Released: June 2016

Director: Roland Emmerich

Rated PG-13

Run Time: 120 Minutes

Distributor: Fox Studios

Composer: Harald Kloser

Cast:
Jeff Goldblum: David Levinson
Liam Hemsworth: Jake Morrison
Jessie T. Usher: Dylan Hiller
Bill Pullman: President Whitmore
Maika Monroe: Patricia Whitmore
Sela Ward: President Lanford
William Fichtner: General Adams
Judd Hirsch: Julius Levinson
Brent Spiner: Dr. Brakish Okun
Vivica A. Fox: Jasmine Hiller

1996 saw a number of films ranging from decent to bad-ass.  The Rock, Dragonheart, Twister, Mission Impossible, Jerry Maguire, and Eraser were some of the biggest movies to be released that year.  But none of those movies made nearly as much money as Roland Emmerich’s Independence Day.  ID4 was the highest-grossing film of 1996 with a gross income of over $800,000,000.  It broke records, and it won an Oscar for Best Visual Effects.  I was barely a teenage when the movie came out.  It was great.  I had so much fun with that movie.  20 years later, I’m still a huge fan of Independence Day.  Why?  I’ll answer that question a little later in this post.  Most people, myself included, assumed that Independence Day was a one-and-done movie, with no sight of a sequel.  It didn’t really need one.  Well, 20 years later, we have ourselves an honest-to-God sequel: Independence Day: Resurgence.

Many things have changed since the War of ’96.  The world has become united in a common cause.  Alien tech has been combined with human technology, and as a result there is a base on the moon, and there are outposts throughout the Solar System to watch for any sign of alien intruders.  David Levinson has become the Director of the new Earth Defense Force, which employs alien-improved weaponry.  There has been peace throughout the globe for nearly 20 years.  The son of Captain Steven Hiller, Dylan, is a captain himself in the EDF and is being sent to the moon for a televised celebration flight when an outpost near Saturn goes dark.  Before long, an impossibly massive alien ship arrives to claim Earth for its own.  The story in the first Independence Day wasn’t anything original, but the way it was executed was phenomenal.  It had its serious moments, but it was also peppered with a lot of humor and other light and emotional moments.  The story in Resurgence is essentially the same, with another massive mother-ship causing havoc around the globe.  When it comes to coincidences, this movie is chock-full of them.  It’s ridiculously convenient when some of these characters and objects just show up in the nick of time.  Cliche is a word I’ll be using a lot here.  Make no mistake, the first movie had plenty of cliches, but the film knew it and had fun with it.  Resurgence seems to take itself a little too seriously.  Oh, there’s some pretty funny moments, but there’s no real sense of urgency here.  It takes about 30 minutes before things start getting wrecked.

While it was certainly inevitable that we would see new characters, we also got to see some of the main characters’ children grow up.  Patricia Whitmore and Dylan Hiller show up as military officers.  We also have members of the old guard show up.  Jeff Goldblum returns in fine form as David Levinson, with Bill Pullman as former President Whitmore.  He seems like a grizzled old man that appears to be off his rocker.  Vivica A. Fox has essentially an extended cameo as Dylan’s mother, Jasmine.  Brent Spiner returns as the eccentric Dr. Brakish Okun, who has apparently been in a coma for the past 20 years, due to alien telepathy.  William Fichtner is one of the new faces as General Adams, and he’s pretty good.  It’s always fun to see Fichtner in a movie.  Sela Ward plays the new President Lanford, and she doesn’t do a damn thing.  If there’s a problem with the casting, it’s with the complete lack of Will Smith.  Will Smith was one of the reasons why the first Independence Day worked so well.  When he was on screen, he commanded it.  Yeah, he was very funny a lot of times, but when he needed to be tough, he was very convincing.  He’s not here, and according to some marketing gimmick, his character was apparently killed during a test flight.  They didn’t really mention that in the movie.  I understand that Will Smith didn’t come back, because he demanded a sizable paycheck.  They didn’t want to pay, so they killed him off.  Very nice.  The complete lack of Will Smith actually hurts this film in the long run.  He was kinda the glue that held the whole thing together in the first movie.  Judd Hirsch shows up and not a whole lot happens with him, other than trying to outrun that giant ship in the screenshot above.  The movie throws a lot of new characters at you in the span of two hours.  The acting is fine, but the characterization is not that good.  The chemistry between these people is almost non-existent.  The characters have none of the charm that they did in the previous film and it shows.

So…the characters and the story took a bit of a dive, how about the action?  It takes a good 30 minutes before the good stuff starts to happen, but when it starts, it doesn’t stop at all.  Not even to let you breathe.  You know what?  I’m fine with that.  With a two-hour movie, it needs to grab your attention, and it does when that huge alien ship starts flying over the moon.  The action and the visual effects are out of this world.  If there’s one thing that Roland Emmerich can really do, it’s to destroy the world.  When the alien ship shows up on Earth, it has its own gravity, so it picks up cities and drops them on others.  It’s a sight to behold.  With the humans using alien technology, they actually don’t have to worry about getting around the shields this time.  The action is nuts.  The dogfights are fantastic, even though it seems to throw a lot at you.  We do actually get to see the aliens themselves in action at a few points in the film.  That was really, really cool to see.  The designs of the aliens haven’t changed, but thanks to modern CG technology, they move a lot better and seem more organic.  Don’t get me wrong, I loved the way they did the creatures in the first movie, but these feel a bit more threatening, because they can move and fight.  The alien queen herself was a fairly interesting design.  So, yeah, the visuals are stunning.  However, there really isn’t anything here that screams “iconic.”  In the first movie, you had the alien ship blowing up the White House, and that became a marketing tool.  We don’t have anything like that in here.

For all the crap that I’m throwing at this film, it might seem like I possibly hate it, but I don’t.  In fact, I really enjoyed it.  I love movies like these.  It definitely isn’t as good as the first movie, but it does to try to up the ante quite a bit with bigger action sequences.  But those action sequences don’t mean a thing if you don’t have the heart behind it, and that’s what this movie lacks the most:  Heart.  There’s also the fact that the movie is deliberately setting up for a much larger sequel.  I really don’t like sequel-baiting like this.  It happened with Warcraft, and I didn’t like it then.  The first film worked, because it was a self-contained film.  It had a beginning, middle, and end.  Independence Day: Resurgence is essentially a set-up for a much larger and grander conflict.  I have no problems with movies setting up for sequels, if they do it properly.  Here, it was pretty blatant.  That being said, I’m hoping this movie does well, because I want to see an Independence Day 3.  I really do.  With what I hope they have planned, ID4-3 could be a massive sci-fi epic the likes of which we haven’t seen since Star Wars: Return of the Jedi.  My final recommendation for Independence Day: Resurgence is this:  If you liked the first movie as much as I did, you may like this as well, just don’t set your expectations to high.  It won’t meet them, unfortunately.  With that in mind, it is still a solid sci-fi actioner that should be seen on the big screen.

Before I give my final score, I would like to point out that I caught this film in a double feature with the original Independence Day.  I hadn’t seen the first movie in theaters for 20 years, so seeing it again on the big screen was like being a kid again.  It was phenomenal and held up nicely.  It was a ton of fun and I’m grateful that I managed to see it on the big screen again.  I’ve been a fan of the original film since it came out and that’s not likely to change.  The sequel and it’s possible follow-up are not going to diminish the first film for me.  With all that in mind, my final score for Indepence Day: Resurgence is a 7.5/10.  It could’ve been a lot better and the pacing could’ve been a little bit quicker, but it’s still movie that’s fun as hell with some really stunning visual effects.

Ron Howard is a genuine talent, not only in front of the camera, but behind as well.  While he first started off in front of the camera with TV shows like The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days, his real talent was behind the camera where his ability to direct became apparent.  His first real success came with the science fiction film Cocoon.  While he has had a number of hits and misses, some of the best movies in the world exist solely because of Howard.  While he ain’t much to look at, this guy knows his movies and how to craft ’em.  For this edition of The Best Directors, we will be examining some of Ron Howard’s best movies.

Willow

Besides Star Wars and Star Trek, Willow was one of my favorite movies growing up and it still is today.  From a visual standpoint, this is a very unique film.  The main hero of the film is a “little person” named Willow, played by Warwick Davis and is one of my favorite actors.  Val Kilmer plays the bad-ass Madmartigan, and is one of the most charismatic characters put on screen.  Willow had a surprisingly dark and bleak tone to the whole affair, because the story revolves around a child that’s destined to destroy the evil queen Bavmorda, who is more than willing to slaughter each and every newborn so her reign of terror can continue.  The visual effects in this movie were simply way ahead of their time, and used a lot of stop-motion animation, miniatures, and a little CG in a groundbreaking morphing sequence.  Willow is one of the most interesting fantasy films to date and has some of the best acting I’ve seen in a movie of this kind.  This is definitely one I can easily recommend.  Ron Howard did an amazing job with this one, even though it bombed at the box office.  That’s a shame, really, I would have loved to have seen a sequel.

The Missing

The Missing is quite possibly one of the most riveting and intense Westerns I have ever seen.  The film stars Cate Blanchett as a widowed rancher when one of her daughters disappears.  She then enlists the aid of her father, played by Tommy Lee Jones.  Together they set out to find the missing girl.  This is probably one of the grittiest Westerns out there.  It doesn’t shy away from the violence or some of the really bizarre happenings that take place throughout the movie.  It’s a Western, but it also has some supernatural elements to it that make it stand out from the pack.  The performances from Blanchett and Jones are simply astounding.  Ron Howard clearly knows how to build tension and emotion to the point where it becomes cathartic.  It’s not going to be a film for everyone as there are some disturbing scenes in the film, but rarely do you find a Western that’s so gripping.

Apollo 13

“Houston, we have a problem.”  Ever since the real Apollo 13 incident, these words of been immortalized in history.  This was one of the most terrifying events in human history.  While a film could have easily exploited the near-tragedy, Ron Howard managed to craft a solid, believable and incredibly thrilling film about one of the biggest challenges ever to face NASA.  Perfectly cast with the likes of Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton, Ed Harris, and Gary Sinise, Apollo 13 is one of the most memorable and intense dramas released in the last twenty-five years.  The film won MULTIPLE awards and is highly regarded as one of Ron Howard’s best movies.

The Da Vinci Code

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMba3fckhuQ

This one’s going to be a bit controversial for some.  The Da Vinci Code is a movie that I really, really like.  Here’s the thing, though:  I’ve also read the book by Dan Brown.  The book garnered a lot of controversy, because it questioned a lot of the dearly-held beliefs of the Catholic Church.  In fact, the book AND the movie really jabbed the Church in the eye.  The Catholic Church was very quick to condemn the book, because they felt it was blasphemous.  The movie, on the other hand, was controversial because people thought it was pretentious, preachy and boring.  I didn’t.  I loved every minute of it.  The acting was fantastic, and while some of the puzzles and solutions in the film seem kind of coincidental, it’s still a really great story.  Tom Hanks, Ian McKellen, and Jean Reno star in one of Ron Howard’s more controversial movies.

In The Heart of the Sea

In The Heart of the Sea is based on the actual events of the Essex, the whaling ship in 1820 that was destroyed by a whale.  The story of the Essex, in turn, inspired the fictional story of Moby Dick, written by Herman Melville.  This is absolutely one of the most stunning movies released last year.  It features a very strong cast that includes Chris Hemsworth, Ben Wishaw, Brendan Gleeson, Benjamin Walker, Tom Holland, and Cillian Murphy.  This is one of those epic sea movies that strangely didn’t get a lot of attention.  It’s a shame, because it’s an incredible story.  While many have complained about the excessive use of CGI, I thought the film engrossing and extremely riveting.  This one is definitely a must-watch if you’re a fan of Ron Howard’s work.

While Ron Howard made many more films than what I’ve covered here, there is no doubt in my mind that he is one of Hollywood’s most talented directors, despite a few….misfires.  I think his movies are incredibly worthwhile and very entertaining while telling a great story.  Ron Howard is an amazing story-teller and I can’t wait to see what he does next.

With summer in full swing, we’re seeing a lot of really big-budget action movies.  We’ve already gotten Captain America: Civil War, X-Men, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Warcraft out of the gate.  July’s creeping up on us as is the Fourth of July, otherwise known as Independence Day.  It’s a bit of a big day for the United States.  People are going to be out celebrating, camping and going to the movies.  I figure now’s the best time to start celebrating some of my favorite directors.  Speaking of Independence Day, German director Roland Emmerich is rolling out the red carpet for his follow-up to the 1996 box-office smash, Independence Day.  I will be discussing that film a little later, but suffice to say, that was a hugely popular movie.  Roland Emmerich has made a name for himself by crafting some of the most spectacular disaster movies over the past 20 years.  For this series of The Best, I’m going to discuss some his best movies.  Let’s start, shall we?  This is The Best Directors: Roland Emmerich.

Universal Soldier

Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren, Universal Soldier was the sleeper hit of 1992.  I don’t think anybody really saw this one coming.  While it didn’t really set the box-office on fire, it did moderately well.  The story is that you have two Vietnam-era soldiers who killed each other during the war, that find themselves brought back to life because of a secret government project.  Problem is, Van Damme’s character has flashbacks, and Lundgren is a complete psychopath.  This was probably one of the funnest movies during the early 90’s.  It was certainly violent, but it was awesome.  Dolph Lundgren stole the show as Sgt. Andrew Scott.  It was a wild ride.

Stargate

Following on the heels of Universal Soldier, Roland Emmerich stunned the world with his first major box-office hit, Stargate.  With an original story that takes place millions of light years away from Earth, Stargate features an all-star cast with Kurt Russell and James Spader taking the helm, and the results were absolutely phenomenal.  You had great special effects, great costume designs and amazing sets.  All of this is set to an epic soundtrack by composer David Arnold.  The grand and epic scale of the film made it an absolute blast to watch, and had some really good performances.  This movie also spawned an expanded universe featuring books, comics, several TV series including Stargate SG-1.  The word on ‘net is that Roland Emmerich is working on a reboot of the film, which supposedly allows him and Dean Devlin to tell the story that they really wanted to tell.  That’s a ways off, however.  Still, Stargate is a phenomenal science fiction film.

Independence Day

In 1996, there were few movies that were as large and bombastic as Independence Day.  This was the movie that people really wanted to see.  With an ensemble cast which included Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Robert Loggia, Brent Spiner, Randy Quaid, and Judd Hirsch, the star power in the film was enormous.  However, Independence Day kickstarted the film career of Will Smith, who would go on to have an astounding career as a leading man.  He had the acting chops, the charisma and comic timing.  Independence Day ended up being the biggest movie of the year.  Yeah, the story wasn’t particularly original, but its execution was superb.  Roland Emmerich basically turned a conventional alien invasion flick into a disaster movie, and the results were explosive.  The film actually won an Oscar for best visual effects.  This was one of the last movies in the 90’s to feature models and miniatures as much as it did.  It employed nearly every single visual effect trick in the book, and it’s STILL fun to watch.  Yeah, the movie’s got its haters, but I love it, and the rest of the world loved it too.  It’s been nearly 20 years since the film came out, and now we have a sequel that will be released on Friday, the 24th of June.  Bring it on, baby.

The Patriot

Not all of Roland Emmerich’s movies were about disasters or alien invasions.  The Patriot was a look at a family during the height of the American Revolution.  While this particular story is fictional, the events surrounding it are not.  While there are big and epic battle sequences, the film focused more on the characters during this time.  Mel Gibson plays Benjamin Martin, a former soldier who has seen some horrible things, trying to make a living by making rocking chairs.  All of that changes when the Revolution reaches his doorstep and one of his children ends up a casualty.  The film is an emotional roller coaster, with Mel Gibson delivering one of his finest performances ever.  Roland Emmerich wisely doesn’t go over the top with spectacle, but it is a violent movie and earns it R-rating.  The cast is loaded with star power, featuring Jason Isaacs, Heath Ledger, Chris Cooper, and Tom Wilkinson.  This was an astounding film is probably Roland Emmerich’s best effort to date.

2012

It seems to me that Roland Emmerich keeps trying to top himself when it comes to disaster movies.  He really outdid himself here.  A lot of people call Mr. Emmerich the master of disaster, and 2012 definitely proves it.  When it comes to destroying the world, few people do it as well as he can.  This is a special effects film, through and through.  It takes about 40 or so minutes before things go haywire, but when they do……wow.  The entire California sequence is mind-blowing.  The eruption of Yellowstone was also freaking amazing.  I consider 2012 to be one of the most epic disaster movies ever made.  If you can ignore the “science” behind the movie, you’ll have a great time.  With awesome actors like John Cusack, Chiwatel Ejiofor, Oliver Platt, and Woody Harrelson, there’s a lot to like here, I think.

While Roland Emmerich made more movies than what I’ve listed here, they weren’t as good or as memorable.  With Independence Day: Resurgence literally right around the corner, Roland Emmerich has proven that he’s one of the most interesting directors alive, because he knows how to film action and bring good performances to otherwise wooden characters.  I honestly can’t wait to see what this guy has up his sleeves.