five people to write.

For a blockbuster summer movie about aliens who want to blow up the Earth again, there isn't a whole lot going on here. "Independence Day: Resurgence" is what I call an extraterrestrial dud.