Moonfall starts off strong with amazing visuals and powerful cast, but it throws all logic out the window in the third act, and completely jumps the shark.
Roland Emmerich is back with another disaster movie, his first one since 2016’s Independence Day: Resurgence. Now instead of having aliens, or natural catastrophes, Emmerich decides to raise the stakes by doing something never attempted before: having the moon fall on Earth. It is a crazy premise, but knowing Emmerich’s previous work, it was to no one’s surprise.
Armed with an all star cast consisting of Patrick Wilson, Halle Berry, John Bradley, Eme Ikwuakor, and Donald Sutherland, Roland Emmerich was going to make the moon fall. Needless to say there was excitement going into it, who doesn’t enjoy the occasional destruction film? And from the director of The Day After Tomorrow and 2012 nonetheless.
This was bound to be the first cinematic event of the year. Sadly, as much anticipation I had for this film, and how I was ready to see some ridiculous action and have a good time, the film fails to deliver on its ridiculous premise. It has a strong start with the action, but unfortunately it does not continue with the same excitement that the opening scene created.
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As I said, the film starts off strong. It gives viewers a small hint of what’s to come while also introducing us to the main characters and their motivations, but the rest of the film does not continue with that intensity. The character motivations that are introduced in the beginning do not continue which makes the third act of Moonfall feel it is like a completely different film.
Moonfall struggles to find balance between the human relationships and the action. They are both very disconnected from each other and it feels like watching two different films, and one could do without the other.
All logic goes out the window here, as Emmerich decides to do an exposition dump in the third act that is so unexpected and out of nowhere, that it ruins the already unstable pacing of the film.
That is the biggest flaw of Moonfall — it tries to find logic in a plot that just lacks it from the very beginning. Rather than explain the moon falling using similar scientific explanations like in The Day After Tomorrow and 2012, something that seems possible — that you know that it is not possible, but you can use suspension of disbelief.
Emmerich just decides to jump the shark instead of embracing the campiness that this film could have had. The special effects were good, as expected from such a high budget film, but nothing life changing. Overall, Moonfall ends up being a disappointing disaster movie, with not enough moon falling to save it.
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
NEXT: 5 Underrated Disaster Movies to Watch Before Moonfall
About Moonfall
In Moonfall, a mysterious force knocks the Moon from its orbit around Earth and sends it hurtling on a collision course with life as we know it.
With mere weeks before impact and the world on the brink of annihilation, NASA executive and former astronaut Jo Fowler (Academy Award® winner Halle Berry) is convinced she has the key to saving us all — but only one astronaut from her past, Brian Harper (Patrick Wilson, “Midway”) and a conspiracy theorist K.C. Houseman (John Bradley, “Game of Thrones”) believe her.
These unlikely heroes will mount an impossible last-ditch mission into space, leaving behind everyone they love, only to find out that our Moon is not what we think it is.
