Roland Emmerich (born November 10, 1955)

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Roland Emmerich is an A-list Hollywood director specializing in films that explore the sometimes rocky relationship between humans and aliens. In 1994 his Egyptian-flavored sci-fi/action flick Stargate was a surprise hit, spawning a long-running TV series.

When asked by a reporter about his fascination with extraterrestrials, Emmerich wondered aloud what it would be like to wake up one morning with fifteen-mile-wide spaceships hovering over major world cities. He turned to his producer Dean Devlin and said, “I think I have an idea for our next film.” This scenario played out in Independence Day, one of the most successful films of all time.

Emmerich followed up Independence Day with the maligned reboot of Godzilla, and then switched gears with Mel Gibson in The Patriot. More recent endeavors include the hits The Day After Tomorrow and 10,000 BC.

Openly gay, Emmerich has donated to the Legacy Project to preserve gay and lesbian films. He also rallied supporters of Hillary Clinton, hosting her at his Hollywood home in 2007 for a fundraiser during her run for the presidency.

Source: Stern, Keith (2009-09-01). Queers in History: The Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Historical Gays, Lesbians and Bisexuals (Kindle Locations 4616-4625). Perseus Books Group. Kindle Edition.

Further Readings:

Dying for a Laugh: Disaster Movies and the Camp Imagination by Ken Feil
Paperback: 272 pages
Publisher: Wesleyan; annotated edition edition (January 25, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0819567922
ISBN-13: 978-0819567925
Amazon: Dying for a Laugh: Disaster Movies and the Camp Imagination

Dying for a Laugh looks at the evolution of the contemporary disaster film from the 1970s to the present. Ken Feil argues that contemporary camp culture has influenced and reformed the conventions of the 1970s disaster film, in both its production and reception. The book chronicles how the genre rose to prominence, sank into critical and popular disrepute, and became unintentionally campy. Through close readings of films including The Poseidon Adventure, The Swarm, Ghostbusters, Independence Day, and Mars Attacks!, along with film reviews, entertainment reports and publicity materials as evidence, Feil shows that the renewal of the disaster genre in the 1990s hinged on self-parody, ironic self-consciousness, and state-of-the-art effects. Feil also looks at the impact of 9/11 on the genre's campy, sadistic pleasures through movies such as The Sum of All Fears, The Core, and The Day After Tomorrow. This analysis of "high concept camp" draws from diverse methodologies and theories, such as historical reception, textual analysis, neoformalism, political economy, genre analysis, feminism, and queer theory.