Olympus Has Fallen - Review

Olympus Has Fallen
(2013 - March 22)
Action | Thriller
2 hrs.

Rated: R Strong violence and language throughout Read more
Grade: B-

Director: Antoine Fuqua
Writers: Creighton Rothenberger, Katrin Benedikt
Stars: Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman | See full cast and crew

The unthinkable happens when heavily armed and highly trained terrorists launch a bold daytime attack on the White House. The building is overrun, and President Benjamin Asher (Aaron Eckhart) and his staff are taken hostage. Luckily for Asher, former presidential security officer Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) is on the scene. With time running out, it's up to Banning to locate Asher's son before the extremists do and rescue the president before his captors unleash their ultimate plan.

Some movie lines are prophetic, when Gerard Butler as hero Mike Banning says, 'With all due respect, I'm the best you've got.'...he's right, this is the best we're gonna' get. Once you accept that reality you can ignore the films spoon fed implausibility, xenophobia, propaganda and clichés enough to choke a horse and simply enjoy A Good Day To Die Hard At The White House, Under Siege, On Air Force One. I suspect it is destined to be a financial success and an audience pleaser. On it's opening weekend it has already earned back half of it's $70 million budget, but it will not hold up as a 'classic'.

I understand hating this film, and in some ways I did, there are plenty of moments of stupidity that are worthy of audience disdain, but like a diabetic eating a dark chocolate Dove/Magnum ice cream bar, I enjoyed it anyway.

The pacing keeps the film moving along, a credit to the director, the actors are engaged and committed to the script taking it all seriously enough that even though the story is ridiculous and silly, they help the audience accept the film's emotional button pushing agenda.

Olympus Has Fallen is a popcorn eating action flick, plain and simple. I was not excited about seeing this film, judging strictly from the movie trailers over the past several months but it was better than what I was expecting, however, like the recent Argo, there was no need for all the profanity especially the ones starting with 'F', I found it very off-putting and distracting.

As a note of local trivia, Aaron Eckhart (President Benjamin Asher) got his start in the movies right here in Utah while a film major at Brigham Young University. He was raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon) and served a two year mission for the church prior to his graduation, but according to Aaron, in an interview, "It would be hypocritical to call myself a Mormon, I haven't lived that lifestyle for years".

Cast

  Gerard Butler         Aaron Eckhart          Morgan Freeman

   Mike Banning      President Benjamin Asher     Speaker Trumbull 

         Rick Yune           Angela Bassett        Dylan McDermott  
 Kang                   Secretary of Defense                 Forbes
  Ruth McMillan

The Campaign - Review

The Campaign

10 August 2012 (USA)

85 min - Comedy

Rated R 

Language (Including crude and pervasive use of  the F bomb, crass and vile sexual references, profanity, blasphemy...you name it its got it.) Crude, Tasteless Sexual Content and Brief Nudity

Director: Jay Roach

Writers: Chris Henchy (screenplay), Shawn Harwell (screenplay)

Grade: D-

Stars: Will Ferrell, Zach Galifianakis, Jason Sudeikis, Dylan McDermott, Katherine LaNasa, Sarah Baker, John Lithgow, Dan Aykroyd, Brian Cox and  Karen Maruyama

In order to gain influence over their North Carolina district, two CEOs seize an opportunity to oust long-term congressman Cam Brady by putting up a rival candidate. Their man: naive Marty Huggins, director of the local Tourism Center.

With the assumption by the critics and industry bean counters, The Campaign is expected to be the box office victor this weekend, so I took one for the team and reluctantly saw this film against my better judgement. Admittedly, I have never seen a Will Farrell movie assuming them to be tasteless and crass (Farrell's SNL work is a testament to the bad taste that is the legacy of his prurient body of work, now unfettered by TV censorship.) and, boy was I ever right. Next one out...I'll pass.
The Campaign is the latest in a string of Will Ferrell (SNL alum) vehicles, that open in late Summer every other year. In 2004 came Anchorman (grossed $85.3 million), next was Talladega Nights ($148.2 million), Step Brothers ($100.5 million) and The Other Guys ($119.2 million). All four of these movies opened to at least $28 million. Even with strong support from Hangover star Zach Galifianakis it is unlikely that The Campaign will match that.

The only bright spots (dim as they are) of this humorless, tasteless, vile and trashy assault on decency, morality, propriety, values, honesty are the performances of Zach Galifanakis and Karen Maruyama (Mrs. Yao) and the only reason The Campaign gets graded a D- rather than and F. Still the adage about casting your pearls before swine comes to mind. Without all the profanity, this might have had some redeeming value, but Ferrell is so vulgar that it's off-putting and offensive.

Political comedy movies don't tend to fare very well and this one is not likely to reverse that trend. The Campaign is a political comedy with little bite in its satire and bias in its political stance. This is the type of film that anyone involved in it's production should be ashamed to admit to their parents that they were a part of it. I know I would.

The Cast:

also:
Grant Goodman ...
Clay Huggins
Kya Haywood ...
Dylan Huggins
Randall D. Cunningham ...
Cam Jr. (as Randall Cunningham)
Madison Wolfe ...
Jessica Brady
Thomas Middleditch ...
Travis

The tagline for The Campaign is "May the best loser win.", The only way anyone wins with this one is to exercise your vote to stay at away from the theater.

This is the man responsible for this trash, Director Jay Roach.