Independence Day: Resurgence - Goldblum Returns June 24th 2016

[JohnC]

It felt lacking. Even though they made things bigger, events didn't feel as big a deal as the original. Didn't feel like as much peril either.

[Andy_Why]

Worth seeing then? For the spectacle alone maybe?

[JohnC]

I thought even the spectacle was somehow lacking compared to the original.

[makkuwata]

It was fine. There were some bizarre choices. Let's maybe not worry about a third as much as we had previously.

[glb]

The important question is what software does Jeff upload to an alien matrix?!

 

This doesn't come out for a couple of weeks due to Ramadan, but guessing IMAX is the way to go for some big, dumb (and very, very loud) fun?

[Monkeyboy]

@Commander Jameson

 

Looks pretty good for an Asylum film!

[Nespresso]

Went to see this yesterday fully expecting it to be schlocky dumb fun. However even if you accept that it still manages to be a bore, cringeworthy and without any charm whatsoever. The whole affair felt like everyone just collecting paychecks and not even the usual charismatic Jeff Goldblum could save this.

 

Spoiler

I don't think any scene lasted longer than 2 minutes with some cuts being especially jarring, the aliens arriving felt like business as usual with not a single fuck given by anyone, people teleporting all over the place and even for a film like this the ending didn't make any sense whatsoever. The aliens left because their leader was killed even though they were only 1 inch away from sucking up the Earth's core? Wat. Also some of the acting by the president's daughter and Will Smith's son was absolutely terrible. My god.

 

The only interesting thing I thought was the introduction of a third faction which were a highly advanced race who long since went full Matrix and fought the bad aliens for millennia. Cool.

 

If you're still really desperate for a cheesy Hollywood sci-fi flick... just go with the original. Even though it has its fair share of problems it's still much more fun and engaging than this pile of shit. This felt like I was watching an Asylum film at times.

 

25/100 (awful)

[Harsin]

I watched Red Letter Media's Re:Review of the original. It's so nice that at least some people agree with me that it was always terrible. I remember walking out of the cinema and my entire group was enthusing about how amazing it was, as was pretty much everyone else walking out. I felt like I'd watched the film with the sunglasses from They Live on and was the only one who realised the terrible truth.

[Djx]

On 24/06/2016 at 5:49 AM, glb said:

...guessing IMAX is the way to go for some big, dumb (and very, very loud) fun?

Yep. Saw this today in IMAX 3D. Enjoyed it way more then I thought I would.

 

The giant white orb in this is so Destiny-esqe I thought it was product placement for the game.

Really want to see what they would come up with for a sequel to this.

 

 

 

[DirkCrisis]

Just back from an IMAX showing and ... with the exception of William Fichter and those who were in the original, they forgot to put actors in this one. I honestly don't think you'd miss anything by waiting for a home release. It's not offensively bad, just not very good. As @X_2_0 said on the way out - "At least it isn't Highlander 2".

 

[thesnwmn]

I thought it was pretty dire. Boring and lacking any real feeling of threat. At each point I felt I knew where it was going and was frustrated by having to watch it happen.

 

But still... not the worst Independence Day I've experienced this week I suppose.

[PopeSmokesDope]

The most depressing thing about this film is that I was sat at work chatting to a work colleague, and we were chatting about the film, I told him I remembered Taking some girl out on a date to this at the cinema and getting pretty wasted after the screening in the bar.... to which he replied "I was 1 when the first film came out..."

[mdn2]

It's...not great. I found the whole thing pretty lifeless and apart from Jeff Goldblum, the characters were terrible.

Spoiler

What was the point of Jeff Goldblums dad in the film? He ran away from the aliens in his boat, got found by some kids and drove a schoolbus through the desert. That was it.

 

[Mr Cochese]

On 25 June 2016 at 0:20 PM, Harsin said:

I watched Red Letter Media's Re:Review of the original. It's so nice that at least some people agree with me that it was always terrible. I remember walking out of the cinema and my entire group was enthusing about how amazing it was, as was pretty much everyone else walking out. I felt like I'd watched the film with the sunglasses from They Live on and was the only one who realised the terrible truth.

Conversely, I loved Independence Day, and watched it at the cinema three times. I've long suspected that the scientists gave you all of the perfect soldier genes, and me the opposite.

[strider]

Even my wife hated this and she has terrible fucking taste when it comes to movies.

[strider]

Oh and also

 

Make them PAY!

That was fucking terrible.

[Steve McQueef]

News just in: Roland Emmerich made a shit film. 

[Mr Cochese]

I genuinely can't tell whether they intentionally went for a Commando-esque farce or not, but this definitely has strong potential for entry in the so-bad-it's-gone canon.

 

From the off, the tone is completely shifted from the first film's general disaster film gravity to the cartoon triumphalism of its ending. So why skyscrapers do start falling from the sky, it's purely as a background to the heroes mucking about in a spaceship, so you never really feel any great sense of peril. That's not a bad thing per se - you can see why they'd go for a lighter, more Marvel-like tone for the shamelessly telegraphed series of sci-fi adventures they obviously hoped to follow this with.

 

It's just all a bit like the aliens in the first film already blew up all of humanity's braincells but one, and then this film drops a mountain on that braincell.

 

(One redeeming feature though is an averted ex-machina ending, so well done for that, Hollywood).

[Girth Certificate]

did they blow up a load of cool minatures again or is it all CGI?

[mdn2]

As far as I could tell, it was CGI. And not great CGI in places either.

[mushashi]

Well with that amount of different VFX houses working on it, quality control might be a bit problematic on the best of films. Considering the director, it seems like he's on his usual form.

[mdn2]

It's not doing the business, apparently. It made $41 million in the US this weekend. The original took $50 million on its opening weekend 20 years ago.

[Mr Cochese]

Yeah, it's stillborn at the box office. I don't regret watching it at all though. It's no more dumb and opportunist a cash-in than Jurassic World.

[Harsin]

Whoever decided to greenlight a trilogy of new Emmerich Stargate films off the strength of this is getting a bit sweaty right around now I'd imagine.

[Despin]

I'm a fan of the first movie, but I can't fathom how this new one could have been any worse.

 

You can see the dna of what, at one point, may have been a coherent movie here... But it's just lost amongst the mess of what made it to the screen.

 

Anyone else think it would have made more sense to have Will Smith's characters son be the young lead of this movie? The Young guy trying to live up to the greatness of his old man (who is now commander of the moon defence force) He's be a MAVERIC type, shit hot pilot struggling to live up to his father's legacy  and constantly getting into trouble, forced to do grunt work despite being an ace pilot. But then his old man dies in the opening attack, and this forces him to step up and be the hero.

 

Even the romance between him and the presidents daughter would make more sense than what they ended up with.

 

In fact I am convinced this was the original plot to the movie. There's no other reason for all the random characters. I'm betting that but due to not being able to cast a bankable black actor they butchered the role and split him into three. They added the pointless chinese girl and made the moon commander dude her uncle and then invented the character Hemsworth played to be the hotshot pilot role. Leaves the black kid with fuck all to do.

 

It's so bizarre and kind of regressive considering the original movie had a couple of African Americans characters at it's core and made so little of it, that at the end of this movie, the black guy has to stand aside by the new white guy kiss the girl he's known all his life?

 

 

 

 

[JohnC]

I assumed the Chinese girl and other pretty notable Chinese presence through the movie was just the latest in Hollywood getting into China, possibly with Chinese investment in the movie, but I don't know about that.

[Despin]

She certainly felt like an after thought. She served no purpose in the story other than to literally stop it so they could go LOOK! A CHINESE PERSON! You Chinese people will fucking love this. It's weirdly offensive.

[Smitty]

 

[MrPogo]

I think it was kind of a "too many cooks" situation; it was a script written by five people based on a story written by four, and you can tell, cos it translated into an awful lot happening all the time and losing most focus and meaning in the process.

[Commander Jameson]

I saw this today and thought it was very bland indeed. I'm in the camp of liking the first film (a lot!). It's got some great action & destruction scenes, memorable characters (both lead and supporting), funny lines plus that speech in all its cheesy glory, awesome visual FX and a cracking score.

 

This one has got none of that. I can barely remember it even after a few hours. I'd still rather watch the destruct-o-porn from The Day After Tomorrow and even 2012 than the few minutes we got in this.