Roland Emmerich makes movies that demand to be seen on the big screen. Not just a big screen. The biggest screen possible. From the monumental explosions of Independence Day (pun intended) to the planet-rattling chaos of 2012 and The Day After Tomorrow, Emmerich specializes in sequences that fill every inch of the screen with practical and digital madness. Which is exactly why Jeff Goldblum plans to see his latest collaboration with Emmerich -- Independence Day: Resurgence -- in a theater, with a paying crowd, to appreciate how they react to the insanity.
Late last year, I was lucky enough to travel to New Mexico and watch Emmerich at work on the set of Independence Day: Resurgence. It looked like a massive undertaking, and I peppered the cast with questions about the process of working on such an epic blockbuster. Jeff Goldblum, over the course of one of his answers, talked about the joy of seeing one of Emmerich's movies with a crowd, and told me the following reason why he plans to sneak in while the movie's playing and enjoy it with a public audience:
You've asked the right person... because I do like to watch movies. ... I'm thinking of several scenes. It's a spectacular... once again, you can imagine, there's much spectacle. I will tell you this. There's more spectacle than I have seen in any... I think it moves the ball, it raises the bar, whatever metaphor I'm stupidly trying to think of, ahead. So it's going to be something that, even though you think you have seen everything before, you'll go, 'I never... That's bigger, and more than I thought!' So some of that. And I'll enjoy that. And like the last one, it's got some heart, I believe. Roland Emmerich is a person of soulful wisdom and humanity. Once again, he's very interested and passionate about creating characters that, for him, tell a story of loveliness and love, of comradeship and some very touching and sweet and funny things. He's got a very keen sense of humor. So I'm hoping that those moments will be delightful in those ways. And I can imagine, you know, watching it with the audience!
If you can believe it, during that last bit of his answer, Jeff Goldblum actually pantomimed himself eating popcorn, surrounded by an audience as they enjoyed Independence Day: Resurgence together. This is only part of his incredible explanation of the joy of working with Roland Emmerich, so you really have to watch the above clip to get the Full Goldblum, as I now like to call it.
Roland Emmerich's Independence Day: Resurgence takes place 20 years after the original film. Humanity is using alien tech acquired from our original encounter with the intergalactic species to bolster our planet's defense systems. Only, the aliens are back... and they are better prepared. Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Vivica A. Fox, Judd Hirsch and Brent Spiner reprise their original roles in the sequel, joining newcomers Liam Hemsworth, Maika Monroe, Joey King, Sela Ward, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Jessie T. Usher. The movie will be in theaters on June 24. And if you go on opening weekend, look around. You might be sitting next to a wide-eyed Jeff Goldblum. Tell him we said hello.
