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https://variety.com/2020/film/news/halle-berry-roland-emmerich-moonfall-1234610787/

The director who brought us such literal disaster movies as the day after tomorrow, godzilla 1998, independence day and it's awful sequel is getting ready to create another disaster, "Moonfall".

The gist is something bad happens and the moon starts falling towards earth. Only a team of heroic self sacrificing astronauts lead by halle berry can save us.



Unless this movie is set at least a thousand years in the future when human technology and probably humanity has changed beyond recognition there is no way we can have any way of stopping the moon from crashing into us is something set it in motion to do so. Since it will no doubt be near future to keep it relatable to the audience there's no way the plot can make any sense. So expect a lot of silly putty science, and dramatic self sacrifice, dramatic action and actors dramatically looking into a camera with dramatic looks on their faces. and of course plenty of DRAMA.

Another big budget scifi action drama that will give anyone with any real scientific education migraines. I hope NDT is already stocking up on aspirin. On the plus side it might make that movie with bruce willis and the asteroid look better in retrospect.

In all fairness to roland emerich, he did one movie i actually didn't think was bad. Moon 44.

Emmerich is the litteral poster child of failing upward in Hollywood.

Having read this, I'm now only surprised that this hasn't already been done...


I didn't mind Day After Tomorrow, and Independence Day is a classic. I'm also a big fan of Armageddon and The Core, for all their absurdity, so cautiously optimistic about this one.

Given that they're going to the moon to stop it, I predict some sort of mechanism for creating a spin to alter the moon's trajectory just enough to skim past and re-enter a stable orbit instead of crashing. No idea if the science would back that idea up, but it's unlikely that the people writing this care overmuch about the science either...

Pfffttt. Everyone knows that the world doesn't end when the moon falls into the earth.

It ends when a runaway planet passes between the moon and the earth. I remember watching a documentary about it as a kid.

If you're interested in this premise, you might want to check out the novel Seveneves.

I mean, it wasn't a good book? But it does explore his premise.

 Lance845 wrote:
Emmerich is the litteral poster child of failing upward in Hollywood.

Nah. He has a poster of JJ Abrams over his bed.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Pfffttt. Everyone knows that the world doesn't end when the moon falls into the earth.

True. It crashes into the ocean and causes the planet to be tidally locked, and crazed scientists build towers for their immortality experiments on the dusk edge. Until a champion comes along, looking for immortality, and unknowningly sacrifices his positive emotions to the process, and out of irritation, activates a machine that flips the planet, so the tower now faces the dawn, representing hope... and a creepy, hollow relationship with his lover and their descendants.

Once you get past the fairly well known and popular characters, Michael Moorcock gets really, really weird.


Emmerich is just boring with his science failures and tedious plots.

"plots".




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To be fair ID4 is a decent enough movie and does in fact have a plot and a bad guy to punch.

But twister? The volcano one? The tidal wave one? The global warming one? There's no plot. You just follow 4-5 characters run from whatever nonsense this one was about.

Twister had a rather good plot - based on actual pseudo-science. Great movie, fight me.

Sure. Just as soon as you can tell me what the actual plot was that isn't "there is a twister. Science people said it would be big. Government people didn't listen. Now it's bigger then they thought. Run science people."

Volcano."there is a volcano. Science people said it would erupt big. Government didn't listen. Now it's bigger then they thought. Run science people."

Etc...

Meh. CGI has rendered Disaster Movies rubbish.

Go back and look at the classics. Earthquake, Towering Inferno, Poseidon Adventure etc. Excellent if cheesy fare (like Nachos!). All done with quite inventive practical effects. But because those effects were inherently limited, we spend more time with the survivor group, seeing them fall apart, come together etc as people respond unexpectedly to mortal peril.

Now? CRASH BOOM SMASSSSSSHHHHH NEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOWWWW! FLASH FLASH FLASH LOOSKATMAHGRAFFIKS!

That’s not to say a modern Disaster Movie is destined to fail, or to suck. Just that when the ability to provide a spectacle replaces the actual plot? Laziness often ensues.

 Lance845 wrote:
Sure. Just as soon as you can tell me what the actual plot was that isn't "there is a twister. Science people said it would be big. Government people didn't listen. Now it's bigger then they thought. Run science people."

Twister was about 2 science teams who fight over who get their "analyse twister machine" working first and therefore ignore government/official warnings and evacuations
at least this is the only "Twister" movie I have seen

 insaniak wrote:

Given that they're going to the moon to stop it, I predict some sort of mechanism for creating a spin to alter the moon's trajectory just enough to skim past and re-enter a stable orbit instead of crashing. No idea if the science would back that idea up, but it's unlikely that the people writing this care overmuch about the science either...

To paraphrase another saying:

"You cannot science your way out a film premise that you didn't science your way into"

In any event where the moon is in imminent danger of crashing into the earth there is feth all we could do to stop it. Not to mention that the moon wouldn't have to physically hit the planet to basically destroy everything thanks to tidal forces. Even if we did manage to make the moon miss us, it will end up in a highly elliptical orbit which will create massive tidal surges every time it is approaching the periapsis of its orbit.

Might as well just get all the biggest bands together and have a massive love in at Woodstock as that has the same chance of solving the problem as any mission to the moon.

 Ouze wrote:
If you're interested in this premise, you might want to check out the novel Seveneves.

I mean, it wasn't a good book? But it does explore his premise.

Squandered potential. Interesting set up that just turned into every other generic sci-fi book.

I enjoyed his early works (a lot) but his later books have sucked hard for a while now.

On consideration, my 'spin' premise does seem a little lame. More likely that they'll borrow a leaf out of Armageddon's playbook. Some previously-underappreciated astrogeologist will no doubt discover that the moon has a giant fault line running right through the middle of it, and if they plant giant nuclear warheads in certain locations they can split the moon in two, forcing the halves to pass on either side of the earth. Obviously, something goes wrong and one of the explosives can't be triggered remotely, so the plucky leader of the expedition tricks everyone else into heading back to Earth while they alone pilot a partially restored Eagle lander at high speed into the precise spot required to crack the moon. Queue celebration montage, and final shot of the Earth with its now dual satellites circling serenely around it...


Can't wait!

 Nevelon wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
If you're interested in this premise, you might want to check out the novel Seveneves.

I mean, it wasn't a good book? But it does explore his premise.

Squandered potential. Interesting set up that just turned into every other generic sci-fi book.

I enjoyed his early works (a lot) but his later books have sucked hard for a while now.

The worst part is that it was 880 pages and it was just interesting enough to string me along for all of them - albeit with a sinking sense of desperation in the last half, the literary equivalent of a sunk cost fallacy.

It could have been amazing if, say, Michael Crichton had written it.


--

I googled what would happen if we had no moon (not if it exploded). Turns out among other things, our days would only be 6-8 hours long and we'd have a thousand days per year. That sounds pretty on the nose for 2020 so far.

 Lance845 wrote:
Sure. Just as soon as you can tell me what the actual plot was that isn't "there is a twister. Science people said it would be big. Government people didn't listen. Now it's bigger then they thought. Run science people."

Volcano."there is a volcano. Science people said it would erupt big. Government didn't listen. Now it's bigger then they thought. Run science people."

Etc...

As mentioned above, it was about tornado chasers trying to analyze actual data from the storm front - unless you're asking about some other tornado movie?

You guys could be right. I honestly cannot remember anything about Twister besides the CGI cow.

Didnt Emmerich make Stargate aswell?
Surely that counts for something.
Also, all his movies are fun watches.

 Lance845 wrote:
You guys could be right. I honestly cannot remember anything about Twister besides the CGI cow.

What not the scene where all the little baubles fly up!
Or the "farming death room" they flee too and then end up looking inside the twister.




Day After Tomorrow was a stretch too far for me, but most of the others I've enjoyed for action/disaster films.



Though I'm a bit concerned. I was always under the impression that the moon didn't fall into the Earth, it gets blown away by a huge nuclear blast! Managing to move at a speed fast enough to hurtle past multiple worlds and yet also having time to explore multiple worlds. SPACE 1999 - which was also, for its time and slot, surprisingly dark in its first season (I think the second got a little lighter in tone if I recall right).

Emmerich's films are...weird to me. They always have a minor agenda to them which is tiresome and they fall into the category of being vaguely amusing. Not bad enough to be a proper B movie, and not actually entertaining enough to be genuinely good.

Independence Day...I'm an outlier in that I hated the original...and loathed the one sequel I tried to watch (the latest one I think)
2012...I watched because I love general disaster movies - just...frustrating.
Day After Tomorrow...see above, I love disasters, and this was also an annoying film.
White House Down...just a worse version of the rather entertaining Olympus has Fallen.
Godzilla remake...generally considered one of the worst films every made. Actually the only movie I have ever walked out of mid-film....and that was in high school!
Star Gate....probably the only decent film, maybe along with The Patriot (which is historically a bit laughable, but we're not exactly swamped with choices when wanting to see muskets fired).
Midway...frustratingly mediocre film.

If film making was like high school, I feel like Emmerich just skates by with a C+ average, and brown nosing teachers...he's never actually done anything of note.

 Elbows wrote:

Independence Day...I'm an outlier in that I hated the original...and loathed the one sequel I tried to watch (the latest one I think)

There's only been one sequel so far.

2012...I watched because I love general disaster movies - just...frustrating.

Yeah, 2012 was a decent enough disaster movie premise, let down by a cast that was thoroughly unlikeable, who make a series of decisions throughout the movie (particularly towards the end) that make them even more unlikeable.

I'm the outlier that I enjoyed Independence day 2 and am really sad I won't get to see that sequel.
Some people can't appreciate fun.

I liked Independence Day 2, also. Well, the world building aspects of it. Well, the world building besides the kaiju-sized alien queen.

As a light hearted, fun nod to Beast from 20,000 Fathoms and It Came from Beneath the Sea, Godzilla 98 succeeds and is very enjoyable. The only mistake was to associate itself with the Toho classic...which...ummm...was a nod to....Beast from 20,000 Fathoms.

Damn. I guess it is true that what goes around, comes around.


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 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I liked Independence Day 2, also. Well, the world building aspects of it. Well, the world building besides the kaiju-sized alien queen.

First movie I saw in 4DX and it was super fun!

Hmm I forgot stargate. That was a good movie I do admit. Still, they ran that series into the ground...

Really? Other than the last couple of seasons of SG1, it was pretty good, it really used to setting to good effect IMO.

 Matt Swain wrote:
Hmm I forgot stargate. That was a good movie I do admit. Still, they ran that series into the ground...

Stargate SG1 was made by a different team of people. And the cast seemed to be having a blast the last couple seasons, so they were still enjoyable. Even SG Atlantis was mostly fun, if not as good as SG1.

Really need to go back and check them out... I've seen bits and pieces of SG1, but none of Atlantis. I did watch the whole run of Universe, which I think could have been good with more focus on the exploring and less on the drama amongst the rather unlikable crew.

Careful, SG1 has aged.....poorly in terms of sensibilities.
Quite a bit of white savior episodes, and talking down to cultures.
Episode 4 is pretty bad, it is essentially the first episode in terms of showing what the series will be about, Planet of the week, and man is it bad.....