Gerard Butler. Sold. I don’t care what the plot is about or who else is in it… I will go and watch any film starring Gerard Butler. When I saw the trailer and realised Morgan Freeman was in it too I quickly decided that Olympus Has Fallen was an absolute must-see. Dishy bloke… Check. The acting god of our generation… Check. Get the bad guys and action and loads of cool stuff… Check, check, check! I was certain this film was going to absolutely blow my mind. And unfortunately, it didn’t.
It started out so well. Gerard Butler plays the head of security who is responsible for the safety of the President of the USA. In a suit (I could stop going on about how perfect he is but, let’s face it, I probably won’t). Aaron Eckhart (Harvey Dent in Batman) plays President Asher, who is charismatic and handsome, a perfect presidential candidate with a delightful family and everything is lovely. Fast forward a little and the White House is under attack… big time. For me personally, the main thing I didn’t like was that America was under attack by North Korea and the whole concept just felt a little too close to home in light of recent news. I felt slightly uncomfortable watching it even though the events on screen were naturally a little far fetched and highly unlikely to ever happen.
A few more grunts and stunts from Butler and I’d eased up a little, ready for some action. The film is a cheesy, very American classic action film. Lots of gore and some laugh out loud hard man lines from Mr Butler make the film actually really quite enjoyable.
I did, however, have a couple of giggling moments at the concept of one man avenging America on his very own. Though great cinematography, probably the most unrealistic concept ever. But, I guess you don’t go to the cinema and watch an action film expecting 100% reality. Morgan Freeman is brilliant, as always.
If you can get over the almost irritating subtle-as-a-brick-to-the-head hints that America is the most wonderful, powerful country ever and American citizens are marvellous etc, etc, etc then Olympus Has Fallen is exactly what you’d expect from the trailer: a pretty good action movie, just don’t expect it to completely rock your world.
It’s worth going to watch just to see Gerard Butler in a suit.
[rating=3]
