White House Down (2013)

[Omario]

Well fuck me, this was so cheesy and lame. Just bad.

 

D

[Squaremaster316]

**1/2

 

Not Bad, not good.  Just okay.

[mattmav45]

Got House'ed as fuck last night and lived to tell about it.

 

If anything one can never accuse Emmerich of holdng back.  His filmography speaks for itself in this regard.  That being said I'll be damned if I didn't find some restraint on display in this one.  It is that restraint that I believe was the film's undoing.

 

Let's be honest here, this was never going to be a good film.  It's only real hope was to let Emmerich go wild and it would seem to follow that the viewer would bask in the complete and utter ridiculousness.  Unfortunately this is not allowed to happen.  I don't want to say that the material is played too straight, but perhaps it's best to state it was played too straight for my tastes.

 

In effect you pretty much know what you're in for during the first half hour.  There seems to be an attempt to provide character development and back-story.  Unfortunately in reality the film just kind of treads water aimlessly during this period.  It is never a good thing when as a viewer you are divested in the initial minutes.  Such was the case here.

 

Once the ball gets rolling the film pretty much stays a pretty lukewarm affair.  The action is surprisingly pedestrian.  Perhaps more telling is the fact that the film lacks any real distinct personality.  There's simply not enough good action for it to succeed in that regard, and there sure as hell isn't good enough human drama to complement it.  

 

The end result is yet another action film that fails to really make one care one way or another.  I'd rather be pissed off than be bored watching an action flick.  The one scene I enjoyed was the car chase and subsequent flip into the pool on the White House lawn.  It is this kind of mood and tone that could have worked.  In my opinion, of course.

 

I'm of the opinion that perhaps it's time the action genre as a whole got a swift kick in the ass.