I had the misfortune of seeing this yesterday, drawn by the appearance of Aaron Eckhart and Morgan Freeman.
I should have stayed home.
Better Title: "Die Hard in the White House" wanna-be, written by a 10-year-old.
The absurd lack of any connection whatsoever with modern technology or security or politics, plus bizarre continuity gaps, and other assorted crap make this movie one of the worst of the genre. Compound this by putting Gerard "Wooden Personality" Butler in the lead role. Then add a bunch of very long close-ups of the American flag, and a speech every 3 seconds stressing "God Bless The United States of America!!!" as a means of appealing to patriotism, as if they knew full well it doesn't stand on its own as an actual movie.
Next to this one, "Under Siege II" is Shakespearian in awesomeness.
On the plus side, there was a LOT of shooting (possibly near-Robocop levels), plus a couple of knife fights and other assorted fisticuffs in between.
"My God!"
(Cut to the Hydra-6, which consists of a machine gun on the roof.)
This isn't my kind of movie by a long shot; I only saw it because I got invited by some church friends. I went in expecting the usual "standard vapid summer action flick with lots of gunfire, lots of explosions, standard-issue damsel in distress, and no plot".
I got exactly what I expected minus the damsel.
** spoiler omitted **
I *think* the intended "oh no!" essence of it was its auto-targeting ability and that it was unmanned, but this doesn't exactly strike me as super new experimental tech.
Its *actual* purpose was, of course, to show that everyone on the good guys' side except the main character and Morgan Freeman was inept. This is equally obvious in the early scenes where Secret Service agents and military are getting mowed down like the nameless mooks they are - they seem to just walk straight into the gunfire mindlessly.
Similarly, the bad guys had excellent tactics. The attack, invasion, capture, all the first 1/3 of the movie was pretty brilliantly executed, from a "bad guys do their thing" standpoint. But when they had taken control of the White House, they immediately shifted into "fall for all the typical bad guy tropes" mode. Patrolling alone, standing still during firefights, etc. etc. etc.
But I'm probably putting more effort into analyzing a subpar movie than it's worth.
Seriously... what did you expect, going into the theatre?
I went in expecting the usual "standard vapid summer action flick with lots of gunfire, lots of explosions, standard-issue damsel in distress, and no plot".
=)
The popcorn was good.
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Yeah but you paid for that separately. :)
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Seriously... what did you expect, going into the theatre?
Something to keep Mrs. Gersen's 92-year-old grandfather occupied for a couple of hours. Unfortunately, he's a Navy veteran, and the movie was goofball even by the standards of his service period.
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Eckhart: "The United States government does not negotiate with terrorists!"
Freeman:
Other Character: "But, sir, they'll still kill the president."
Freeman: "Well, give in anyway!"
Me: (Shakes head in bewilderment)
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Yeah, the trailer of this one made it pretty clear it was going to be awful. Plus the entire idea of a rogue plane making it over the capital in this day and age was unbelievable to me, to say nothing of the idea of a bunch of mooks breaching White House security. Those Secret Service guys aren't mooks (same issue I had with Air Force One).