Olympus Has Fallen

[4 stars] [IMDB Link]

[Amazon Link]
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Yes, I'm still in my Big Dumb Movie mode. And (also) yes, it's only been a few days since I watched White House Down, a remarkably similar movie to this one. Both were made in 2013. This bit of IMDB trivia claims both movies were based on the same Vince Flynn book. (Flynn died in 2013, but apparently not from suffocating under the huge piles of cash Hollywood dumped on him.)

The broad strokes are the same: both feature an ultraviolent White House takeover aided by a traitor inside the building. The perpetrators advertise one motive to the public, but actually have an even more dastardly plan. There's a kid in danger. The evildoers are thwarted by an outsider with unexpected talents.

I liked this one a bit better. It's rated R, while White House Down garnered a PG-13. Why? The language is saltier, and there's more violence, and a lot of it's pretty explicit. And it seemed that White House Down was considerably jokier, if that makes sense.


Last Modified 2024-01-11 2:58 PM EDT