OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN
‘Olympus Has Fallen’ sort of took me for surprise. When comparing
these two films, ‘Olympus Has Fallen’ is far more intense, not just because of
the fact that this movie was rated R compared to White House Down’s more
audience-friendly PG-13 rating; a serious tone is maintained throughout the
entire course of the film. In a way, it works and in some ways it doesn’t. With
a premise like this, it seems like everyone involved in this film was taking it
a little too seriously because let’s face it; this is sort of a silly premise. While
that is sort of a flaw, the main character Mike Banning surprisingly has a good
amount of depth to him. He was once a member of the President’s Secret Service,
but left the job after an incident that resulted in the death of the First
Lady. For the record, both of these films’ leads are in a similar situation;
they’re trying to turn their lives around and they ultimately do… by saving the
President in the process. In the case of this movie, it’s less cliché than in
‘White House Down’ (more on that in a bit). On that note, the best thing about
this whole movie is Gerald Butler’s performance in the lead role. To put it
simply, these kinds of movies are the ones where he’s at his best. The rest of
the cast does a fine job as well and in the end, while ‘Olympus Has Fallen’
takes itself a bit too seriously, it’s still pretty entertaining.
Rating: 3.5/5
WHITE HOUSE DOWN
Right off the bat, the key difference between these two
movies is their overall tone. ‘Olympus Has Fallen’ was more serious while ‘White
House Down’ doesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s more lighthearted and in
this one, the President even gets involved in the action. However, this film
ends up being even more cliché than ‘Olympus’. This film doesn’t pull many
surprises. One cliché in particular that I’m getting rather sick of is the
‘deadbeat dad’ plotline… mainly because it’s been in most of director Roland
Emmerich’s movies (‘2012’, ‘Independence Day’, ‘The Day After Tomorrow’, etc…).
On the bright side, like with ‘Olympus’, this film benefits from the
performances from its leads; in this case, Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx. The
two work off each other very well, which helps to ease the tension during some
of this film’s more intense moments. All in all, they help make this movie
entertaining despite its flaws; most of which stem from the writing.
Rating: 3.5/5
How these two films fared:
As far as critical reception was concerned, both of these
films received rather mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, ‘White
House Down’ has the better ratings (50%), but just by 2% over ‘Olympus Has
Fallen’. The former also earned more at the box office (over $200 million),
which may have been because of the film’s summer release date (the latter was
released in March). However, with a budget of $150 million, it’s considered to
be a bit of a flop. Meanwhile, ‘Olympus Has Fallen’ grossed more than twice its
budget (which was a more modest $70 million) and a sequel is currently in
development that will take place in London.
Overall winner:
This is a tough one because, as shown by my ratings for these
two films, I’m not really sure if one of these films is better than the other.
Neither is particularly original, so it all depends on the way each film is
executed. From a writing standpoint, ‘Olympus Has Fallen’ has a better
developed lead character while ‘White House Down’ is full of clichés. However,
I’d say ‘White House Down’ was more entertaining. ‘Olympus Has Fallen’ was
surprisingly very intense, but it felt like it was taking itself way too
seriously. ‘White House Down’ is a more straight-forward popcorn flick. So in
the end, I’ll give the slight edge to ‘White House Down’ but for the record, I
do think both of these films are pretty entertaining. It just depends on what
you’re looking for; a super-intense action thriller, or a more light-hearted one.
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