Olympus Has Fallen
Director: Antoine Fuqua
Writer: Creighton Rothenberger, Katrin Benedikt
Cast: Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Finley Jacobsen, Dylan McDermott,
Rick Yune, Morgan Freeman, Angela Bassett, Melissa Leo, Radha Mitchell, Ashley Judd

Plot:
Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) was President Asher’s (Aaron Eckhart) first bodyguard and friend. Until he wasn’t able to safe the life of the First Lady (Ashley Judd). 18 months later he’s working a desk job even though he wants nothing more than to get back at the president’s side. Then the White House is attacked, the president is being held hostage in his own bunker and Mike finds himself in the middle of things, trying his best to save everyone.

I didn’t expect Olympus Has Fallen to be any good. @kathrintha and I went in with a bottle of alcohol and the distinct suspicion that it was going to be awful. We had no idea how awful though and when we ran out of (ready-made) Mojito half-way through, the movie became pretty much unbearable.

It was clear that this movie was going to be a uber-USAmerican patriotic crapfest. But they really overdid it. This is a movie where the Korean delegation drives over the remnants of the 4th of July decoration. Where terrorists take down the USAmerican flag in the middle of their attack because they apparently don’t have anything better to do. Where pretty much every character in the movie gets to make their own patriotic little speech. It was nauseating.

It was also combined with a whole lot of Xenophobia. Not only are all North Koreans evil (and they didn’t even have the decency to include a token good Asian), there’s also this one USAmerican dude (Dylan McDermott) who went to work for the South Koreans, to be bought by the North Koreans, doing evil things until he’s confronted with his wrongdoings by Mike and gets to redeem himself by helping Mike out before dying. [Not to mention the fact that the evilness of the guy was telegraphed so badly that in the first scene I saw him I thought he would turn out to be bad, to be only briefly moved from that assumption when he mentioned that he was retiring because then I thought that he’d just die.]

All of this is of course made even more delicious by the fact that Gerard Butler isn’t actually from the US, as opposed to Rick Yune.

But even if your favorite pastime is to paint the USAmerican Flag on your face and walk around alternatively chanting “USAUSAUSA” and quoting Abraham Lincoln, I doubt that you would get much from this film.

I mean, Morgan Freeman is great. Melissa Leo kicks ass. And Rick Yune is all sorts of cool (and hot). But in the end that doesn’t change the fact that Olympus Has Fallen is a bad movie that is way too long and that repeatedly hits you over the head with its metaphors.

Summarising: Hell no.