Over the past two years or so, there’s been talk of not one but two sequels to Roland Emmerich’s awesome 1996 sci-fi blockbuster, Independence Day, all of which you can catch up on here.

Details about the plot specifics have been kept pretty tightly under wraps, but some interesting details about the project itself have now arisen.

Emmerich spoke to The Lantern this week and it sounds like things are moving forward with the project, and even that we could start to see some concrete traction being made sooner rather than later.

“I’d say hold tight… It’s happening soon.”

Emmerich and his old frequent writing collaborator, Dean Devlin (Independence Day, Godzilla, Stargate), have been working on the scripts and Emmerich is working on rounding up the original cast, which included Will Smith, Bill Pullman, and Jeff Goldblum, all brilliant actors and brilliant in their roles in the first film.

In their report, Collider say that the scripts for both the second and third films in what will become the Independence Day trilogy have been written, but whether or not they’re entirely finished or just semi-fleshed skeletons is unclear in light of Emmerich’s interview earlier this week.

Interestingly, however, they note that Will Smith is asking for somewhere in the range of $50m. to star in both films, which is a pretty high asking price. However, given that the first film made north of $800m., and that was fifteen years ago, unadjusted for inflation, it wouldn’t be too hard a stretch to believe that the two films together would make over a billion dollars between them. And when you consider the plan is to shoot them back-to-back, thus bringing down the budget, Smith’s price tag is probably not an unreasonable percentage of the profits the films will likely go on to make, even if that initial $50m. figure does sound very high.

Though plot details are being kept hush hush, it is thought that despite being filmed back-to-back, the two films will work as standalone films in their own right, linked through a cliffhanger and an overarching plot between them. So whilst the details aren’t especially informative right now, it sounds like the project to bring a second and third film to the big screen is still very much alive.

I love the first film so much, and I’m hoping that if these two do get made, then by the time the third one rolls around, cinemas will offer a six-/seven-hour epic showing of all three films, start-to-finish. Until then, I’ll leave you with this inspirational speech from the first film by Bill Pullman. It’s one of my all-time favourite film speeches that just raises the hairs down my spine no matter how many times I hear it.

“We will not go quietly into the night. We will not vanish without a fight. We’re going to live on. We’re going to survive. Today, we celebrate our Independence Day.”

Cue ridiculously incredible triumphant film score. Enjoy. Be inspired.

Next Friday 11th March sees the release of Sony’s new epic alien invasion movie, Battle: Los Angeles. If you’re not sure after seeing all the coverage that we’ve put up so far if this movie is for you, hopefully this infographic will help you decide.

As the infographic suggests, the movie appears to have similar themes to some great movies including; Cloverfield, Saving Private Ryan, Independence Day, District 9, Aliens and Jerry Bruckheimer / Ridley Scott movie, Black Hawk Down.

Battle: Los Angeles is a movie we can’t wait to see and we know many of you out there are looking forward to it also.

Battle: Los Angeles stars Michelle Rodriguez, Aaron Eckhart, Bridget Moynahan, Cory Hardrict, Lucas Till, Michael Peña and Ne-Yo.

Synopsis: When unknown forces put the City of Angels under attack, it’s up to a Marine staff sergeant (Aaron Eckhart) and his new platoon to come to the rescue.  As the invasion hits the streets of L.A., the Marines become our first and last line of defense against a highly powerful enemy.

Love this infographic, click it to enlarge.

Looks like the Torchwood team are calling on the services of a US President who once saved the world from potential genocide due to a powerful alien threat.

Deadline are reporting that Independence Day star Bill Pullman is joining the cast of the Dr. Who spin-off in the reoccurring role of one Oswald Jones, a clever convicted murderer who escapes his lifelong prison sentence on a technicality and quickly becomes a media sensation.

Pullman’s output has been relatively small in recent years (compared to his heyday in the 90’s) but he does seem like a sizable star for a modestly-budgeted show like Torchwood.

A co-production deal between the BBC and US company Starz would explain how he managed to get cast (alongside big(ish) name Mekhi Phifer) in the fourth season of this sci-fi adventure series

Rumours have been circulating of a sequel to Independence Day for as long as I can remember. I recall talk of a sequel for the new millennium, tentatively titled “ID2000″, which obviously never materialised.

Director Roland Emmerich, who since ID4 has continued to find new and exciting ways to destroy the planet (The Day After Tomorrow, 2012) spoke with MTV back in February, but it is only now that what he said has been released. Our friends at AICN describe his comments as follows:-

“It’s an alternate reality kind of movie,” he said. “We pick up the story, what would have happened after this kind of attack? Naturally, the alien technology has changed everything.”

Did they rebuild the White House? Who will be president?

“Or, who will be president?” Emmerich answered. “Who will be president? See?”

He’d just dropped us a none-too-subtle clue with that drawn out “will,” and the implication was clear: Will Smith, the fighter jet-flying hero of the 1996 film, at some point became commander-in-chief after the attacks. Whether he remains Mr. President during the course of the sequels or is eventually elected during the new films is an open question.

Another element of the idea for a sequel is that we Earthlings have incorporated all sorts of left-behind alien technology into our own military hardware, making us a much more difficult prospect for the alien invaders second time around.

Obviously, this remains filed under “wild speculation” for the time being, but it is intriguing to know that Emmerich has ideas in mind. What do you think? Fancy another crack at the slimy, tentacled invaders, or have we had enough? As always, comment below.

Sam Raimi appears to be playing a guessing game with his plans to bring the game World of Warcraft to the big screen, but until then, it looks like he’ll also been involved (albeit in a producing capacity) with another large scale fantasy epic.

Vulture are reporting that the Evil Dead creator has teamed up with District 9 producer Bill Block, and they are currently in talks with Warner Bros to produce a new movie called EDF (which stands for Earth Defence Force),  based on a script from Air Force One and (ahem) Hollow Man scribe Andrew Marlowe.

It’s a sci-fi tale concerning the Earth’s response to an imminent alien invasion. Vulture have even had their hands on the script which they enthusiastically describe as “Top Gun with Independence Day and add a pinch of The Last Starfighter”. Wonder if Raimi and co are using that fail proof premise in their pitch to the studio?

No director is attached as yet, but we’ll keep you posted on any further development we hear of.

I’m going through a phase of looking for silly videos on YouTube at the moment. We’ve had the 100 movie insults post, the 100 cheesiest movie quotes and now ’40 Inspirational Speeches in 2 Minutes’!

The guy who made it: Matthew Belinkie has transcribed it too which you can see below but before you watch, can you name each film the quote is from?

This has me laughing out loud and I hope this lunchtime it will have the same effect on you! Enjoy!

Transcription: Shame on you. This could be the greatest night of our lives, but you’re going to let it be the worst. And I guarantee a week won’t go by in your life you won’t regret walking out, letting them get the best of you. Well, I’m not going home. We’ve come too far! And I’m going to stay right here and fight for this lost cause. A day may come when the courage of men fails… but it is not THIS day. The line must be drawn HERE. This far, no further! I’m not saying it’s going to be easy. You’re going to work harder than you ever worked before. But that’s fine, we’ll just get tougher with it! If a person grits his teeth and shows real determination, failure is not an option. That’s how winning is done! Believe me when I say we can break this army here, and win just one for the Gipper. But I say to you what every warrior has known since the beginning of time: you’ve got to get mad. I mean plum mad dog mean. If you would be free men, then you must fight to fulfill that promise! Let us cut out their living guts one inch at a time, and they will know what we can do! Let no man forget how menacing we are. We are lions! You’re like a big bear, man! This is YOUR time! Seize the day, never surrender, victory or death… that’s the Chicago Way! Who’s with me? Clap! Clap! Don’t let Tink die! Clap! Alright! Let’s fly! And gentlemen in England now abed shall know my name is the Lord when I tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they’ll never take our Independence Day!

In November last year we wrote up the story that Destroyer of Worlds Roland Emmerich was talking up two sequels to his 1996 alien face off movie Independence Day.

Now the good guys at IESB are reporting the rumour that Will Smith has signed on to star in the two films, and that the two films could shoot back to back as early as 2011.

Getting Smith back on board would guarantee that Fox would greenlight ID4 Parts 2 and 3, and in the fifteen or so years since the original film the CGI technology has improved so much that we are certain to see a whole lot more of Emmerich’s epic destruction as shown in 2012.

There will surely be alien homeworlds, and enormous motherships descending once again, and I’d personally like to see Emmerich return to the scarred world of ID4 fifteen years after, and give us a proper post-apocalyptic tale (with plucky dogs).

I enjoyed Emmerich’s recent 2012 for all its CG bombast and silliness, and the news last night that Godzilla is about to roar back onto our screens now seems the perfect time for Emmerich and Dean Devlin to return to the film which made their names.

What do you think? Are you keen to see another Independence Day?

What is it about total carnage that sends people to the theater in droves?  I’m totally guilty of this as well, but I’m wondering what exactly it is about disaster movies that make them so awesome (and by “awesome” I mean, totally cheesy, silly fun).

Disaster movies while not high quality, will normally have really good visual effects.  At least I hope they do, because let’s face it, the visuals are normally the one great thing they have going for them.  I don’t mean to harp on all disaster movies, but if I’m being honest, a lot of them are mainly eye candy.

I use the term “Disaster Movie” pretty loosely.  I may mention a movie that isn’t so much a “disaster”, but does have a fair amount of destruction to the world. There are different genres if you will.  The outside influence disasters (i.e. Aliens, asteroids, etc.), the natural disasters (tornadoes, effects of global warming, volcanoes etc.), and we can’t forget the Mayan prophecy disasters.

Take Independence Day for example.  This falls under the “Outside Influence” category.  Mainly it was about the human race trying to survive an invasion of aliens who want to harvest our planet for it’s natural resources.  Along the way they blow up good portions of Mother Earth.  They blew up the White House.  THE WHITE HOUSE!  This is neither a visual I have; nor think is actually going to happen.  You don’t blow up the White House.  You just don’t.  But seeing it in a movie, that’s different.  The aliens also blew up Manhattan. And Los Angeles.  Of course the human race prevails but now there is a worldwide mess to clean up.  On the plus side, the clean up will create jobs, and that’s always a good thing.

Armageddon and Deep Impact handled the meteor/asteroid category.  I’ve seen Armageddon loads of time but have only seen Deep Impact once.  While Armageddon left me amped and excited and spun up, Deep Impact left me morose.  I’m sure the ending had something to do with that.  In Armageddon, we saw the destruction of Paris and the South Pacific.  The shot of Paris after the asteroid hit, was a bit of bummer.  Nothing like having a HUGE crater where Paris used to be.  From what I remember, the real destruction in Deep Impact came at the very end with the huge wave.  I don’t remember seeing much damage through out the rest of the film.  If I’m missing something, let me know.

The “natural disasters” category is pretty much shored up with Twister, Volcano and The Day After Tomorrow.

While there aren’t really any major landmarks in Twister, the scene that takes place at the drive-in alone makes it worthy.  What’s great about Twister (yes, believe it or not, there is something great about it) is if you watch it at home with a good surround sound system, you can hear the dialogue from the drive in movie.  If you remember the film playing at the drive in is The Shining.  Right before the twister hits, it’s at the part where Danny encounters the twins.  You can hear the twins dialogue.  Creepy.  The other great thing is that the tornadoes were so….menacing.  It seemed they were gunning for the chasers. I like it when my natural disasters have personality.

With Volcano, the coast is toast.  Well that’s what they promised anyway.  Really, it’s just parts of L.A. that get fried.  Volcano is by and large one of the most ridiculous disaster movies out there.  The dialogue is bad, the acting isn’t great, but for some reason, I feel the need to watch a least a little bit of it when it’s on.  At least to hear Anne Heche scream “LAVA BOMBS!”. Is there a line of dialogue that is more saturated with cheese than that?  I think not.

And then there is The Day After Tomorrow.  This is not to be confused with The Day After (the nuclear war/fallout movie that scared the crap out of every kid back in 1983 when it aired on TV).  The Day After Tomorrow just shows destruction everywhere.  The scene that got me was when the wave came crashing over the Statue of Liberty.  Now, I’ve never seen Lady Liberty in person, but I’ve heard she’s pretty tall, and the thought of a wave that big, creeps me out.  Not to mention absolutely annihilating the iconic Capitol Records building in L.A. Poor L.A.  Seems disaster movies have it out for sunny Southern California.  I actually really enjoyed TDAT.  What I didn’t like is that it left me feeling cold.  Literally, not figuratively.  I need to take a jacket when I see “icy” movies. BRRRR!

As far as the Mayan prophecy disaster movie, we all know it’s 2012.  I haven’t seen this one yet unfortunately.  I will have to wait for Blu-Ray since it’s already come and gone from the theaters here.  But just what I saw in the previews is enough to make me want to see it.  From what I could tell, this movie takes out Las Vegas, the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio, and the White House.  Again with the White House.  This time it gets taken out by a wave and an air craft carrier….the USS John F. Kennedy no less.  I guess if you’re going to obliterate the same landmark in different films you have to do it different ways.  Can’t let destruction get stale and boring.

I realize that 3 of the films here are all done by Roland Emmerich.  Man sure does like his destruction.  But he does it with flare, and that’s what’s important.  If you’re going to decimate, do it with style.

Discuss: what is your favorite destruction scene?  Is there something you’d like to see that hasn’t been done yet?  Let us know!

Fresh from destroying the world in 2012 it seems Roland Emmerich can’t keep away from finding new ways to put the world in peril.

Almost exactly a month ago we reported on Emmerich’s desire to make a sequel to his 1996 Earth vs. Aliens epic Independence Day, a film that was all about the boom and didn’t suffer from an appalling Bill Pullman presidential rallying cry or that bit with the dog – you know what I mean.

Now MTV movies blog have caught up with Emmerich and a few more details have emerged about The Day After Independence Day (a sure title, right?), chiefly the news that the director is planning two sequels based years after the aliens were defeated with a Mac and a Nuclear weapon.

Click here to read the article and marvel at Emmerich’s determination to find new and exciting ways to kill us all.

Two more Independence Day films? If it turns out that the Mayans were right maybe 2012 won’t be so bad after all…

Some crazy news coming to us from Latinoreview.com that there just might be a sequel to the mega blockbuster Independence Day.

The guys at Latino Review have an interview with Roland Emmerich highlighting the possibilities of a sequel and Emmerich is quoted as saying there is a story and a script that they have taken to FOX and Will Smith is in but FOX are stalling as they can’t work out a deal to incorporate all the big names of Smith, Dean Devlin and Emmerich.

Interesting news then as the original was the film released way back in 1996 that i remember being one of the biggest Summer films of all time and the biggest, most jaw dropping special FX i had ever seen, shame the films second half was pants when it stepped away from something that could have been very very dark.

With the likely success of 2012 about to hit our cinemas and with Emmerich likely to want to destroy Earth in another FX ridden way I’m sure FOX will start opening it’s cheque book soon and writing a blank one to get a sequel on the move.

So a sequel without Will Smith? could it be done? i personally think they should go without Will Smith as there isn’t anything they could add to the story of the original as everything is destroyed and there wouldn’t be anything cool for the aliens to blow up second time round! unless they wanted to go to the aliens home planet to get revenge but we were millions of years behind in technology so we would be destroyed with ease.

What do you guys think? will it happen or is this just another wish list film?