Olympus Has Fallen (A-)

Antoine Fuqua brings his fantastic skills as a director of gritty crime dramas to make a high-profile action blockbuster that retains the intense, R-rated, realistic, and believable vibe of his earlier movies. The result is a film that is tremendously entertaining while not being so far-fetched as to prevent audiences from caring about the story or relating to its patriotic themes.

Agent Mike Banning is a Secret Serviceman who was once one of the people protecting the president, but was transferred to a desk job after letting the First Lady die in order to ensure the safety of his commander-and-chief (this scene, a car crash sequence which opens the movie, is poorly executed: I can’t quite tell what, if anything, Banning did wrong). Banning ends up the only agent left alive in the White House after a band of North Korean terrorists attack it and take the president hostage. It is up to Banning to protect the First Son (Finley Jacobsen) and keep the nation from a nuclear attack.
Aaron Eckhart is President Benjamin Asher. Eckhart plays the character in much the same way he did pre-transformation Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight, which is a little weird, but it still works. Of course, since the President is captured for most of the movie the new commander-in-chief is Speaker of the House Trumbull, played by Morgan Freeman. Freeman is unable to play more than one character, but his character seems president-ly. One would expect the movie to mostly be about Banning, but in fact much of it is about Asher and Trumbull dealing with the crisis. Several scenes are West Wing-style political drama, which is a cool contrast to the Die Hard style plot-line with Butler. At no point do Asher or Trumbull make decisions that are irrational and the way they handle the situation is diplomatic, strategic, and like something real presidents would do. It makes the movie seem far more believable.

Gerard Butler (King Leonidas in 300) is Banning, and as usual he does a good job. His character is likeable but also a credible soldier. His antagonist is played by Rick Yune, who steals the show. Instead of commanding a vast army with superior technology like most movie bad guys, Yune’s character--Kang--is able to take down the White House with one rogue jet, a few suicide bombers, less than forty henchman, and a couple stolen army gadgets. Kang is funny, charming, charismatic, and smart, but also a ruthless pig who takes pleasure in torturing his enemies (in one surprisingly graphic scene he brutally kicks the female Secretary of Defense until the president reveals crucial information). When we get to the doomsday plot where Kang reveals how he plans to nuke the US, it is (mostly) plausible since everything up until then was tactically brilliant and realistic.
The movie has a noteworthy cast, with Ashley Judd appearing in a cameo as the First Lady, Melissa Leo taking on the role of the Secretary of Defense, Robert Forster playing a high-ranking general, and Angela Basset shining in her performance as Banning’s boss.
The film’s biggest flaw is the cinematography used by Fuqua and his Director of Photography (Conrad W. Hall, who did Panic Room). The movie was probably shot in the middle of the day, but in order to make it look like night-time Fuqua and Hall use weird camera lenses and hideous post-production digital color “enhancements.” It looks utterly unrealistic and distractingly stupid, especially if your theater (like mine) doesn’t have a bright enough bulb projecting the image.

Still, that problem is counter-acted by Fuqua’s ability to craft engrossing action sequences. The attack on the White House is truly thrilling, and none of the subsequent fight scenes take away Olympus Has Fallen’s momentum.
In the end, the movie is a great tribute to the American spirit. Banning represents the everyday man, who’s work behind the scenes is just as important to the country as the work of the President. This is one of the most patriotic movies I have seen in recent years, and I think the theme only carries because of the gritty, semi-realistic tone Fuqua and the writers (newbies Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt) bring.
Understandably, movies like Olympus Has Fallen are a tough sell overseas. It would be wrong to deny that this isn’t a movie meant primarily for Americans. But if people in the US were able to connect so well with Skyfall, which is very much a patriotic British film, I think that those in Europe and Asia will be able to relate to Olympus as well.
Olympus Has Fallen is a gritty, beleiveable, and engrossing action thriller that is able to back up its patriotic themes with a good story and stellar directing.
PS: Not that this detracts from the movie, but a comment must be made about the stupid title. It refers to a code used by the Servicemen in the film, where "Olympus Has Fallen" means "The White House has been taken." I think that any half-wit terrorist could figure out. If they aren't serious about using codes then they should just say "White House Down."

The Call (C)

Right up until the last fifteen minutes or so, The Call is a cool, plausible thriller with a Hitchcock-esque tone. It isn’t amazing or profound or even particularly original, but it was entertaining, engrossing, and believable. This makes it particularly frustrating that the filmmakers throw it all away with a ludicrous, semi-comedic, exploitative, and incredibly stupid final act. If the whole film was trash it would almost be better: Unfortunately, it started out pretty well.

Jordan, the protagonist, is a 30-something 911 operator who receives a call from a teen girl (Evie Thompson) saying someone is breaking into her house. When the phone gets disconnected, Jordan foolishly calls back. The rings alert the prowler (Michael Eklund) as to the girl’s location. He turns out to be a serial killer, so things don’t end well. Jordan is racked with guilt, but gets a shot at redemption when six months later the station she works at gets another call from another teen girl kidnapped by the same killer. This girl, named Casey, is in the trunk of a car and is using a disposable phone, so finding her will be no easy task.
Unlike most low-budget thrillers (and this movie is distinctly low-budget), the picture cast big name stars. Casey is played by former child star Abigail Breslin and Jordan is played by Academy Award-winner Halle Berry (Catwoman, Dark Tide, Movie 43). At no point is their acting outright bad, but it is never noteworthy. The movie would have been just as good if they had cast unknowns.

The Machinist director Brad Anderson helms the picture. The most notable credit among the three-man writing team is a script outline on the Bruce Willis bomb Perfect Stranger. Still, little past box office success doesn’t necessarily mean poor writing. And for a while, The Call impresses. Jordan relays advice to Casey (kick out the tail light; leave a paint trail) while a police helicopter and numerous cars search high and low for the missing girl. The killer avoids capture with a clever strategy known as “killing any and all witnesses.” There is no doubt that he will eventually be caught, but it is quite possible that won’t be until after Casey dies. Some of the dialogue is campy and there is no depth, but the film is still an engrossing game of cat-and-mouse, mostly because everything stays (mostly) believable.

Then we get to the final act, where everything falls apart. I’m not going to spoil anything, but I will say the picture throws out any notion of logic as a shirtless Casey (played by sixteen-year old Breslin) teams up with Jordan in a vicious battle against the killer, who has built an underground lair with electricity, multiple tanks full of chloroform, and working plumbing but never thought to buy a gun, taser, axe, knife, or anything else remotely useful in actual combat. Come on! The guy in Silence of the Lambs had a gun and night-vision goggles, and he was too dumb to put his weird dog on a leash.
The first part of The Call proves that the filmmakers had the ability to craft a well-structured, engrossing thriller. Couldn’t they do that for the whole movie?

Dead Man Down (A)

The trailers for Dead Man Down suggest is is a stylish revenge tale with Taken-esque action scenes. I think the rather underwhelming reaction to the picture has to do with the inaccurate genre the marketing placed this film in. Dead Man Down is a slow, suspenseful thriller that is firmly based in characters. It provides an excellent look at depression, grief, and friendship. The revenge plot is almost a side story.

Dead Man Down has so many twists and turns that I can barely say anything about the plot without giving something away. This is what I can tell you without spoiling any more than was in the trailer: The protagonist is a man who calls himself Victor. He is part of a crime syndicate led by an ambitious, stylish, and ruthless gangster named Alfonse Hoyte (one of only two black characters, both of whom are bad). Victor is (maybe) romancing a woman named Beatrice, who has a dark past represented by a few facial scars. Not much to go on, but trust me: You don’t want spoilers.
The story is written by J.H. Wyman, who has done some TV writing and producing but has little credited work in film. In fact, his last credited movie was Gore Verbinski’s The Mexican back in 2001. I hope he does not wait as long to write his next picture. His story is something special: A thriller where you care about the characters. Deeply. They aren’t just avatars for video-game esque violence: Victor and Beatrice seem like real-life, breathing people with a history and emotions. If it weren’t for this, it would be impossible to care enough to handle the slightly-implausible and very complicated plot (Wyman's TV background shows; this movie has enough material that it could have been a good series or mini-series). Wyman might cop out a tiny bit at the end with a too-tidy conclusion, but this is a small flaw, and by that point the audience should be involved enough in the story to ignore a slight change in tone.

Part of the reasons Wyman’s script works is because of the acting. As Victor, Colin Farrell is doing his normal sad-guy schtick, but that is what is required here. Beatrice, on the other hand, is a more complex role and one that needed a fantastic performance to work. Fortunately, the role went to Noomi Rapace, the star of Prometheus and the Swedish The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Rapace’s Hollywood career is fairly new (up until 2010, almost all of her movies were Swedish), but it undoubtedly shows promise. Her ability to convey dozens of emotions at once, to constantly be interesting, and to have a character that seems both likeable and flawed is incredible. She has yet to be recognised by a major award ceremony, but it is unlikely she won’t have at least an Oscar nomination and maybe even a win within the next five years.
The rest of the supporting cast is great as well. Alfonse Hoyte is not as pivotal a character as the advertising would make you believe, but Terrence Howard gives him extra depth (if Howard has ever given a bad performance, I haven’t seen it). French actress Isabelle Huppert has a throw-away role as Beatrice’s deaf mother, but the character is fascinating and her performance is so touching that her scenes are actually the most memorable. Practically non-existent in the picture’s marketing is Dominic Cooper, who has a very important role as Victor’s friend who knows nothing of Victor’s past. The role would be good with anyone, but Cooper makes it all the better.

Danish director Niels Arden Oplev (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) helms the project. Oftentimes when promising foreign directors move to Hollywood they quickly pick big-budget blockbuster and their style never translates (Daniel Espinosa’s Safe House comes to mind). For Oplev it is the opposite: Choosing a smaller film where he can have more creative control, he takes the best parts of his lower-budget, ultra-violent foreign work while knowing that the graphic material acceptable in Scandinavia is unacceptable for international audiences. Oplev’s talent is best visible in the action sequences, which are fast-paced, gritty, violent, and (for the most part) believable; it is also worth remembering that if it weren’t for his direction and editing the acting might not seem so flawless. His biggest mistake is the make-up he chose for Rapace to wear as Beatrice: Her facial scars are a critical part of the story, but honestly they don’t look all that horrifying. In fact, you barely notice them.
Oplev and cinematographer Paul Cameron (Man on Fire) chose an interesting color scheme and composition for their cinematography: The images are sleek and stylish but at the same time look faded, dull, and almost like you would see on an old VHS tape. This doesn’t always work, but I think it provides a nice backdrop to the underlying themes in the film. This is not a revenge fantasy: It is a look at depression and grief. How does one move on when everything in life has lost its luster? How can one find friendship when they feel like they don’t even care anymore? These are the questions this film asks, and the answers it gives are compelling and moving.
Dead Man Down is a slow, suspenseful, and emotional thriller/drama; you don’t come across movies like this every day.

Jack the Giant Slayer (B)

It has gaping plot holes, no depth, dozens of cliches, a far-too-short runtime, and numerous other flaws, but I’d be lying if I said this family-oriented action adventure wasn’t entertaining.
Jack the Giant-Slayer is a retelling of the classic story--A young peasant in medieval Europe travels up a beanstalk and battles giants. In this story, Jack is accompanied by a knight named Sir Elmont and is on a quest to rescue a princess.

Jack is already receiving comparisons to last summer’s blockbuster “fairy tale” Snow White & the Huntsman, but despite what trailers may have you believe, Jack is intended for family audiences. Director Bryan Singer certainly has a few moments here and there where he interrupts his tone to have a slightly violent scene (something that the X-Men director seems to struggle with when doing more kid-friendly pictures), but if the harsh PG-13 rating is deserved--and, to be honest, it isn’t--it would take less than 75 seconds of cuts to edit it down to PG. This adventure is significantly tamer than similar PG-fair like Eragon, Chronicles of Narnia, and Tron: Legacy; it is possible that the studio may have wanted a PG-13 rating just to attract older audiences. If that is the case, it didn’t work.

In an attempt to please kids, there are some things that will turn off adults. Flatulence humor and booger jokes, for starters. Also, idiotic comic relief characters, most annoying of which is a human bad guy minion played by Ewen Brenner. The main antagonist--the giant General Fallon--has a second head which serves as a less irritating but still weird sidekick. I suppose Singer agreed to a two-headed villain in order to distinguish the character, and some may find it funny or at least a little interesting. My guess is that the majority of people, like myself, will find it too weird. The second head isn’t exactly another character--it only grunts and repeats garbled versions of the main head’s sentences. Still, it’s dopey grin looks almost friendly and clashes horribly with the gruff giant head on the right, and you kind of feel bad for what may be an innocent (if dim-witted) extra character unfairly chained to his jerk-tastic twin brother.

If you’re wondering, none of the other giants have extra heads (or arms or legs, for that matter). In fact, for the most part they look pretty cool. They are shot with motion capture, like was used for Gollum and Caesar of Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Since there are a lot of them, they don’t look quite as realistic as those two characters, but they still showcase a neat blend of human and beast-like qualities: They are enough like people to seem like formidable foes, but not enough like us for anyone to care when they fall in battle. I do wonder where the female giants are, though. Perhaps the species reproduces aesexually, or the genders just look the same as each other. My best guess, though, is that the she-giants from Jack left the city in the clouds and reside on the same planet as all the girl dwarves from Lord of the Rings.

The biggest flaw of the film is undoubtedly the run time. It is 110 minutes, which is significantly shorter than most action adventure films. With the amount it costs for a family to go to a theatre, it isn’t unreasonable to expect the two plus hours that is standard for this genre. You have been warned.
The other big issue is plot holes. Obviously logic isn’t what one is looking for in this type of movie, but it is always frustrating when you see that the viewer has put more thought into the story than the producers. With four credited writers it is clear this is a story that has undergone several drafts and has lost a bit of coherency in the process.

Still, none of these flaws stop this very playful tale from being entertaining. The action is stellar, the visuals are decent, and the whole thing looks gorgeous. The imagery is constantly inventive, and both the giant and human world looks like the kind of place you would love to visit. Possibly best of all, though, is the acting. Nicholas Hoult, the cute kid from About a Boy, has matured into a charming, personable leading man. He seems heroic and cool while also being a little dorky and completely relateable. His dynamic with Eleanor Tomlinson is genuine and enjoyable, even if her character of Princess Isabbelle is both an annoyingly spunky and precocious (read: selfish) teen and a whiny, utterly useless damsel in distress. In fact, Tomlinson should win award just for successfully thwarting the writers attempts to make the year’s most dislikeable character.

The supporting cast is full of A-list actors such as Stanley Tucci as a villainous human noble and Bill Nighy as General Fallon (it isn’t just his voice; he did all the acting too in a motion capture suit). Character actor Eddie Marson plays a doomed redshirt audiences actually care about (kudos to Singer for not editing him out); and Ian McShane is a scene stealer as the King. Best of all, though, is Ewan McGregor as Sir Elmont, who ends up partnered with the peasant Jack. Generally this role would be comic relief (like Prince Charming in Shrek 2) but the screenplay lets McGreggor form an utterly charming, funny, cool, and actually quite smart warrior: I would love to see a spin-off just about that character.
There are a lot of flaws with this movie, but it is still great fun, and the kind you can bring the whole family to.