What Took Me So Long: I needed to get Olympus Has Fallen out of my system before going after this one.
Why I Saw It: (Club 50) This is the kind of movie in which most of the issues are with setting up the story. It was sold as a movie about the President shooting his way out of the White House against terrorists, and in that respect, it was good. The action is over the top. All sorts of tension-cutting jokes. Channing Tatum and Jaime Foxx are believable leads in this context. Emmerich has some nasty misfires out there like 10,000 BC and 2012 to go along with excellent successes like Independence Day and The Patriot. White House Down falls comfortably in the middle.
Why I Wish I Hadn't: "Comfortably in the middle" means "well short of greatness". Just being the better of the two White House takeover movies from 2013 doesn't mean it is without many blemishes. As I alluded to earlier, the many contrivances to setup the premise require too much staging. Then there's the moments that are complete gambles. Little Joey King waving the American flag to stop the bomb strike. That's either going to be a great moment (think, Mel Gibson waving the flag to stop the retreat in The Patriot) or the stupidest thing you've ever seen. Guess where it landed with me. Ultimately, I think the thing that hurt it the most was the need to keep adding twists. Did it really need the Secret Service chief looking for revenge or the Speaker of the House arranging to become president? I'd almost rather have it be terrorists for the sake of having terrorists.
Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend
No comments:
Post a Comment