Moonfall (2022) Review: A Disaster of a Disaster Movie

Roland Emmerich has been in hot water for the past week for comments he made on about how Star Wars and Superhero movies are “ruining” cinema. While this isn’t the first controversial take he’s had on blockbuster cinema (he once claimed that Man of Steel ripped off the first Independence Day*), I honestly wish he had kept his mouth shut about that or at least waited until the dust settle on his latest film releases before making those claims. Because of that, the most recent discourse surrounding him is about how right or wrong he was on today’s big movies when it SHOULD be on what an absolute piece of dreck that his newest film is. While I don’t want to be a guy to claim if a director has the authority to criticize big budget movies, but if you do, at the very least, back up your points with a better film than Moonfall.

To be honest, if it wasn’t for the fact that it says directed by Roland Emmerich at the end of the credits, you would be hard press to even believe that Emmerich directed this movie at all. Moonfall is not only a parody of disaster movies but it’s a parody of Ronald Emmerich himself, and not even in a meta/self-aware way. It’s not bad because it’s a mindless disaster movie, it’s bad because it’s BAD at being a mindless disaster movie.

Emmerich’s movie in the past, regardless of their quality, at least was aware of it’s own endgame and knew the identity that it had. The original Independence Day was able to carry itself as a classic thanks to providing action spectacle that hadn’t been done before and actors that were fully committed to their roles that you could (somewhat) buy into the drama and chuckle at the jokes throughout. Moonfall is so aimless that it can’t seem to figure what it’s own endgame and identity is. It’s a movie that intends to not be taken seriously but it doesn’t really have a sense of humor about itself. It wants to have one-note cardboard cutout characters with stereotypical personality and traits but still attempts to add unnecessary family drama into the mix as if it was actually trying to had depth to begin it. It wants to show some turn-your-brain off action but will also take time out to have characters deliver painfully overlong scenes of expositions that even the actors themselves can’t make believable when delivering it. No spoilers, but this movie has one of the longest and most tedious scene of exposition in recent memory. So much so that not even Jonathan Majors could make it seem entertaining.

This aimless level of thinking also goes right into the plot of the movie itself which tries to add multiple messages/subtext and can’t even be bothered to decide which one it’s actually interested in exploring. It wants to be a movie about what happens behind the scenes of N.A.S.A. and when the government tries to cover up something big from the world….until it doesn’t. It wants to be a movie about if the moon is fake or not and how it might lead to the destruction of Earth….until it doesn’t. And then it tacks on a very anti-Artificial Intelligence message by the end and claims that was the sole purpose of the movie despite barely being touched upon throughout the course of the movie. Not even Tomorrowland has this tacked on of a message at the end that just comes out of no where.

All of this could be forgiven if at the very least it would provide some breathtaking action scenes and visuals but it can’t even do that right. The action, while occasionally flirting with some cool ideas, is generic and poorly shot. The visuals while nice in their own right, are nothing special and can’t even bother to make the moon falling look as jaw dropping or as high staked as it should be. Even as a mindless action flick, this movie stumbles.

Moonfall can’t seem to grasp what kind of the movie that it wants to be. If it’s not boring you with it’s constant sci-fi exposition (which a lot of it is total bs btw), it’s making you cringe with dialogue that feels more dated than Armageddon and Emmerich expressing his crush on Elon Musk (Here’s a drinking game, take a sip every time there’s a Elon Musk reference throughout the movie. You’ll be remembering as much as you will remember the experience of watching this crap). Negative reviews like this are usually brushed off a movie like this because it’s designed to be “critic proof”. And yes, I agree this movie is not for critics. The problem is it’s not for audience either. It’s a movie that really only exists to pleasure itself.

The cinematography itself is quite top notch and the cast do what they can with the garbage script and awful dialogue that they’ve been getting but there’s not much of a reason to recommend this movie, even for those that just want a dumb popcorn flick. It’s doesn’t work as a popcorn flick nor an intelligent or engaging piece of sci-fi. It’s not on the same offensive level as say, Independence Day: Resurgence (though even that movie had a solid action sequence about midway through), but it does makes for a far more dull and less interesting experience than even that movie was.

Mr. Emmerich, if you want to talk smack about big movies again, at the very least craft something that’s even as half as well-made as say, Thor: The Dark World**.