INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE

20th Century Fox

Rated PG-13

Running time: 120 minutes

Click below to watch a movie trailer of Independence Day: Resurgence on YouTube.




In Twentieth Century Fox's Independence Day: Resurgence, it has been 20 years since the war of 1996, but a distress signal had been sent out - and the aliens are coming back.

In the sequel to Independence Day, Produced, Written, and Directed by Roland Emmerich and based on Characters created by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich, it has been 20 years since the alien war of 1996. Humanity has combined their technology with the alien's technology to help improve the defense of Earth - but the aliens have responded to a distress signal from a mothership from the previous war, and have returned to Earth in greater numbers.

While the first movie seemed more of a contemporary movie - Independence Day: Resurgence, the first movie sequel as of 2016 to be released twenty years after the original movie, is set in the present day but seems more of a science fiction film than the first one with all of the alien technology involved as well as having a huge base on the moon. However, Resurgence seemed less silly to me then the original Independence Day. Aside from one character that eventually became comic relief, the main silliness to me was what looks like an unintentional pokemon referance. The film also reminds me of the movie Starship Troopers.

This movie is a combination of old, as well as a new generation of heroes Maika Monroe, Jessie T. Usher, Liam Hemsworth, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Angelababy, and Sela Ward as these characters work together as an international generation of heroes in order to fight off an even bigger alien invasion on Independence Day. While the movie seemed bigger, there did not seem to me to have as many powerful dramatic scenes in this movie as the first movie had. For political reasons there were certain landmarks that were not depicted destroyed during the movie.

Some of the background of the movie might be a little confusing. A lot of the background is explained in the prequel novel Independence Day: Crucible, which is like required reading if you want to understand what happened in between the two movies, as well as understand the references that Resurgence had made.

A lot of the stars from the first movie Jeff Goldblum, Judd Hirsch, Vivica A. Fox, John Storey, and Brent Spiner reprised their roles in this one and were like mentors to the new generation. Will Smith is not in this movie, aside from a couple of pictures, and while there were occasional references to Smith - there was no memorable scene at least to me where they explained what happened to him. That was explained in the book Crucible. Usher as Smith's adopted son in the movie had big shoes to fill as he leads the new generation of fighter pilots against the aliens. Former President Bill Pullman, despite his aging abilities, is still a leader in this movie.

Once again the movie spent a lot of time at Area 51, which in a way ties the movie back to the original Independence Day.  It also explained how Brent Spiner's character returned for this movie. The movie also spends some time at Cheyenne Mountain with President Sela Ward as they lead the attack against the aliens.

There was a cameo with Robert Loggia who reprised his role in this movie, his final film role. The movie was Dedicated to Robert Loggia during the credits.

I love that they created a website for the movie warof1996.com

The movie sets up the sequel Independence Day 3.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Independence Day: Resurgence from YouTube.



Click below to watch the Superbowl TV spot of Independence Day: Resurgence from YouTube.



Rated PG-13 for violence and language. Running time: 120 Minutes.

Pancho
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The Expendables 2

Lionsgate

Rated R

Running time: 103 Minutes



Click below to watch The Expendables 2 trailer.



In Lionsgate's The Expendables 2, Sylvester Stallone and his team of mercenary Expendables are sent on a secret mission by CIA operative Bruce Willis to recover the contents of a safe - which holds the key to an abandoned Cold War Soviet Union mine of five tons of weapons grade plutonium.

This is a fun action-packed sequel to the 2010 first movie of The Expendables. The Expendables 2 includes an ensemble of 1980's action stars as well as current action stars which makes for an incredible cast. The Expendables 2 is directed by Simon West and co-written by Stallone and by Richard Wenk, with whom I used to work with. I did not know Richard wrote the movie until I saw the credits on IMDB. However, when watching the movie, I can recognize jokes that are obviously Richard's.

This group of action stars - both old and new - which includes names like Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Chuck Norris, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Terry Crews, and Randy Couture look to be having fun on this movie, including newcomers Liam Hemsworth as the next generation Expendable, and Yu Nan (or Nan Yu, I have seen two different postings of her name. Yu Nan is posted on the official website) as a Chinese agent sent by Willis to join their team. It was great that Lundgren's history of chemical engineering was written into his character, making Lundgren perhaps the smartest character of the Expendables. I liked the fact that they played up on Norris's urban legend facts in the movie, as well as playing up Schwarzenegger's character as Stallone's action rival. Charisma Carpenter of Buffy the Vampire Slayer reprises her role as Statham's girlfriend.

Jean-Claude Van Damme was great as the villain. Van Damme is even credited in the movie as Vilain. The final face off battle between Stallone and Van Damme is a great hand to hand battle, worthy to see between the two action stars. Although since they were both basically wearing the same clothes, it was hard to tell the two of them apart when they were battling in silhouette despite their different tattoos and logos. Director West captures the essences of all the other 1980's action films that made these action stars famous.

While I would have liked Van Damme as an Expendable - someone has to be the villain and be strong enough to stand up to the Expendables and Van Damme fits the bill, especially with Van Damme's fighting style. Scott Adkins was sufficiently sadistic as Van Damme's henchman as he executes the various village slave workers. It is a shame that Jet Li left the film early, so you could not really appreciate his character -  although Nan took over the token Asian character aspect of the movie and she does hold her own as an action star, and Statham's knife fighting abilities made up for the missing Li's hand to hand fighting scenes as well as Statham being Stallone's best friend. Liam Hemsworth is not as well known as an action star as his older brother Chris Hemsworth, but Liam made a nice addition as the Expendable's young sniper. I liked that Terry Crews was the cook of the movie, but I do not remember much of Randy Couture, even though he was supposed to be the glue that holds the dysfunctional Expendables together. Watching all the 80's action stars firing off the big guns was a lot of fun. The shootout at the airport reminded me of a video game my nephew was playing with recently.

Having a village full of mothers such as Amanda Ooms defending their children from the Expendables and Van Damme's men was both comedic and heartbreaking and added some humanity to the story. There is a great bit with a Smart Car which is especially funny to me as we have a fleet of Smart Cars at work for promotional appearances for our company and to see a Smart Car being used in the movie was great.

Rated R for graphic violence. Running time: 103 Minutes.

Click below to watch a Top Five list of Action films to prepare you for The Expendables 2 movie.



Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews