White House Down (2013) [Blu-ray]
Action | Drama | Thriller

Tagline: It Will Start Like Any Other Day.

Capitol Policeman John Cale (Channing Tatum) has just been denied his dream job with the Secret Service of protecting President James Sawyer (Jamie Foxx). Not wanting to let down his little girl with the news, he takes her on a tour of the White House, during which the complex is overtaken by a heavily armed paramilitary group. Now, with the nation's government falling into chaos and time running out, it's up to Cale to save the president, his daughter, and the country. Co-starring Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke, Richard Jenkins and James Woods.

Storyline: Capitol Policeman John Cale has just been denied his dream job with the Secret Service of protecting President James Sawyer. Not wanting to let down his little girl with the news, he takes her on a tour of the White House, when the complex is overtaken by a heavily armed paramilitary group. Now, with the nation's government falling into chaos and time running out, it's up to Cale to save the president, his daughter, and the country. Written by Columbia Pictures

Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Martin Liebman on October 27, 2013 -- Spectacle filmmaker Roland Emmerich likes his big time action, his epic scale, and his mass destruction. He trashed the globe in 2012, he blew up the White House and nuked Houston in Independence Day, and he flooded and froze New York in The Day After Tomorrow. He's the undisputed king of epic Disaster movies, and as such it's sometimes easy to forget that he's made more focused, slightly more personal, more character-driven Action movies, too. Stargate, Universal Soldier, and The Patriot represent his escape from the large-scale Disaster film and foray into smaller, but not significantly less spectacular, Action fare. He returns to that latter style of movie in White House Down, a largely disappointing paint-by-numbers assault on both the White House and the audience's senses. It's big and macho to be sure, but it's so void of substance and so disappointingly routine that it never comes across as anything but a big dollar special effects show that occasionally depicts characters shooting, quipping, or yelling at one another. It's a serviceable Action film, but those looking for a more complex, authoritative Action escape should definitely look elsewhere, and particularly to the far superior "attack on the White House" movie of 2013, Olympus Has Fallen.

Capital Police Officer John Cale (Channing Tatum) aspires to become a secret service agent. He's on the detail for U.S. House Speaker Eli Raphelson (Richard Jenkins) but aspires to something greater. Unfortunately, his credentials don't paint a very flattering picture. He's seen as capable but a slacker, someone who can't get things done. He insists he's changed, but the prospects for landing the coveted position aren't promising. That's doubly disappointing because his estranged daughter Emily (Joey King) is in love with Washington, D.C. and the political system, and inside access would certainly bring her back closer to him. Cale earns some brownie points with his daughter when he secures them a pass for a White House tour, and things take a turn for the surreal when their group bumps into President Sawyer (Jamie Foxx) who gives Emily a sound byte for her YouTube channel. Unfortunately, the good vibes are instantly drained when an explosion rocks the U.S. Capital building and heavily-armed men, already in position within the White House, take the tour group hostage. John manages to escape and takes the fight to the enemy, all the while fearing for his daughter's safety and finding himself defending none other than the President himself.

White House Down fluctuates between breezily entertaining and downright ridiculous. Unfortunately, the latter observation dominates. It never reaches the sort of heights for which the finest Action movies strive and it doesn't even come close to replicating the high quality escapism of its direct competition, Olympus Has Fallen. The picture plays like a very poorly realized recreation of Die Hard with the White House subbing for Nakatomi and lame digital effects replacing practical stunts. Substitute the estranged daughter for the estranged wife, replace the limo with the Presidential "beast," swap out Theo with Skip, get rid of one of cinema's most memorable villains and replace him with a politician or two, and, oh, why not, use some precision missiles to blow up some choppers carrying special forces to the scene. And none of it ever comes close to matching the majesty of Die Hard. Worse, one of the most critical scenes comes straight out of The Rock; just replace flares with a flag. The picture duplicates rather than innovates in almost every scene. It's admittedly action-packed but there's no life to it, no pride in the content. It's as straightforward and dumbed-down as these sorts of movies can be, a rather grating, "why even bother" experience that barely produces a pulse beyond the flashes at the end of its ceaselessly firing guns.

Almost worse is the film's constant abuse of the humor crutch. Nary a sequence goes by without some lame effort at generating a laugh from the audience, the film's obvious and desperate attempt to mask its lazy script and uninspired action. Ultimately, the bad efforts at humor only worsen the experience, not improve upon it. More, the acting does neither that humor nor the greater film any favors. The performances are dry and the emotion seems forced into every scene. The relationships are never believable and the confrontations feel staged rather than natural. Every character is painfully flat and so linearly structured that there's absolutely no surprise as to what happens to whom, how it happens, and why, all encapsulated in that The Rock ripoff scene at the end that comes across as the corny culmination of a completely disappointing movie. Granted, the actors never have much of a chance to improve on bad material, but they certainly don't do much to inject a positive energy, either. From Foxx and Tatum on down, there's a very stiff, by-the-book feel that runs through the movie. The final insult-to-injury comes in the form of the surprisingly poor special effects that look flat and very much the product of CGI. Nothing looks authentic; characters appear as if they've been Photoshopped into a number of scenes while digital vehicles look like plastic toys, both more than enough to detract from whatever tension, emotional content, or adrenaline any scene manages to create.

White House Down fails on nearly every level. The action proves terribly routine, the script falls short of mediocrity, the performances are flat, the humor is overbearing, there's not an original moment to be found, and most of the movie looks like it's made out of plastic or inside Photoshop. It's grossly inferior to Die Hard, never mind its "White House under siege" 2013 counterpart, Olympus Has Fallen. There is decent chemistry between Tatum and Foxx, but that's hardly enough to save one of the most disappointing Action films of the past several years. Sony's Blu-ray release of White House Down does feature genuinely fantastic video and audio. A healthy assortment of featurettes are included. Worth a rental as a companion piece to Olympus Has Fallen.

[CSW] -2.6- This is a fairly entertaining popcorn actioner, but it has too many similarities to other like-themed movies, like "Air Force One" and the recent "Olympus Has Fallen"; both of which, by the way, are much better films than this one. It offers very little that is new; and it takes itself far too seriously for an actioner with its overt simplistic, cliché-laden, left wing political themes... which introduce huge plot holes that you have to consciously ignore just to enjoy this heavy actioner. On the plus side the action sequences - though choppy at times - are well done and entertaining; and the acting - especially the comic chemistry between Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx - is superb. In addition to Foxx and Tatum, look for standout performances from Maggie Gyllenhaal, as a lead Secret Service Agent; and child actor, Joey King, as Tatum's daughter. If it is a rainy Friday evening and you have popcorn and you like action movies and you really don't have anything else better to do, this is definitely worth a rental.
[V5.0-A5.0] MPEG-4 AVC - No D-Box motion codes were available at the time of this rental although they are available now.

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