Last night, Cyndi and I went to see Olympus has Fallen. I’ll try not to give too much away; however, if you want to see it you may want to come back after.
First, I thought the action scenes were good. Realistic. There. Cyndi made the comment though that it was more gorry than she had seen in a while.
Second, the plot is relatively realistic: kidnapping the president. The setup is fantastic–as in fantasy…would never happen in real life–but after the initial attack, things are ok believable.
Third, you can tell the thing was written by a bunch of liberals and people who had never been around the military. Two scenes in particular stand out to me: the president ordering people to give up their codes to activate a secret self-destruct in the nuclear weapons (it wouldn’t be followed for multiple reasons) and the head of the Joint Chief’s ordering a secret service guy to stand down (he wasn’t in the chain of command)
Fourth, the premise was flawed. Kidnapping the president buys the attacker no bargaining room whatsoever (unless they want the launch codes in the football) The US Constitution very clearly describes who is president and what happens when the President can’t act. This happens clearly in the movie yet everyone still acts as if the president (the one at the start of the movie) were still THE President. Sure, they would try to get the President out as he knows TONS about LOTS of secrets…but he can’t actually do anything. He’s lost all power at that point.
Fifth, and lastly, when someone brings a knife to a gunfight, use your gun. Shoot the bad guy…don’t simply have a fist-fight with him
3 out of 5.
Image from cpence via flickr