In 1996, director Roland Emmerich released what would become
his first major foray into the disaster film genre, Independence Day. Starring a large ensemble cast that included Will
Smith, Jeff Goldblum, and Bill Pullman, the film revolved around a massive
alien invasion and the efforts of various people across the world to combat the
alien threat, which just so conveniently happened to occur during the Fourth of
July weekend, hence the title of the film. Independence
Day was a massive commercial success upon release, grossing over $817
million worldwide and becoming the highest grossing film of its year.
Seriously, no other film released that year even came remotely close to
reaching those kind of numbers at the box-office. But even though the film
ended up being one of the most successful blockbusters of all-time, it took
quite a long time for a sequel to get made. It wasn’t until a few years ago
when Emmerich and Dean Devlin, who co-wrote the original film with Emmerich but
hadn’t worked with him since 2000, finally got an idea down for not one but two
sequels to the original film with the goal being to shoot them back-to-back.
And while it’s unclear at the moment if a third film will ever get made, we
finally have a sequel in the form of Independence
Day: Resurgence. Mirroring the gap in years between films, this new film
takes place 20 years after the events of the original film and once again finds
the people of Earth dealing with a massive alien invasion. And even though the
film is most certainly just as cheesy as its predecessor in terms of its
execution, it also carries the same sort of playful tone that is just enough to
make it an enjoyable popcorn flick even when taking its shortcomings into
account.
It has been 20 years since the aliens’ initial invasion of
Earth was thwarted by the human race, primarily thanks to heroes like then-U.S.
President Thomas Whitmore (Bill Pullman). Since then, humanity has come
together to not only rebuild in the wake of the devastating attack but to also
prepare for the likelihood of the aliens’ return. The latter goal comes
primarily through the formation of the ESD AKA ‘Earth Space Defense’, a united
global defense program led by fellow war hero David Levinson (Jeff Goldblum)
and whose military force is captained by the late Steven Hiller’s son Dylan
(now played by Jessie Usher). As the 20th anniversary of the ‘War of
1996’ approaches, David finds an intact alien ship in Africa that had been
drilling a hole leading to the planet’s molten core prior to the aliens’ defeat
20 years prior. This ship also ends up sending out a distress signal which
leads to a new mothership that is, to quote David, ‘definitely bigger than the
last one’ arriving to attack the planet, once again causing a considerable
amount of collateral damage. With the odds once again stacked against them,
David, Whitmore, and Dylan, along with others including Whitmore’s now grown-up
daughter Patricia (Maika Monroe) and her fiancé, pilot Jake Morrison (Liam
Hemsworth), once again look to stop the aliens before they can harvest the heat
of the Earth’s core and destroy the planet. To do so, they end up acquiring the
help of some of the aliens’ biggest ‘enemies’ who hold the key to defeating
them.
Like the original film, there’s no denying that this alien
invasion film is very, very cheesy in terms of its plot and overall execution.
In fact, it’s so cheesy that if it wasn’t for the more elaborate modern-era
visual effects, you’d swear that this film was made back in the 90’s when the
original was made. But even with that in mind, the film actually does manage to
maintain the same sort of light-hearted and action-packed atmosphere of the
original Independence Day even after
all of these years. A lot of this comes from the light-hearted comedic banter
between characters that was also present in the original film, something that
I’m sure was at least one of the reasons why the film was as successful of a
crowd-pleaser as it was. Admittedly Resurgence
does have a bit of a slow start and like its predecessor, more focus is spent
on the action than it is on developing the plot and its large cast of
characters. However, as the film went on, I gradually started to become more and
more engrossed by it all to the point where I was totally hooked by the time
the finale rolled around. Sure it may not carry much of the emotional depth
that it wants to have but it’s still full of fun and exciting action sequences.
It certainly isn’t boring, which is something that I’ve seen a few critics
argue. Obviously the gap between films means that the sequel uses a lot more CG
than the previous film, which actually did utilize quite a lot of practical
effects. And with that said, the visuals in this film are quite excellent and
they very much up the scale when it comes to epic alien vs. human action. That
has usually been the case with most of Emmerich’s disaster films. For as
ludicrous as they can get plot-wise, he certainly delivers when it comes to
scenes of epic destruction.
The film’s ensemble cast is a mix of both new and returning
characters, although some of the latter were re-cast. Specifically, Dylan
Hiller is now played by Jessie Usher, having previously been played by Will
Smith’s Fresh Prince of Bel-Air co-star
Ross Bagley in the first film, and Thomas Whitmore’s daughter Patricia is now
played by Maika Monroe, with the latter recasting attracting quite a bit of
controversy over the supposed dismissal of Mae Whitman, who played the part in
the 1996 film. But of course one of the most talked about developments
regarding the film was the fact that Will Smith wasn’t returning to reprise his
role as Steven Hiller. I’ll admit that I thought he was going to make some sort
of cameo despite all of the denials but it’s true; the sequel is very much Will
Smith-less as it’s established that his character died a few years prior to the
events of the film. As a result, the film does lose a bit of the original’s
charm that came courtesy of its charismatic lead star. But even if there may
not be any ‘award-worthy’ performances in this cast, as was the case with the
previous film, the cast still seems to be quite game for a film of this nature.
While Smith doesn’t return, both Jeff Goldblum and Bill Pullman return as David
and Whitmore, respectively, and both are still just as memorable as they were
in the previous film, with Goldblum once again providing plenty of the film’s
humorous moments and Pullman yet again proving to be quite a badass ‘leader’ as
the former President that gave one of the most epic speeches of all-time in the
original film. Plenty of the new additions are solid as well, particularly
Usher and Liam Hemsworth who do actually manage to provide a good chunk of the
charisma that someone like Smith was able to provide. Though as is the case
when working with a large ensemble cast, some characters are fairly underused,
including both new characters like David’s co-worker Dr. Catherine Marceaux
(Charlotte Gainsbourg) and even some returning characters like Hiller’s widow
Jasmine (Vivica A. Fox).
I’ve noticed that reviews for this film have gotten much
more negative these last few days. For the record, it was faring pretty
decently reception-wise before its release date, hovering around a 50% on RT. But
once opening day rolled around, suddenly reviews for it started to get much more
vitriolic with plenty of people calling it ‘one of the worst films of the year’
and so on and so forth. And I’m rather surprised by that because the film
really isn’t as bad as those recent reviews imply. Now don’t get me wrong, this
film is by no means perfect. Like its predecessor, it is very, very cheesy and
definitely doesn’t really do that much in terms of story and character
development. It could very much be argued that this is one of those cases of a
sequel that came way too late given how much blockbuster films have evolved in
the years since the original ID4 as
this film feels very much like its predecessor in regards to feeling like a
90’s-esque action film. And yet by the end, I was legitimately hooked by it.
Yeah it’s totally stupid but it is what it is. At its core, it’s just a fun
little popcorn flick that never really tries to be something that it’s not.
Yeah it does start off on a rather awkward note but it does manage to smooth
things out for the most part by the end. And sure, the film does end on one
hell of a blatant ‘sequel-baiting’ note and it’s unclear if a third film is
even going to happen given the generally negative reaction to this film. Still,
I won’t lie in saying that I would be interested in seeing how Emmerich and
Devlin plan on concluding this supposed trilogy. Hopefully if a sequel does get
made, it won’t take 20 more years to happen like it did the first time.
Rating: 3/5
