Roland Emmerich, the master of disaster, he returns to the place that truly started his career and easily the scene of his most iconic triumph; the White House. To say I've not been a fan of Emmerich's films over the years has been an understatement, he is much more orientated towards the spectacle rather than including some much needed substance which I understand is intended to be the appeal for his films. For me though, it just isn't enough. Was White House Down any different? Find out.
If you go to into a Roland Emmerich film expecting a firmly layered and intricate plot waiting for you, you've been sadly mistaken. This is the recurring case which leads into White House Down as there isn't really much there. Thankfully I've grown to understand this so it is always there for me to remember if I ever do come across one of his films. Sometimes this can work don't get me wrong. If a film is entertaining enough and offers something else in another department then it can easily account for the lack of a detailed plot. I would say for the most part, the film manages to do so. We have a 20-30 minute intro where the build up to the big action set piece is taking place. Character development and mini backgrounds to the protagonists and major players in the game are included which attempts to convince the audience to later invest emotions into these characters. I wouldn't say I did and to be perfectly honest, this was without doubt the worst part of the film for me. If I'm going into a summer action blockbuster such as White House Down, then I want to be amazed by the action sequences and visuals as opposed to trying to give depth to a story about the White House being taken over and destroyed. It could sound like I'm actually contradicting myself here but with a Roland Emmerich movie, I don't expect this and I am more than happy for him to blow my mind with the gun fights, hand to hand combat and sheer destruction taking place. If he's never included this in his latter films, why start now?!
This partially leads me into my next point of the pacing of the film. I will first mention that this opening of attempted development was extremely slow. What was around 20-30 minutes felt like an extended period of time for me personally, I was on edge waiting for something to be destroyed or someone to be shot. It's actually an aspect of the earlier released and strangely similar 'Olympus Has Fallen' that I can appreciate - the fact that it more or less got straight into what the trailers, photos and synopsis were depicting what the film would be - sheer mayhem. For the duration, it had the generic pacing of action set piece, slow moment of characters recovering etc, followed by action set piece, etc, etc. It followed a pretty standard format and I didn't have a problem with it because again, this was something that I was expecting the film to do.
A little pet hate that this film fell into the trap of several times was including these lighter hearted moments and gags that modern day action films feel the need to implement. They were thrown in left, right and centre and I couldn't stress how out of place they felt at times. I'll admit, a couple of times some of them made me laugh but I'm left constantly thinking to myself even after these moments "Why was that in there?". They're of course trying to appeal to more mass audiences, making it more suitable and less full on for families, making the stretch of drawing in children much wider. I don't mind them doing that but surely there are simpler, more effective ways of doing so. It feels like a really picky thing to attack the film on but it's just something I'm getting quite frankly sick to death of in films nowadays.
An aspect that Emmerich can more than outmatch many directors are the effects that he incorporates into his films. Even in the utterly abysmal '2012' there was great visual and special effects in that film that was probably worth at least sitting through it once just getting to see the sheer spectacle the man had to offer us. It's something that he very rarely fails on and I'd have to say he delivered once again. Now I've seen some people saying they thought the effects were terrible. I can vouch for them not being perfect by a long shot, in moments they had some cartoony look to them but you're bound to get that in places. I will definitely say they were leaps and bounds above that of Olympus Has Fallen in which I thought for the most part they were absolutely terrible. Even if they weren't the best effects, I certainly didn't have a problem with them and they sure as hell didn't take me out of the movie.
What is with the choppy, cutaway editing that films through in these days too? I'm getting sick of them trying to throw away a perfectly intriguing action sequence and attempting to make it seem much grander and hectic than it really is. It's just a cheap tool to try and trick the audience in to thinking more is happening than it actually is. Nobody is fooled or wowed by this, not to my knowledge anyway. All this does is just confuses and disorientate people, while the editor is clearly thinking they are drawing in the audience, they are in fact just uninteresting them in such an ineffective way. Since it was more or less a recurring thing throughout the action sequences, more so the outdoor ones involving Tatum and Foxx trying to escape from the mercenaries; on a whole I have to say that it was poor editing I'm afraid.
I will however praise the editing and potentially contradict myself yet again by saying the combination of that, the visuals and sound did a good job of upping the intensity and making a gripping finale. Normally for any film if you've not been wowed throughout, then the ending sequence will not do all that much for you but this wasn't the case for me. Overall, I had a good time with the film and was fairly entertained but the final sequence was great I thought. I got the real sense of the stakes being high and that everything really did come down to this, the whole fate of potentially the world in Channing Tatum's character's hands. A well executed final action sequence that left me pretty satisfied until of course the ending. If you haven't seen the film then just skip the rest of this paragraph while I get this off my chest. Another reason why trying to make it light hearted and fit for all is a ridiculous waste of time. "Mr President wants to do the thing" What an utterly disgraceful line and attempt a final gag from the writer which left me with a fairly sour taste in my mouth. Not to say that the rest of the film was a masterpiece but I wasn't bored like I felt I might have been from the initial trailers.
I think a couple of things that I will quickly cover includes the acting. All in all it was pretty bog standard, what you would expect from this type of flick. Nobody was particularly bad, but there won't be any Academy Award nominations for these guys. Channing Tatum was a good 'bad-ass' and maintains to be in my good books for the time being after his roles in Side Effects and 21 Jump Street. Jamie Foxx was decent, far away from many of the great performances he's given over the years but I didn't have a problem with him. I feel by saying this I'm going to get abuse or told I'm wrong but I actually thought Joey King was quite good. She could have easily been one of the annoying child actresses that we so long for avoiding these days but she was more than bearable, in fact displayed some pretty good chops if you ask me.
Another is a minor gripe that I had which completely unsettled me throughout and was part of the reasoning that my score may seem a little harsh in the end. Now I'm not one to nit pick with films like so many do. Take The Dark Knight Rises for example, I thought it was a solid film, I picked out a few problems that it had but I certainly didn't think it was infested with problems and hiccups like so many did. I couldn't help but point out irrational decisions, reactions, and just general flaws with the movie. Some that I had included how did these mercenaries gain access into the White House? If it the most protected location in the world, how did a group of invaders manage to fool the heavily trained guards? A simple check from a worker later on revealed all of the identities and records for these people so how they could slip past so easily is beyond me. Another was how did Emily last as long as she did roaming around, remaining undetected by the invaders? Hiding behind curtains around corners that this highly trained team would not check doesn't seem like the perfect hide and seek spot to me. There are so many others I could touch upon such as the generic twist of both *spoiler alert* James Woods and Richard Jenkins being in on the act and revealing they were bad guys all along. Or that the authorities took an awfully long time to at least devise a plan or attempt to breach the White House considering that it was the biggest attack the US had ever seen and the current President was trapped inside. But who cares ay? I guess it's one of those films where you REALLY have to suspend your disbelief. Like seriously, throw it completely out of the window. Otherwise you'll be out of the cinema within the first 10 minutes.
Overall, I can't say White House Down was terrible but it just wasn't good by any means. Don't get me wrong, I was entertained while watching it but it won't last very long in my memory that's for sure. Some cool, exciting action sequences is what you were expecting, and that is exactly what you'll get. Was it too long? Definitely. Was there some dull, drawn out scenes that could have easily been cut? Sure. Was it fun to see Tatum and Foxx take these mercenaries out and have over 2 hours of explosions? Damn right. While it was about what I was expecting on terms of quality, I had a decent time watching it while it was on so for that, it earns it's 2 stars.
At least it was better than 2012.
No comments:
Post a Comment