Ablaze and confused
He blew us up in his film but does he know where we are?
During a press junket in Sydney, Australia, held earlier this month, Independence Day: Resurgence director Roland Emmerich (below) told M and a group of Asian reporters that he loves Singapore.
But I had a nagging suspicion the German-born director may think our little red dot is part of China.
Just before his declaration of affection for "the town of Singapore", he mentioned visiting China at least 10 times and gushed about the decor of his London home, which is heavily influenced by Chinese propaganda art.
I was getting a little worried about the potential disappointment of Singapore film buffs.
EXCITED
In February, we were excited to spot our skyline - for a good three seconds - in the trailer of Emmerich's latest disaster film, the sequel to the wildly popular Independence Day (1996).
The towers of Marina Bay Sands were seen to be one of the first few landmarks completely annihilated in the aliens-destroying-Earth blockbuster.
Singapore was getting major recognition at last on the big screen, but could this all be a misunderstanding on Emmerich's part?
After all, Hollywood films are hankering for the Chinese yuan these days.
I did not manage to ask him if he knew the difference.
But the 60-year-old responsible for disaster epics like Godzilla, The Day After Tomorrow, and 2012, did say Singapore was "not the usual Chinese city", and we had "some really cool, nice buildings" during our one-on-one interview.
That was why he chose to wipe out Singapore.
He also said he got the idea of destroying the city when he was in town in 2013 to promote his action thriller White House Down.
Emmerich said: "I took a good look at (Singapore) and I always had an idea that Asia gets sucked up and dumped on Europe, and we needed a representative of an Asian city."
The good-natured film-maker was concerned that we would be offended by his celluloid destruction of our beloved buildings.
"Would Singapore find it too violent?" he asked.
No, we would be more than flattered.
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