Director: Roland Emmerich
Distributor: 20th Century Fox
Duration: 115 minutes
Independence Day: Resurgence (DVD) – Movie Review
It has been twenty years since Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum fended off the alien invaders, in the now rather iconic movie Independence Day. With the trend of remakes and sequels of ‘older’ movies nowadays, it’s no surprise that this title also made the list, albeit for a sequel. This time we’ll have to make do with an aging cast that starred in the original, minus Will Smith, who was filming another title at the time. While many good stories are often best not to be dragged out, we were quite curious what this second installment would have to offer.
It’s been twenty years since aliens last set foot on our planet, and our first encounter with the race from outer space wasn’t exactly the one we hoped for. More than two billion humans lost their lives during the attacks, and while we finally won the fight, the event still lives on in the minds of many. The only advantage seems to be the technological advancements we have made thanks to the alien technology scavenged from the wreckages of their ships, which powered down after spreading a virus in their mothership, or at least what we thought to be their biggest vessel.
During the preparations of the twenty year anniversary of defeating the alien scourge, a new vessel appears in the proximity of the moon. Even though this ship looked totally different compared to the original one in terms of design, technology and even hostility, the big shots of the world decide to shoot it down. The victory is short lasted when all of sudden a gigantic ship shows up, dwarfing the mothership from the first movie, destroying the moon base and heading towards our planet.
This time we think we are prepared as we have the alien technology aiding us but nothing seems to be further away from the truth. David Levinson (Jeff Goldblum), one of the heroes that helped defeat the first threat, was exploring the wreckage of the ship the cannon on the moon shot down when the new spacecraft appeared, and due to its massive size it has its own gravitational field and drags David, and the other members of the team aboard their small ship with them.
On Earth, everyone is frantically planning to retaliate, sadly, the orbital cannons are immediately destroyed, and the giant alien ship lands on earth, destroying many cities in its wake. It seems like this time it’s truly over for our planet.
Even though the movie has its fair share of action scenes, it has an extremely long buildup for a rather short finale. Resurgence spans almost two hours, yet most of the important events unfold during the last thirty minutes, while it’s clear that the creators are already hinting at a sequel, thus not concluding the story of this revival of Independence Day. The latter does not feel like an issue, at least if it weren’t for the shoddy implementation of hinting at a third movie, only if this one would do well in the theatres. While this might be a rather inexplicable statement, it just feels like the creators aren’t even sure either if there will be another movie, but they plan on keeping all possible routes open. Anyhow, the movie has a rather slow flow, just like the original did back in the day.
Overall the movie simply feels different than the original one, as it implements CGI in nearly every scene, and the acting is set in a ‘nineties’ mood, but not in a very convincing fashion, when implementing many other newer techniques. This doesn’t mean that the acting is bad, not at all even, it’s just the atmosphere of the acting and heaps of CGI that clash. Again the ‘America is the best country in the world’ reign supreme, and even though it worked twenty years ago, it’s a bit overdone during this day and age.
While the lack of Will Smith’s persona left a void in the cast, we have to say that the cast itself was certainly a top level one. The original Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum duo is now replaced by Jessie T. Usher and Liam Hemsworth, who play Dylan Hiller and Jake Morrison respectively. These two new protagonists play their roles out quite well, and they seem to be accompanied by their own little hench(wo)men, who also do a fairly good job in portraying interesting personas, albeit reduced to characters who hardly show any development and have to stick to many one-liners, rather than dialogues with a lot of substance. It’s sad that because of this, we can’t see the full potential of Travis Tope and Angela Yeung Wing. Pill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, Brent Spiner and Judd Hirsch present you with a very similar acting performance that made the first movie rather iconic. The funny duets between Jeff and Judd feel authentic and add a certain humor factor to the movie, whilst Pill plays a more serious role, as the first event clearly left scars on his character. Even though Brent only had a small, comical, role in the original flick, he now gets a lot more screen time, and he portrays his goofy character superbly.
After the rerelease of the original Independence Day on DVD left a bad aftertaste in our mouths when talking about the special features, this DVD version of Resurgence makes up for a bit of said bad experience. This time we at least get treated to the basics such as a gag reel, deleted scenes, commentaries and so on, but we also get a few original featurettes. You’ll get a short newscast about what has happened between 1996 and 2016, which explains a bit of the progress our human race has made, but there’s also a lighter special feature which revolves around Julius, and the book he wrote about ‘saving the world’.
Conclusion
Independence Day: Resurgence is a fun homage to the original 1996 movie, but tries too hard to please the fans of the original, while attempting to attract a younger generation of fans. The overall atmosphere feels a bit different than the first movie, and the lack of Will Smith is painfully noticeable at times. Nonetheless, the movie still has a phenomenal cast, is able to make you grin from time to time, and adds a few impressive scenes to the mix. If you were a fan of the original, and you wanted the story to go on, this one will provide a pleasant experience. If you are content on how the story of the first title ended, this one might not add a lot to that feeling.
Independence Day: Resurgence (DVD) - Movie Review,
No Comments