By Nicholas Davies

They’re calling this film ‘Die Hard’ in the White House’. And they’re right.

In fact, that sums it up so well that there isn’t really a whole lot else to say.

The film perfectly, predictably enjoyable if you like this sort of thing – which, for the record, I do. It goes something like this: Mike Banning, a top-drawer Secret Service agent (Gerard Butler) is in disgrace with US President Ben Asher (Aaron Eckhart); Kang (Rick Yune), an unhinged terrorist type from North Korea seeking vengeance for personal and political damages pulls together a small army and stages a daring and remarkably successful siege of the White House aforementioned agent redeems himself by singlehandedly rescuing the President, the President’s son, the United States of America and, yes, Planet Earth. Oh, and his troubled relationship with his wife.

Now, yes, I’m being a tad cynical about summing up the film in this way, but in terms of narrative arc, character development and plot points, there isn’t a whole lot of new territory being covered here.

What I do find interesting is how extreme some of the film’s elements are – I’m having a bit of a critic’s daydream that there’s perhaps more going on than meets the eye. We’re talking big names, after all – Butler and Eckhart are joined by the likes of Morgan Freeman, Melissa Leo, Dylan McDermott and Angela Bassett –and I like to think that these folks are trying to do something smart. (Chances are I’m off base and that the film is just your bog-standard mediocre thriller, but indulge me for a moment.)

There’s the hyper-violence. Crowds of Washingtonians are mowed down by machine-gun fire. There are countless at-close-range-gunshot-wounds-to-the-head. Knives, broken necks and hand-to-hand combat round things out. There’s some information extracted through torture, too – perpetrated by both hero and villain.

Patriotism goes way overboard as well – even for Americans. Check out the shots of the Stars and Stripes, first drifting to the ground full of bulletholes; later being hoisted over the destroyed White House in a shot reminiscent of Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima. Or the Secretary of Defence (an excellently hysterical performance from Leo) repeating the pledge of allegiance as she is dragged kicking and screaming out of the presidential bunker. Then there’s the melodrama of the collapse of the Washington Monument and the gradual destruction of the White House and its familiar Oval Office and Lincoln bedroom. And let’s not forget that a fundamental decision being made by those in power here is whether or not the life of the US President is equal in value to the lives of the population of the entire Korean peninsula.

And how about that friendship between the Mike and Ben? It’s jacked way beyond palsy-walsy to full-on bromance, even though the two are barely onscreen together. There’s the way the terrorists are always two steps ahead of the Americans. And the computer graphics that make the USA look like a nuclear meltdown waiting to happen.

So maybe – though I repeat, it seems doubtful – there’s some critique of America bubbling beneath the surface of this movie. It certainly might be worth having the conversation. And if not, well … the film is solid enough. Well acted, occasionally ludicrous (but that’s kind of what you came for, after all), a bit cheap in the CGI department. We’ll see soon enough if it’s entirely forgettable.

video#1