I was actually really excited when I saw the trailer for Independence Day 2: Resurgence. It looked like a fun movie, much like the original film. A big dumb movie with explosions, and just ridiculousness. I expected a film that was fun to watch and entertaining. Did the movie deliver on that front? lets find out!
Independence Day 2 is an action, adventure, science fiction film. The events in the film take place two decades after the first Independence Day invasion, Earth is faced with a new extra-Solar threat. But will mankind’s new space defences be enough?
Independence Day 2 is directed by Roland Emmerich, of course! It would be hard to make a disaster movie like this without him. His filmography includes such director titles such as Universal Soldier (1992), Stargate (1994), Independence Day (1996), Godzilla (1998), The Patriot (2000), The Day After Tomorrow (2004), 10,000 BC (2008), 2012 (2009), and White House Down (2013). I honestly haven’t been quite the Emmerich fan lately, I didn’t finish 2012, I got bored and did something else, maybe its time to try to watch it again, maybe i wasn’t in the mood. But I really liked Emmerich back when I was younger and I grew up with Stargate, Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow. I thought The Day After Tomorrow was a lot of fun.
Emmerich also wrote the film with original film screenplay writer Dean Devlin. Devlin also wrote Universal Soldier (1992), Stargate (1994), Independence Day (1996), and Godzilla (1998). But also joining the mix is James A. Woods and Nicolas Wright. This is their first attempt at script writing, and I don’t think they did very well. Here is my first issue with this movie, there are way too many script writers that the film is all over the place, the writing isn’t consistent, the characters are dumb minus a couple of good performances or they’re the “smarter characters.” You have the elements here that made the first movie so good, but it just seems like theres some new stuff that really doesn’t well, the execution of the ideas isn’t very concrete.
The acting in this movie was all over the place, probably goes with the inconstant script. There were some of the new characters I didn’t like at all, but I liked some others (mainly those who were reprising their roles from 20 years ago, it was fun to see them again in this world). The new actors that are involved with the film consist of Liam Hemsworth, known for his roles in Knowing (2009), Triangle (2009), The Hunger Games Trilogy (2012-2015), and The Expendables 2 (2012). I wasn’t a huge fan of him in this movie, in fact I’m not a huge fan of him in any movie, minus The Expendables 2, but I also haven’t seen the Hunger Games movies yet, so I’ll check those out sometime. It also woman whose acting I’ve been a fan of for a while, Maika Monroe stars in this movie as well. Her other roles consist of Labor Day (2013), The Guest (2014), It Follows (2014), and The 5th Wave (2016). I thought she was very good in this movie, her character was actually very well done, and it was cool to see how they used her in this movie. She played President Whitmore’s (the president from the first movie, you know the guy who gave the great speech?) Daughter. I thought she did well in this, as she has done with her other movies. Joey King is here too, which is an young up and coming actress I really like. Her other roles consist of Quarantine (2008), Battle Los Angeles (2011), Crazy, Stupid, Love. (2011), The Dark Knight Rises (2012), White House Down (2013), The Conjuring (2013), Wish I Was Here (2014), andFargo TV Series (2014-2015). She wasn’t in this movie a lot, but when she was in it I thought she did a good job, I see bright things in this young actors future. The last and the worst actor in the movie was Jessie T. Under, who played Dylan Hiller. If the name Hiller rings a bell, this would be Captain Steven Hiller’s (Will Smiths Character in the first film’s step son, remember his mom married Steve before he and David – Jeff Goldblum’s character – went to go plant the virus in the mothership.) To me, he was just over-acting the entire time, he started off okay and then an event happened that should have really shaped the character, and he just was stone, like there was no character development on his part. Since Will Smith’s fee of 50$ million was turned down by fox, they had to write him out of the movie, and they replaced him with Dylan, I don’t even think Will Smith could’ve saved this movie, maybe in parts, but…
The old actors who are back reprising their roles consist of course of Jeff Goldbum as David Levinson. His other roles consist of The Big Chill (1983), The Fly (1986), Jurassic Park (1993), Independence Day (1996), The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004), The Switch (2010), and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Bill Pullman is back as President Whitmore. His other roles consist of Spaceballs (1987), The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988), A League Of Their Own (1992), Sleepless In Seattle (1993), Caspar (1995), Independence Day (1996), Lake Placid (1999), The Grudge (2004), The Equalizer (2014) and American Ultra (2015). And finally Judd Hirsch reprised his role as Julius Levinson, David’s father. Hirsch’s other roles consist of Ordinary People (1980), Independence Day (1996), A Beautiful Mind (2001), and Sharknado 2: The Second One (2014). I thought all the actors that were reprising their roles did a good job, especially Jeff Goldblum and Judd Hirsch. I felt they didn’t skip a beat and got back into the mind of their characters very quickly. Bill Pullman on the other hand, phoned it in a little bit, it wasn’t until later on in the movie, that he actually felt like he was actually President Whitmore again, and even then it didn’t last long.
I kinda reversed the order of how I do things and gave you a bunch of negatives about the film, with a couple positives. I’ll stick now to some more of the positives, close again with a few negatives, and give my final score.
As I said previously, it was fun to see some of the original actors reprise their roles in this universe, even if some people seemed to have phoned it in. The CGI used in this movie, much like the original was very well done, as to be expected from a Roland Emmerich movie. I felt like the action scenes were also well done, the typical fair thats expected is here, air-to-air combat, theres some even on foot combat which is a nice change from the original film which was all air to air combat, but it was a lot of fun in the original movie.
My favourite scene was the final fight in the movie, which I won’t spoil just incase you watch it. But it was a lot of fun, and the aliens looked really cool. I thought they did a good job in changing the look of the aliens from the original, making them look almost like a different race and a little more creepy. Also the design of the queen alien was a lot of cool.
I think my major negative about Independence Day 2: Resurgence was that they took all the major scenes from the original Independence Day, it wasn’t subtle at all too. Cocky fighter pilot? check. Sacrifice from an old washed out war hero by blowing themselves up? Check. Using a human’s voice box to talk to everyone else into surrendering? check. A INSPIRATIONAL SPEECH THAT IS MEANT TO RALLY EVERYONE TOGETHER AND INSPIRE!? yup…thats here too.
The ending, when everything is wrapping up was pretty bad, and guess what they do leave it open for a sequel, but depending on box office returns which are okay, it may or may not happen. I think it made around 328$ million on a 165$ million budget. So we’ll see.
Theres very little that this movie does differently than the original film, even down to some of the musical queues. Is that a bad thing? no this movie played it really safe, but I think to me that hurt it a bit. You had all these new actors come in, and you had actors that came back to reprise their roles. But with a bad and inconsistent script, theres only so much that this film can do.
For what it was, I had some fun with it, it doesn’t hold a candle to the original at all, but I wouldn’t call this movie great, its just okay.
Are you in the mood for a really dumb invasion disaster movie? maybe this is for you. Have you been interested in seeing it because you’ve seen the original? if you have the means to check it out, go for it.
Theres enough fun in this movie to warrant my final score. Could it have been better? absolutely, could it have been worse? well yes it could have.
This is no hollywood movie, this is a B movie…
Independence Day 2: Resurgence a 2/5.
Until Next Time!
-Andrew
**NOTE**
I should kind of talk about how I review films,
5 – means I loved it, There may be issues but it is a wonderful film that should be watch
4- means I thought it was great, theres more issues that ware down the film a bit, but its still worth watching, the issues aren’t glaring enough to prohibited enjoyment
3- Means I thought it was good, Issues galore, story could be plot hole filled. but it was still alright. This is my average, so if you’re wanting to watch it and you’re reading my review, this is the tipping point, it means watch it, but approach with caution.
2- Means I thought it was meh – Issues, Plot Holes, Characters, Action, Story – could all be really weak, theres some elements that are good, but the bad outweighs the good.
1 – Means I thought it was bad – Its just a bad film, and for me to ever give a film a 1/5 I would have really hated it. I enjoy all films, even bad ones, but if it gets a 1, AVOID IT LIKE THE PLAGUE.