Independence Day: Resurgence

1996’s Independence Day endures in the pop culture consciousness because everything about it was huge: the spaceships, the explosions, the spectacle, the special effects (the perfect moment in time where old-fashioned model-making met the dawn of CGI), and the personalities. Also, it’s just a complete blast, as fun today as it was 20 years ago (and for me personally, as enjoyable in adulthood as childhood).

How do you top something so big, and really, can it be topped? Independence Day: Resurgence doesn’t hold the answer to either question, not only falling far short of the first film’s legacy, but barely looking like the filmmakers even tried to live up to it. Unless, of course, they’re saving their better ideas for later; in spite of depicting a world where the last 20 years went very differently, one thing the movie couldn’t shake from our world is the blockbuster trend of always setting up for a potential franchise. 

Resurgence catches up with the world two decades after the invasion in the first film. All nations are united in peace. Using leftover alien technology, the planet’s militaries collaborated to create the interplanetary Earth Space Defense in case the invaders should return. What little good it does, because once the baddies show up, the ESD is overwhelmed, much of Earth is devastated, and humanity is once again pushed to the brink.

And it all seems so small. Despite an alien ship bigger than any we saw last time, the destruction-as-spectacle that’s director Roland Emmerich’s specialty feels uncharacteristically insubstantial. Only a single short sequence, in which a futuristic London is toppled by several continents’ worth of landmarks falling from the sky, is memorably impressive. The rest of the brick-and-mortar carnage and the aerial dogfights that follow aren’t exactly inadequate, but all seem rather contained and claustrophobic, something that can rarely be said of Emmerich’s work, good or bad.

That’s not the only failure where its predecessor succeeded. The underlying message of global brotherhood, already a tad cheesy in the first film (not to be unpatriotic, but no, President Bill Pullman’s famous speech is not up there in the American oratory canon), is so forced here. So is the characterization. Whereas the original placed the main characters in simple family units and left them to interact like normal, those in Resurgence lack any natural chemistry even in the easiest, most familiar of roles. Where main character deaths before aroused a sense of tragedy or heroic sacrifice, players new and old are expended without the slightest wisp of feeling, even in another major sacrifice scene (one wonders if the presence of Will Smith would have registered at all had he been included). Comic relief courtesy of Jeff Goldblum, Judd Hirsch, and Brent Spiner somewhat works, but also feels tacked-on instead of organic and spontaneous. And whereas simplicity worked best (“the aliens want to kill us and take our planet” was enough), the picture adds unnecessary and fairly ridiculous rules and hints of a greater mythology, blatantly planting seeds for multiple sequels.

The dogfights are passable, at least. Even though they’re decidedly less than his best work, it cannot be said that Emmerich doesn’t know how to direct an action sequence. That much makes Resurgence an average enough two hours indoors avoiding the hot summer weather. Then again, with Fourth of July weekend almost upon us, that time might be better spent catching the classic original on TV.