White House Down

Hitting the arcade with ONE roll of quarters that lasts all day on a Saturday and watching The Empire Strikes Back 8 times in the theater with my big brother are two me of my fondest memories of growing up in the 80’s!  Christopher Reeve was my Superman and Adam West was my Batman.  Now all grown-up, 40 something, living in New Zealand and a mom of two not-so-teenagers, I’ve decided to give you my opinion, whether you like it or not.  No matter what the genre, a good movie = realistic acting, good direction, seamless editing, a clever script and interesting story-line that doesn’t drag.  It doesn’t take a huge budget to impress me, just yummy ingredients.  (Napoleon Dynamite and Moonrise Kingdom are two of my all-time-favorites.)  Now for my view… a Kiwi Lady review. Being a huge Jamie Foxx fan since “Ugly Girl” from “In Living Color” and not gonna miss an op to see Channing Tatum, White House Down seemed like the perfect choice of a film.  This action-packed, shoot em-up delivers some great scenes, incredible CG of the Capitol Building exploding, and enough fighting sequences for the manliest of men!  read more…

White House Down – Channing Tatum

Ok, so I watched this latest Channing Tatum film with the pre-conceived notion that I was going to get a generous dose of eye candy and  maybe some action, actually not expecting  much.  (This is the way I would recommend anyone going into a film, you come out way less disappointed for sure.)

Here are my positives: Jamie Foxx always delivers his acting chops, and a few one-liners for comic relief in tense moments.

Channing Tatum always delivers his good boy looks, but can hold him own with some hard action fighting sequences and plenty of on target shooting up the bad guys.

The story line, hmmm well, let’s try to forget that only 3 months ago we had Olympus Has Fallen, which is basically the same story, but gives us a bit more beautifully shot and cinematic feel.  Also, the similarity to Die Hard (one) kept creeping in, just replace John McLean’s wife with the President’s daughter, and location and you  pretty much have the same scenario.  Saying that, Die Hard was awesome, so originality…schmoriginality, if it’s a good story you can make substitutes, change a detail or two and keep Hollywood in business for many years to come.

White House Down – Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx

There are only a few complaints worth mentioning.  First would be that the writers seem to omit some details to connect the scenes and a couple transitions felt choppy.  The other was a bit of cheese, guessing to lighten the mood, but the White House Tour Guide Guy kept popping up in odd places, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he was related to someone in the production so they gave him a bigger part.

We like to see the good guys win, we like to see the bad guys fall, and this film delivers, even with a little twist in the end that you may not be expecting.   Overall a good flick for anyone that likes an action packed thrill ride with plenty of combat fights, decent acting and a good ending.

4 out of 5 Stars from me.