London Has Fallen is a ridiculous movie. One which is filled with moments that are unbelievable or happen because of extreme coincidences. Aaron Eckhart and Gerard Butler are back again for this sequel to Olympus Has Fallen as the American president and his bodyguard. This time it isn’t the White House which is attacked, but as you might guess, London.
All the world leaders head to the city after the prime minister has unexpectedly passed away. And just before the ceremony is about to start and all the heads of state are still on their way, terrorist attacks happen all over town which according to the film must have taken years to plan, but which in reality are completely unbelievable. If you were to believe this movie central London has been flooded by terrorist who have infiltrated security forces everywhere and know exactly where each of the world leaders can be found and targeted.
Mike Banning (Butler) seems to be an invincible superhero bodyguard who is able to get the upper hand in every situation, going in like Rambo and even goes looking for problems (at one point he decides to head to the embassy even though he said himself it is the most dangerous place before instead of just driving out of London). No one in the city can be trusted (not even the police) and it is up to Banning to get the president to safety. This is all happening while the American vice-president (played by Morgan Freeman) and the English crisis centre just try to look serious without effectively doing much to help the two.
Although this is a movie with a budget of about 60 million dollars the bad CGI really stands out and you regularly see more money should have been spent. Explosions don’t look convincing at all, a helicopter scene seems to have come straight out of a video game and the water effects during an explosion on the Thames make it seem like someone threw a pebble in a puddle. And still…despite that criticism I still was able to enjoy London Has Fallen. The action moments which are there, whether those are car chases or shootouts in various environments, managed to entertain me. Is London Has Fallen a good film? No. Did I enjoy it? Yeah. And that to me is something I always use to decide the score I give a film.
I have liked other ridiculous movies before but at least those were entertaining. I can’t say the same about this one. I think I hated the story/character/dialog so much I didn’t even think the CGI was THAT bad, ahah. I wish I didn’t waste 2 hrs seeing this.
How would you compare this to Triple 9 Ruth?
Sorry I just saw this comment Jordan. I haven’t seen Triple 9, my pal Ted saw & reviewed it for me. I bet it’s still eons better than this one.
Absolutely. Was thinking the same thing as I watched this, and yet, strangely entertained. Occasionally, laughing at some of the quips.
This reminds me of what I have been reading about Triple 9. Doubt this will ever get to Aussie theatres though
I’m still looking forward to seeing this one. I had a lot of fun with the old school, cheesy first film. If it can give me some of that same explosive silliness I will be happy.
Nothing wrong with enjoying a crappy film from time to time. I’m hanging to see this one on DVD at some point. Nice job!
Diabolical film from start to finish. I could find no redeeming features in it. Not only did it fail to entertain, it managed to be offensively stupid at the same time. The implausibility of the set-up is one thing but the film is far too proud of its own self-worth, the idea of the infallibility of the American hero, that its missteps are even more pronounced. Horrible dialogue, horrible CGI, horrible politics, horrible film.