As far as the McWeeny house is concerned, the decision-making process regarding Independence Day: Resurgence is over. Toshi let me know in no uncertain terms that we will be seeing the film and that he is very, very excited about it. He”s a fan of the original, which I”m not even sure when he saw. That”s how little fondness I have for the 1996 Roland Emmerich film, but the sequel”s coming, and at this point, I am on notice, evidently.
One of the things that made the first film a global sensation was a truly brilliant marketing campaign. So far, the trailers for the new film strike me as business as usual. If there”s any blockbuster director responsible for the “let”s blow up the world in the trailer” culture that we live in right now, it”s Emmerich, and Independence Day“s trailer was a masterful promise that the film couldn”t really fulfill.
The best move they can make at this point is to lean heavily into the nostalgia. They”ve earned it. The first film was a full twenty years ago, and they haven”t touched it since then. There”s something admirable about that, because I”m sure they could have made at least two films fairly quickly after the first one and squeezed out a fair amount of box-office in the process. Instead, everyone involved went and did different things for two full decades, and they got almost everyone back together. Will Smith, busy making Suicide Squad, is noticeable in his absence, but they got the guy who was the Blockbuster MVP of the ’90s, Jeff Goldblum. Seriously… imagine Jurassic Park without his performance. Impossible, right? Spielberg knew what he was doing by putting Malcolm front and center for The Lost World. By the time the first Independence Day came along, Goldblum was considered as safe a bet for this kind of film as any actor could be.
So it”s weird that Fox didn”t hire him.
Wait, what? I know. I was confused by it, too. But that”s because I thought it was Jeff Goldblum in the original film. That”s why I thought he was the one coming back for the sequel. Today, 20th Century Fox clarified what is actually happening, and I find myself a little dizzy from all of it. You can see their video here…
… and my conversation with Roth Cornet about the event horizon for this particular type of destruction porn is embedded at the top of the story, in case you haven”t seen it yet.
Independence Day: Resurgence is in theaters , 2016.