White House Down (2013)

[baumer]

Discuss

[RobinHood26]

-

Edited May 3, 2018 by Jay Hollywood

[Dragon]

B+. I enjoyed the script better. Still hella fun ride if you would love to revist the 90's throwback film.

[baumer]

Major issues in every aspect of film in the first half.Major kick ass awesomeness in the second.8/10

[Cmasterclay]

My favorite movie of the summer so far except This Is The End, and the best blockbuster/action movie by quite a bit. Tops MOS, STID, and FF6 for me, and I expect it to stay on top the rest of the way. Funny, intense, exciting, interesting, and well acted. Infinitely better than OHF for me, mainly because how wonderful Tatum and Foxx are compared to Bore-tler and Ehhhhart. Great performances by the rest of the cast. ID4 is one of my 5 favorite movies ever, and it is great to see Emmerich return to form. The perfect summer blockbuster.

 

9.5/10

 

P.S. This movie is more proof that critics are just uptight, pretentious babies.

[Water Bottle]

It's always great to see two movies take on the same premise because it's interesting to see what they do different and why. Overall, I think White House Down was stronger than Olympus Has Fallen. In White House Down, the action scenes were tighter and the takeover of the White House was more...realistic. I mean, it was still illogical but it was easier to swallow my disbelief. The plot was stronger and I felt more connected to the characters in this one.

 

Yes, it's ridiculous. It's over-the-top. It's riddled with plot holes.

 

It's also one of the most fun movies of the year. It's a movie that at times makes you swell with patriotic pride (such as when the President uses the rocket launcher).

 

As a note:

(*) The film is surprisingly political and the bad guys are not North Koreans but the Far Right. As a conservative, I'm a bit wary of this but I'm cool with it for two reasons: the protagonist kept talking about how he didn't vote for the liberal President towards the end implying he's conservative or at least leans that way and the FOX News guy was willing to stand up for the little girl. Still: risky for any movie to potentially alienate conservatives.

(*) The ending where the Speaker basically tries to get away with it by claiming that nobody will believe the protagonist was too stupid. I'm sorry, but that threat doesn't work as it's basically an admission of guilt IN FRONT OF THE MILITARY MEMBERS WHO WEREN'T IN ON YOUR PLOT TO COUP THE COUNTRY. Idiot. Other than that, none of the logic holes in the movie bothered me.

 

A-

 

(Final Note): This might be a stronger film but Olympus Has Fallen keeps it's B+ from me. I'm happy we got both films: when I like the premise for a story (White House taken over) I like multiple versions of it because I want more.

Edited June 30, 2013 by Water Bottle Down

[Jay Beezy]

This film isn't believable, but its villains were certainly more believable than those in Olympus. It's generally more believable to be taken off guard by domestic terrorists than foreign invaders, since they're the kind you don't see coming.

[baumer]

I still like OHF better but seeing this the second time today I enjoyed it a lot more.  I still think the first half hour or so has some problems but the rest of it is really quite good.  Tatum is really the center of the movie and dammit if I didn't get emotional in the flag waving scene. 

 

This is the personification of summer film and this is absolutely in my top 3 this summer.  Probably number 2 behind TITE.

 

9/10

[RobinHood26]

The flag waving thing was the cheesiest thing in a movie all year. 

[MrPink]

The flag waving thing was the cheesiest thing in a movie all year. 

 

It was like a 100x less awesome version of this

 

[Jay Beezy]

It was like a 100x less awesome version of this

 

 

What I found odd about that scene in the Rock was that Cage was on the side of the island the fighters were coming from yet they had to be informed by a guy elsewhere with a scope that Cage had lit the flares. Couldn't the fighters have seen Cage with the flares?

 

At least in this they saw Emily hold the flag.

Edited June 30, 2013 by Jay Beezy

[MrPink]

What I found odd about that scene in the Rock was that Cage was on the side of the island the fighters were coming from yet they had to be informed by a guy elsewhere with a scope that Cage had lit the flares. Couldn't the fighters have seen Cage with the flares?

 

At least in this they saw Emily hold the flag.

 

Does it matter? Jesu...I mean Jim Caviezel bombed Alcatraz and we got another gratuitous explosion in the process.

[Water Bottle]

The flag waving thing was the cheesiest thing in a movie all year. 

 

Cheesy? Yes.

 

Did it make me swell with pride of the girl and was it still an awesome fucking desperate moment to stop the air strike? Yes.

 

Cheesy doesn't necessarily mean it's a bad thing.

[RobinHood26]

Cheesy? Yes.

 

Did it make me swell with pride of the girl and was it still an awesome fucking desperate moment to stop the air strike? Yes.

 

Cheesy doesn't necessarily mean it's a bad thing.

yeah, but personally it was one of my least favorite/worst moments in the film. 

[ssjrem]

I enjoyed both White House Down and Olympus Has Fallen, even though I think they were both terrible movies. At least White House Down didn't take itself too seriously, but still had its fair share of ridiculous moments.

[Jay Beezy]

Does it matter? Jesu...I mean Jim Caviezel bombed Alcatraz and we got another gratuitous explosion in the process.

 

That's true. The fighters calling off the strike when they saw the flag was a lot less anti-climactic than them not seeing the green flares and accidentally dropping one.

[Michael Gary Scott]

Great movie great summer fun. 4.5/5

[TMP]

Am I the only one here who didn't like this?

The humor fell flat, and felt forced. I didn't give a shit about any of the characters, and the first half hour tried to make us care about the characters, but failed to do so. The CGI looked surprisingly bad, and there was little action, which is troubling because that was one of the only things not terrible in this film. And you know a film is bad when lackluster action is the best thing about it. I'm glad it flopped.

4/10

[Blankments]

Great, fun time. Foxx and Tatum were great, along with the rest of the cast. It was just a fun blockbuster, which we don't see often anymore. Great action too. B+

Edited September 1, 2013 by Blankments

[Webslinger]

White House Down delivers exactly what's expected: it's dumb, yet it's also quite fun. I'm sure that the plot has more holes in it than Swiss cheese, but Roland Emmerich and crew do such a strong job of channeling the classic Die Hard formula that I was thoroughly entertained from the point the action got started onward. The brutality of the violence is understandably neutered (it seems a bit disingenuous to make a movie about terrorism and not have it be rated R), but the action sequences have a great deal of spectacle and are very exciting to watch, especially as they get more preposterous (e.g. the car chase on the White House grounds). It's not an actor's film by any stretch of the imagination, but Channing Tatum is more than adequate as the action hero lead; he could stand to be a bit more charismatic, but he's still come a long way from the cringeworthy work earlier in his career. Jamie Foxx is a solid choice for the presidential role, and he has enough chemistry with Tatum that the decision to play up the likeness to a buddy film in the middle portion works. James Woods isn't an ideal villain, but at least his involvement takes the film down a more interesting (but by no means original; see: The Rock) route than having the lead villain be an international terrorist. It could stand to be a bit leaner (especially in the first act; it takes a little too long to get to the attack) and have a more charismatic lead performance, but it's still a very sufficiently enjoyable popcorn flick. In the duel of "Die Hard in the White House" films, I'll take it easily over Olympus Has Fallen. Whereas I exited that film mostly unimpressed and not entertained, I had a really good time with White House Down.

 

B