Topic: OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN review by Zarban (slight spoilers)
OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN (2013)
Gerard Butler stars in this Die-Hard-in-the-White-House picture which seems tailor-made for today's on-the-go audience that loves America and can't follow much of a plot.
Bad guys take over the White House thru reasonably plausible means, and Butler stalks and kills them one-by-one like small game. It features all your favorite hits, such as...
a semi-disgraced Secret Service agent a la In the Line of Fire
stabbing someone in the skull
casually applied security protocols
an obvious turncoat
improbable computer hacking
secret passages that don't make sense
a lifelong military man who gives up secret codes at the threat of violence
a terrible helicopter decision a la Die Hard
an I'm-a-victim-not-a-baddie scene a la Die Hard
'splosions of every shape and size
The depiction of the White House itself is very good, with only the aforementioned secret passages as egregious nonsense. There's actually a point where Gerard Butler goes thru a door in the second floor family quarters and enters what appears to be a disused cowshed in the basement. (And it's not a cut for shoe leather: Fuqua keeps cutting back and forth to show they're connected.)
What does it not have?
Journalists. Apparently, every correspondent with a desk in the West Wing flees into the sewers at the first sign of trouble.
Doubt for our hero. Aside from the opening, there is literally not one moment when the hero feels defeated. There are moments when he feels bad that OTHER PEOPLE are defeated, but oh well...
Much humor. Just a couple of dark quips.
I would say that it's a relentless march thru the White House to rescue the president, but actually Butler is up and down and all over in the Residence and the wings from one scene to the next. It's kind of dizzying.
Last edited by Zarban (2013-09-29 19:09:08)