Olympus Has Fallen & London Has Fallen

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Earlier tonight I was talking about Gerard Butler in the Den of Thieves thread and it got me thinking about his career.

I never saw Olympus Has Fallen or London Has Fallen, but I knew they were legitimate hits for him. Apparently OHF made $170 million and LHF made over $200 million. So I figured what the hell, I'll bust a double-feature tonight and see what they're all about.

Olympus Has Fallen is actually a really solid action film. It's a Die Hard knock-off, but it's one of the good ones. You know how you have Die Hard on a bus (Speed), Die Hard on a ship (Under Siege), Die Hard on a mountain (Cliffhanger), etc. Well this is Die Hard in a White House.

The action is hard-R, with dudes getting stabbed in the throat, being shot at point blank range and getting the shit kicked out of them. Butler plays a Secret Service agent who happens to be an ex-Army Ranger and he's convincing as a bad ass. The scene where the terrorists launch their attack on Washington and take over the White House is very well done and genuinely thrilling stuff.

The film is also shot well enough that I got curious about who directed it and it turns out it's Antoine Fuqua. That really surprised me, but when I saw that I was like, oh, okay, no wonder it's actually pretty good.

So I finished OHF and then rolled right into London Has Fallen. It's an okay sequel to the first film but nothing more than that. The director--Babak Najafi, who I had never heard of--seems to have a good eye for visuals and knows how to frame a shot, but the story wasn't especially interesting, the action is more implausible than the first film and it just altogether feels like a lesser movie than its brother. It's not bad if you're just looking for mindless action, but don't expect a lot of satisfaction dramatically.

I would give OHF a 7.5. LHF I'd probably give a 6 or 6.5.

From what I read earlier, there's going to be a third entry into the franchise that's supposed to go into production this year, Angel Has Fallen. We'll see how that goes.

Anyone else have thoughts on these films?

Trailers:





 
Haven't seen them but they have to be much, much better than their competition White House Down.
 
I didn't know these movies were related.
 
I enjoyed both, but LHF drags for a majority of the movie. Great deaths in the beginning and above average final assault set piece.
 
Saw London has fallen. Can't remember where or why I saw it.

Completely forgettable, to the point where it took me a minute to remember whether I had actually seen it, or just seen the trailer.

All I remember is quite a good ending where he shoots a shit load of terrorists in a tunnel or some kinda dark building...and some terrible looking CGI explosions.

And wasn't the president going to be executed on live streaming?
 
BisexualMMA said:
Haven't seen them but they have to be much, much better than their competition White House Down.
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I would say that Olympus Has Fallen was better than White House Down, and I say that as someone who actually didn't hate White House Down like a lot of other people seem to do.

It's actually interesting to compare the two because each film seems to come from a distinctly different political inclination. Olympus Has Fallen felt like a right-leaning film to me in it's stance on terrorism and overt patriotism, whereas White House Down obviously leaned hard left.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
I would say that Olympus Has Fallen was better than White House Down, and I say that as someone who actually didn't hate White House Down like a lot of other people seem to do.

It's actually interesting to compare the two because each film seems to come from a distinctly different political inclination. Olympus Has Fallen felt like a right-leaning film to me in it's stance on terrorism and overt patriotism, whereas White House Down obviously leaned hard left.
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I thought White House Down was easily one of the worst films I saw that year that had a theatrical release. Maybe one of the worst of the decade.
 
Both crap but still better than the other knock off "White house down"
 
Katsumi Yamada said:
Saw London has fallen. Can't remember where or why I saw it.

Completely forgettable, to the point where it took me a minute to remember whether I had actually seen it, or just seen the trailer.

All I remember is quite a good ending where he shoots a shit load of terrorists in a tunnel or some kinda dark building...and some terrible looking CGI explosions.

And wasn't the president going to be executed on live streaming?
Click to expand...

You really should watch Olympus Has Fallen. Like I said, if LHF is a 6 or 6.5 then OHF is a 7.5.

So if you even moderately enjoyed London then I think you'll have a good time with Olympus.
 
BisexualMMA said:
I thought White House Down was easily one of the worst films I saw that year that had a theatrical release. Maybe one of the worst of the decade.
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It annoyed me with its politics but judging it purely on its merits as a film I didn't think it was bad. I distinctly remember the action reminding me of some of the films that came out in the mid-90s.

Do you remember why you thought it was so shitty?
 
shadow_priest_x said:
It annoyed me with its politics but judging it purely on its merits as a film I didn't think it was bad. I distinctly remember the action reminding me of some of the films that came out in the mid-90s.

Do you remember why you thought it was so shitty?
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I've blocked out a lot of the details. I think it was terrible and horribly cliched character development, maybe a ridiculous coincidence or two in the plot. It was basically all of the worst things about Roland Emmerich, all on steroids, and few if any of the good things he can do. But I really remember hating it and wanting it to end more than the precise reasons why.
 
BisexualMMA said:
I've blocked out a lot of the details. I think it was terrible and horribly cliched character development, maybe a ridiculous coincidence or two in the plot. It was basically all of the worst things about Roland Emmerich, all on steroids, and few if any of the good things he can do. But I really remember hating it and wanting it to end more than the precise reasons why.
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I'd be curious about your response to Olympus Has Fallen.
 
I enjoyed it and OHF is better than LHF for sure but LHF was still solid albeit forgettable in large doses movie. OHF is good and I enjoy alot of Butler's movies. Some really good brutal parts in it. He has some underrated flicks. I'll eventually want to see Den of Thieves just for the hell of it.
 
El Che said:
I enjoyed it and OHF is better than LHF for sure but LHF was still solid albeit forgettable in large doses movie. OHF is good and I enjoy alot of Butler's movies. Some really good brutal parts in it. He has some underrated flicks. I'll eventually want to see Den of Thieves just for the hell of it.
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The thing I think really separates the two is that Olympus Has Fallen is smarter and more interesting on a story level.

London Has Fallen's story, in comparison, feels more generic and bland. But if you're just wanting a movie with some shootin' and some fightin' and some explosions then it will do.
 
Both are good turn your brain off and enjoy the action movies
 
Two solid action movies. I like the combination of gunplay and semi realistic krav maga style hand to hand scenes.

Like bourne movies, taken movies, bond movies with craig, John wick, Jack reacher, ect
 
Those films kill brain cells quicker than Tequila.
 
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