Olympus Has Fallen

Ah, Gerard Butler.  Where did you come from and what did we do to deserve you?  You're like some old, boring tenured professor.  You're taking up your position and depriving us of a younger, more talented, action star. You need to have a discussion with your dialogue coach.  Your American accent is laughable.  Hey, did Arnold ever try to cover up his accent? No. Did Sean Connery win an Oscar for playing an Irish cop with a Scottish accent? Yep.  Just own it man!  Also, don't do musicals.  Your rendition of Music of the Night made my loins hurt.

Now here comes Olympus as Fallen.  Wow.  I feel like I just got out of a time machine from 1985.  Early in the film, star Gerard Butler sits at a DC cafe.  Behind him there is a picture of Ronald Reagan at his desk.  Just so we don't miss it, director Antoine Fuqua cuts to a close-up of the framed picture.  The opening also features Butler boxing with President Aaron Eckhart, a scene right out of Broken Arrow and Rocky IV.  Fuqua lets his audience know that this is a throwback to the Reagan-era action film, when film gods like Stallone and Schwarzenegger filled the screen with commie-busting machismo.

I'm sure Sean Hannity will choose this as one of his films of the year.  The film opens with the American flag waving in the air, a beacon of stolid hope.  President Eckhart tells the nation that the terrorist enemies came to "trample our freedom" and "destroy our way of life."  Fuqua's characterization of the villains is offensive and stupid.  They are North Korean, but they wear Middle Eastern kafyas and suicide bomb the front of the White House.  Hey, they're all the same, right?  Ugh.

In a year where films like Zero Dark Thirty, Argo, and Lincoln showed the complexity of America and its place in the world, Fuqua should be ashamed to put his film on the same silver screen.  Never mind the Walker Texas Ranger TV-style filmmaking.  Forget about the computer effects that look like they were drawn by my nephew Rex.  Hey, the kid can draw, but he may need to wait a few years before he goes to Hollywood.  Beyond the filmmaking, this movie is just wrong and regressive.

Olympus Has Fallen has no respect for DC and its landmarks.  The terrorists knock down the Washington Monument.  Gerard Butler loads his cache of weapons on the desk of the Oval Office.  There is a shootout in the Lincoln bedroom and Butler even crushes a bad guy's skull with a bust of President Lincoln.  I'm not sure that's the message Steven Spielberg and Daniel Day-Lewis were trying to send with their Oscar-nominated film. Hey, maybe I misinterpreted all the discussions of justice and benevolence.

There are a few elements that I enjoyed, just so you don't think I'm completely bitter.  There is this chunky White House aide who has about four lines in the whole film.  His only job is to look jowly and really shocked when something explodes.  It's a powerhouse performance of character acting.  Angela Bassett and Morgan Freeman also elevate the material a bit.  I swear the two of them could sell ex-lax to a diarrhea ward.  Freeman deserves an Oscar for delivering the line "He just opened up the gates of hell" without laughing.  I hope he was paid a hefty fee for the film and that he got himself something nice. Maybe a fur sink or gasoline-powered turtle neck?

The rest of the film is just a montage of meaty face close-ups and exploding heads. Does Butler have to go for the headshot every time?  He makes Rick from The Walking Dead look like a terrible marksman.  Still, he would make President Reagan proud.  Maybe he and Butler could have ridden horses together.  Well, they can have each other.  Maybe I'll go see if Rex has any new pictures for me.