White House Down – The DVDfever Cinema Review

Let’s start my review of White House Down with suggestions for more accurate titles: White House Thumbs Down, White House Dumb and Die Soft.

For the next part, I’d normally explain what the plot is about, but that’s easily skipped by saying: read my review of Olympus Has Fallen.

Up to speed? Right, now despite director Roland Emmerich‘s previous actioner, 2012, not being too jingoistic for a change, and thus giving us a breather, for this one, the jingoism kicks in early as the President’s choppers flying close to the water in front of the Lincoln memorial, to show it off, rather than keeping a safe distance above it in case of any mechanical in-flight problems which may cause an emergency landing.

(And, yes, I know he directed Anonymous inbetween that and this, but no-one cared about that film.)

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Hero of the day is John cale (Channing Tatum) who wants a job as a Secret Service agent, but his ex, Carol (Maggie Gyllenhaal), is doing the hiring and firing, and she doesn’t want him anywhere near the place. In the presidential role, Jamie Foxx takes the lead as Commander-in-Chief. I don’t know whether Emmerich wants to appear up-to-date or just politically correct, but it matters not hear as he’s just as ineffective as any other President, bar the fact he occasionally gets to carry a gun. And a rocker launcher. Until he loses the latter. Oh, the hilarity(!)

Meanwhile, there’s a tour of the White House going on, led by Donnie who helpfully reminds us of the director’s biggest film by telling us which part of the building was destroyed in Independence Day. James Woods turns up as a Presidential bigwig with a shock of white hair to distract from his facelift, done a few years ago, which seems to have since fallen. His character, by the way, has just one week to go until retirement. Meanwhile, the rest of the cast is made up of cardboard cut-out baddies who are ear-marked out early, for the idiots amongst the audience. You can tell they’re the baddies because none of them shave regularly.

During this, Cale’s daughter/stepdaughter/whatever (who gives a fuck) gets separated from him and the tour they took part in, and ends up continuing her Youtube blog of the place by filming the terrorists. Of the cast, Tatum continues to prove that he can’t act his way out of a paper bag, Foxx shows none of the star quality he’s had in some previous films, while Nicolas Wright as tour leader Donnie is the supposed comic relief, but it just doesn’t work. Maggie Gyllenhaal and Richard Jenkins are also never required to do more than the bare minimum.

Go to page 2 for more thoughts on this film.

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The film is also hampered by the constraints of a 12-certificate. As such, the baddies shoot people in very 12-certificate-friendly ways, so you never actually witness a bullet going into a body. Either you see them get hit when the camera’s behind, or the bullet hits them just off-screen. In addition, the action and fight scenes look choppy and badly-choreographed. It’s unclear whether they were filmed in full, as if they were going for a 15-cert* and let the blood and violence fly (as with Olympus Has Fallen) or film all the small elements of each scene which they were left with. Either way, it looks a mess.

(*rarely will such a film garner an 18 these days, and even the full uncut versions of the first two Die Hard films have been re-rated as 15)

And because it’s a 12, no-one swears realistically. Or at all.

The only incredible thing about White House Down is not the special effects, but how overlong and boring it is. In fact, compared to 2012, the effects here are utterly terrible. Then there’s so much dull dialogue, such as when Jamie Foxx is talking to his wife, being all lovey-dovey while enthusing about Lincoln because of some crappy watch he’s apparently got. In fact, the only amusing thing about this film is that the music is performed, in part, by a Thomas Wanker.

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And the only cast member worth watching is comparatively brief turn by Jimmi Simpson (below) as terrorist Tyler, who heads down to the President’s underground bunker to do all the cyber whatnot to crack codes and extract money. There’s humour in his character and the actor was also in Breakout Kings, a series only shown in the U.S. – and which only lasted for two seasons, about a trio of convicts with decades of sentences to complete. For each prison escapee they help recapture, they get a month of their sentence. As well as Jimmi Simpson, the show’s other cast highlights were Serinda Swan (because she’s brunette and hot), Brooke Nevin (because she’s blonde and hot) and Domenick Lombardozzi (here, The Wire‘s Herc was playing the FBI guy in charge of them, and he had all the one-liners down to a tee)

So, basically, don’t watch White House Down. Watch Olympus Has Fallen. And then watch Breakout Kings. Both seasons.

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Cert:
Running time: 131 minutes
Year: 2013
Released: September 13th 2013
Widescreen: 2.35:1 (ARRIRAW (2.8K))
Rating: 2/10

Director: Roland Emmerich
Producers: Roland Emmerich, Brad Fischer, Larry J. Franco, Laeta Kalogridis, Harald Kloser and James Vanderbilt
Screenplay: James Vanderbilt
Music: Harald Kloser and Thomas Wanker

Cast:
Cale: Channing Tatum
President Sawyer: Jamie Foxx
Carol Finnerty: Maggie Gyllenhaal
Stenz: Jason Clarke
Raphelson: Richard Jenkins
Emily: Joey King
Walker: James Woods
Donnie the Guide: Nicolas Wright
Tyler: Jimmi Simpson
Vice President Hammond: Michael Murphy
Melanie: Rachelle Lefevre
General Caulfield: Lance Reddick
Agent Kellerman: Matt Craven
Agent Hope: Jake Weber