Roland Emmerich
Independence Day: Resurgence

'Independence Day' was definitely one of those films that marked a generation. I'm not talking about a movie that became a cult classic or that I consider among the masterpieces of cinema history nor of the sci-fi genre alone, but we're talking about a 'blockbuster' that, when it hit theaters in 1996, attracted a lot of viewers and turned out to be one of the biggest box office hits of the nineties.

When it came out, I must have been twelve or thirteen years old, and I believe it was one of the first films I saw at the cinema without being accompanied by my parents and in the company of some friends. I can't deny that at the time I was definitely impressed by the viewing, how could it have been otherwise? I was rightly a kid. But at the same time, I can't deny that over time I have come to consider it an utterly useless episode in the history of cinema and science fiction, a genre of which I am notably a big fan.

Roland Emmerich's film is a typical entertainment product, full of naivety, trying to combine spectacular scenes with a kind of "let's all get along" sentimentality and the kind of irony that's a must in a film of this type, which found its strength in the protagonist Will Smith, fresh from 'Men In Black', and during those years, anything he did turned into a guaranteed success. But 'Independence Day' was much more than this. The film featured a President of the United States of America actively participating in the war against the invading alien forces, a figure of a positive hero in stark contrast to what was then the American public opinion, disappointed by Bill Clinton in the wake of the Sexgate events.

It was undeniably an event and the most acclaimed science fiction film of that decade. When 'Mars Attacks!' came out right after, it was wrongly believed that the film, so full of irony and aimed at demystifying the classics of the sci-fi genre, wanted to be a parody of 'Independence Day,' a hypothesis that Tim Burton himself sought to deny. However, as far as I'm concerned, I must say that even today, I often confuse the two films, which in the end, in my opinion, are more or less practically identical. Although I know such a consideration might not be well-received by fans of the Californian director. And similarly by those enthusiasts and fanatics of Emmerich's film. If there are any.

It seems, however, that this sequel had been in the works for at least fifteen years, but due to various vicissitudes, the project was always postponed until now, when the twentieth anniversary of the original film's release is practically celebrated.

Directed once again by Roland Emmerich, 'Independence Day: Resurgence' is appropriately set exactly twenty years after the alien invasion. The world has radically changed since then. The technologies inherited from the aliens have transformed everyday life and, thanks to the wealth and development that ensued, Earth is experiencing an ideal historic phase of peace and brotherhood in which there are practically no more wars.

Nevertheless, afraid of the possible return of the alien invasion forces, the United Nations has created a space defense program. Besides the usual Area 51, which has been enhanced and serves as the center for all those intervention forces in case of an invasion, a further base has been set up on the Moon. It is right on our satellite that the events of this second film begin in an initial sequence where a spacecraft, piloted by Jake Morrison (Liam Hemsworth, the actor who essentially plays the good and brave hero), risks colliding with one of the base’s structures, and as it was shot, it is perhaps the film's best moment for the suspense it manages to create and for a certain callback to a brilliant and genuinely engaging cinema genre from past years starting from the sixties-seventies and up to episodes like Ron Howard’s 'Apollo 13' or Clint Eastwood’s 'Space Cowboys.'

'Independence Day: Resurgence' reprises practically all the same cast members from the first film. Unfortunately, except for Will Smith, who might have been the only one to add a bit of zest to a movie that, even while retracing the storyline and events of the first chapter, is doomed to failure and where the first was, however, well-received by the critics at the time.

The events are practically the same. The aliens, before being defeated, managed to send a distress signal, and Earth is attacked once again after twenty years by the same invasion forces, this time more numerous than before. In a series of usual mishaps and brilliant solutions by the usual David Levinson (Jeff Goldblum - what a shame to see an actor who I think could have had a much bigger career given his undeniable talent looking so dim), the quirky scientist Brakish Okun (Brent Spiner), and on the military level by the duo formed by the aforementioned Jake Morrison and his friend-rival Dylan Dubrow-Hiller (Jessie Usher), who would be the son of the character portrayed by Will Smith in the first film, 'Resurgence' concludes with a battle against what could be defined as the alien mother, a sort of giant reminiscent of a sci-fi even more naive than the blockbuster made in the USA, referencing the imagination of the various Godzilla and Japanese robot monsters.

It is really difficult to find something to save within this film. Indeed, even the heroic and symbolic figure of the U.S. President ready to risk his own life to save the planet is missing. There's Bill Pullman again, in the role of the retired president Thomas J. Whitmore, and he will once again put himself to the test to finish what he himself had started, but we are far from the charismatic level of what it was twenty years ago. Time, evidently, passes for everyone, even for the characters of science fiction films. There is little to do about it. And to think that in my opinion, there will still be another sequel to this film because it seems, following the appearance of a new species (a matter not at all explored within the film) which would be aligned with Earth, it really seems that our planet is destined to be at the center of a kind of intergalactic dispute, the contents of which are still all to be unveiled.

A hypothetical third episode, in which evidently our planet is supposed to be decisive for resolving the conflict and where perhaps the director will once again have that sort of feel-good sentiment, typically 'Independence Day', which we find today unchanged twenty years later and during which practically everything would have happened in the world. From the dissolution of what we can now define as the ex-Yugoslavia, to the events of September 11, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the economic crisis, and all that happened in Europe and North Africa, and the Middle East, up to the most recent events, from the failed coup attempt in Turkey and the undoubtedly more burdensome issue of ISIS, which just last week tragically struck again in France in the city of Nice. A positive message from Emmerich, at least in intent, which instead translates into a kind of childish naivety and doesn’t even allow dreaming in a tired film and because in practice, like everything proposed in 'Resurgence', it turns out to be sterile and devoid of any meaningful message.

Considering a film like this in any manner 'credible' is truly difficult. Even more so than the possible alien invasion, who knows, after all, for a change, could already be among us.