FBI Aide: Olympus has fallen! Olympus has fallen!

As you may or may not know, I tend to get particularly excited when the title of a movie is said in the movie, and because of that I ordinarily don't use that moment in the film as one of the quotes I give in my reviews, since I wouldn't want to spoil that moment for people reading who have not seen the movie yet. However, with Olympus Has Fallen I just had to use that quote because a) Come on, you knew it was going to be said. And b) the line perfectly resembles the essence behind this action blockbuster.

The movie stars Gerard Butler as Mike Banning, a former security guard and friend of the president of the United States. After a traumatizing accident, Mike has been moved down to some desk job. When the North Koreans invade Washington D.C, destroying the White House and the Washington Memorial, they kidnap the president along with another group of people and hold them hostage in the now damaged White House. Witnessing this Mike Banning goes to rescue his former superior commander and whoever else he can.

General Edward Glegg: Can we trust him?
Secret Service Director Lynn Jacobs: He will move mountains or die trying.

It is easy to say that this is not a great film. The movie really is not all that artsy at all. Some of the effects look a bit fake and the dialogue is laughable. The movie is, in fact just a cool bloody blockbuster, and it knows that. It is essentially a throwback to '90s action films, like Independence Day or Air Force One or any of the Die Hard movies. In fact, Olympus Has Fallen has a vastly similar plot to the first Die Hard movie. (despite that being an '80s film) This film also contains all of the cheesy elements as the Die Hard sequels and all those other awesome action cheese-fests the '90s brought us. My theory here is that the whole reason this movie was made was to pay homage to those types of films we all used to love to watch.

The actors here also tie everything together nicely. Butler was great as his John McClaine-ish type character who is funny, vulnerable, and completely bad-ass. Aaron Eckhart plays the president. After seeing him as Gotham City's great Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight I always thought this guy would be just perfect to play the role of the U.S president. Rick Yune is good too as the ruthless terrorist d-bag who likes to be in charge. What surprised me to the greatest extent though was Oscar winning Melissa Leo's character Secretary of Defense Ruth McMillan. She was fantastic as her tough as nails character who took a vicious beating, giving us some very effective scenes. Overall, having such great famous actors in a movie like this really helped it out rather than taking anything away from it.

Speaker Allan Trumbull: We're talking about the safety of the president of the United States!
Mike Banning: We're talking about a hell of a lot more than that, sir.

Long story, short Olympus Has Fallen is not ground breaking, but it is very entertaining by its suspense and fine acting/directing. It is also cool to see a movie like this on the big screen in 2013. I bet this is exactly what Kim Jong Un is fantasizing about right now, even though he will never succeed at ever doing it.

President Asher: The United States doesn't negotiate with terrorists!
Kang: Who said anything about negotiating?