Olympus Has Fallen (2013) - Fuqua's rough and unrefined actioner

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Not a still from the actual, real-life, presidentially commanded storm on the Washington D.C. Capitol Building of January 6 2022, this is instead an explosive poster for Antoine Fuqua's Olympus Has Fallen

Mike Banning was a Secret Service agent who was close with the US President, until he was involved in the accident that cost the first lady her life. Now the White House comes under attack by North-Korean terrorists, and Banning decides to return!

Olympus Has Fallen is written by Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt (The Expendables 3 (2014), both) and co-produced and directed by Pennsylvanian master filmmaker Antoine Fuqua (Bait (2000)), whose 7th feature it is.

The film attempts to marry In the Line of Fire (1993) with 24 (2001-10) but doesn't get anywhere near the quality of either of these thrillers. It is a shame, because Olympus Has Fallen has so many of the right ingredients. But although Fuqua is good, he is no John McTiernan here, and Olympus Has Fallen fails first and foremost because it is lacking suspenseful scenes.

Instead there is sketchy CGI by the barrel load, and scores of scenes of co-producer/co-star Gerard Butler's (Dracula 2000 (2000)) Banning torturing and punishing bad-guys. (You'll also get Melissa Leo (Bottled Up (2013)) as Secretary of Defense getting beaten up at length and forced to walk on shattered glass.) Without the necessary suspense one mostly just thinks 'yikes' at this and other unpleasantness - and the preposterous plot, which involves a bomb program in the basement of the White House that no-one at the Pentagon has contact to ... Olympus Has Fallen is also souped up in more than enough jingoistic prattle and possibly more presidentially sounding drums than in any film ever before. 

 

Related posts:

 

Has Fallen franchise: London Has Fallen (2016) - Jingoistic and irrelevant actioner that passes the time

Antoine Fuqua: The Magnificent Seven (2016) - Fuqua makes a noisy party trick out of the western

2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess 

The Equalizer (2014) or, Mr. Swift Justice

 

 

Watch a 2-minute clip from the film here

 

Cost: 70 mil. $

Box office: 170.2 mil. $

=  Minor flop (returned 2.43 times its cost)

[Olympus Has Fallen premiered 18 March (Los Angeles) and runs 119 minutes. Shooting took place from July - September 2012 in Louisiana, including in New Orleans, and in New York. Production scrambled through to be the first of 2013's two big White House attack action movies, beating White House Down to the punch by around 3 months. The film opened #2, behind fellow new release The Croods, to a 30.3 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent another 3 weekends in the top 5 (#4-#4-#5), grossing 98.9 mil. $ (58.1 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 9.5 mil. $ (5.6 %) and China with 5.8 mil. $ (3.4 %). Rothenberger was sued by a John S. Green over authorship of the script with Rothenberger winning 175k $. Butler sued Nu Image/Millennium Films for 10 mil. $ over perceived unreported profits and failure to pay him according to a 10 % net profit participation deal. The conclusion of that suit has been kept under wraps. The film spun two sequels with Butler but not Fuqua returning; London Has Fallen (2016) and Angel Has Fallen (2019), with a third sequel entitled Night Has Fallen currently in production. The film additionally earned more than 38.2 mil. $ on the domestic home video market. Fuqua returned with The Equalizer (2014). Butler returned with a voice performance in How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014) and physically in Gods of Egypt (2016); Aaron Eckhart (Thursday (1998)) in I, Frankenstein (2014); and Morgan Freeman (Edison (2005)) in Oblivion (2013). Olympus Has Fallen is rotten at 50 % with a 5.40/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Olympus Has Fallen?

The Magnificent Seven (2016) - Fuqua makes a noisy party trick out of the western

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A golden seven across a grey sky with the seven actors in heavy get-up at the bottom makes up this macho poster for Antoine Fuqua's The Magnificent Seven

Seven men gather to help the intimidated citizens of small frontier town Rose Creek fight and prevail over the evil tyrant industrialist Bartholomew Bogue.

 

The Magnificent Seven is written by Nic Pizzolatto (The Killing (2011, TV-series)) and Richard Wenk (Vamp (1986)) and directed by Pennsylvanian master filmmaker Antoine Fuqua (Bait (2000)). It is a remake of the same-titled 1960 hit western by John Sturges, which was in turn based on Seven Samurai (1954) by Akira Kurosawa.

Modernly cast with a diverse group of actors, Fuqua pulls the trigger in the West with mighty explosions, CGI, shoot-outs upon shoot-outs and cocky stars in thinly sketched parts. It rumbles and bumbles, - but why are we supposed to care?

The Magnificent Seven doesn't look or smell like the West we know from the genre's best pictures. It feels phony, unnecessary, long and dreary.

 

Related posts:

 

Antoine Fuqua: 2016 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]

2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess 

The Equalizer (2014) or, Mr. Swift Justice

 

Watch a trailer for the movie here

 

Cost: 90 mil. - 107 mil. $ (different reports)

Box office: 162.3 mil. $

= Big flop (returned 1.51 - 1.80 times its cost)

[The Magnificent Seven premiered 8 September (Toronto International Film Festival) and runs 133 minutes. Several other stars and director John Lee Hancock had been rumored to head the remake before Fuqua was hired and assembled his cast. Shooting took place from May - August 2015 in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Louisiana. The film features the last score of great composer James Horner, who passed away in 2015 with his friend and collaborator finishing his work. The film opened #1 to a 34.7 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it stayed in the top 5 for another 3 weekends (#3-#4-#4) and grossed 93.4 mil. $ (57.5 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 7.9 mil. $ (4.9 %) and South Korea with 6.8 mil. $ (4.2 %). Fuqua returned with Ice (2016, TV-series), The Receipt: The Gift (2017, short) and theatrically with The Equalizer 2 (2018). Denzel Washington (The Siege (1998)) returned in Fences (2016); Chris Pratt (10 Years (2011)) in Passengers (2016). The Magnificent Seven is fresh at 64 % with a 6.00/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of The Magnificent Seven? 

2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

Best of 2014

1. Boyhood - Richard Linklater

2. The Look of Silence - Joshua Oppenheimer

3. The Grand Budapest Hotel - Wes Anderson

4. Looking season 1 - Michael Lannan, creator

5. Calvary - John Michael McDonagh

6. Godzilla - Gareth Edwards

7. Magic in the Moonlight - Woody Allen

8. Nightcrawler - Dan Gilroy

9. Interstellar - Christopher Nolan

10. The Equalizer - Antoine Fuqua

Worst of 2014

1. The Monuments Men - George Clooney

2. Mr. Peabody & Sherman - Rob Minkoff

Other reviewed titles:

A Most Wanted Man 
Dumb and Dumber To
The Expendables 3 
Guardians of the Galaxy 
The Lego Movie 
Love Is Strange 
Non-Stop 
Sabotage 
The Salvation 
Sex Tape 
Speed Walking/Kapgang 
True Detective season 1
The Two Faces of January
X-Men: Days of Future Past 

Notes:

This is only a first draft of Film Excess' 2014 lists, because I have only seen and reviewed 26 2014 titles so far, which is far from enough to compile an accurate list. A more comprehensive list will appear on the blog by the end of June. This preliminary list does, however, feature some of the films of the year that have generally been recognized as the best of the year, namely Boyhood and The Grand Budapest Hotel. The third pristine masterpiece of the year (found by me so far) is the less seen Danish-American-Indonese documentary The Look of Silence.
Behind these incredible films, 2014 gave us an awesome new TV-series in Looking, a kaiju smasher for the history books in Godzilla; Irish John Michael McDonagh moved up in the European - and world - director ranks with his great Calvary; Woody Allen charmed with a typical show of gentle force in Magic in the Moonlight; Dan Gilroy flashed an eerie contemporary story in Nightcrawler; Christopher Nolan bested last year's star-cruiser Gravity (in quality) with his vast Interstellar; and Antoine Fuqua and Denzel Washington gave us an irresistible vengeance thriller guilty pleasure in The Equalizer. Out of the list are other great films such as the western The Salvation, the airborne thriller Non-Stop, the animation The Lego Movie and Danish coming-of-age Speed Walking, besides a slew of other good films. 2014 has already been a joyous film year, and one with very few bad films found so far. But they will surely appear as I venture boldly further down into the year's cavern.

Perhaps the next, more elaborate 2014 lists will include some of these titles from my 2014 watch-list, which I literally can't wait to watch:
The Overnighters, Obvious Child, The Babadook, Alive Inside, The Skeleton Twins, Life Itself, Dead Snow 2: Red Vs. Dead, What We Do in the Shadows, Cesar Chavez, They Came Together, The Way He Looks, Kelly & Cal, We'll Never Have Paris, Zero Motivation, Rob the Mob, Walk of Shame, Grace of Monaco, Mr. Turner, The Fault in Our Stars, Force Majeure, The Homesman, Mommy, Maps to the Stars, Kick, Tammy, Hector and the Search for Happiness, Birdman, The Imitation Game, St. Vincent, The Humbling, Before I Go to Sleep, While We're Young, The Good Lie, Tusk, This Is Where I Leave You, I Am Ali, Citizenfour, Serena, Sex Ed, Selma, Annie, Unbroken, The Interview and Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks.

- Happy New Year!

Other years in best and worst lists:

2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 
2013 in films - according to Film Excess
2012 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 
2012 in films - according to Film Excess 

Please, make a comment on Film Excess' 2014 lists
What have been your best and worst 2014 movie experiences?
What has surprised positively and what has disappointed you?
Any movie or TV-series that needs to be on Film Excess' watch-list?

The Equalizer (2014) or, Mr. Swift Justice

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A simple, neat poster for Antoine Fuqua's The Equalizer

  
Antoine Fuqua (Olympus Has Fallen (2013)) made a great villain out of Denzel Washington (Flight (2012)) in his break-out movie, which also won Washington his Best Actor Oscar, tough crime drama masterpiece Training Day (2001). It escalated both of their careers and was also a landmark for African-Americans, as Washington was the first black man to take the Best Actor Oscar, although the fact that he got it for playing a despicable, violent, drug-taking, morally reprehensible character bothered some. This may be an indirect reasoning for the matching in this year's The Equalizer, in which Fuqua directs Washington again, but this time as a straight-as-an-arrow vigilante hero, making up or 'equalizing', if you will excuse the pun, their past misdemeanor in the African-American mirror of self-reckoning.

McCall is a tough, aging guy who is content with a job at the Home Depot, until his local acquaintance, a young woman who is a prostitute from an Eastern European country, gets in trouble with some nasty Russian hoodlums ...

The Equalizer isn't a societally relevant, troubling, groundbreaking film as Training Day was. Instead, it is a potent revenge thriller, based on a CBS TV-series (1985-89), where Washington hands it out to some really ugly Russians in Boston. For those of us who'll never tire of watching ugly Russian mobsters take beatings and some incidental bullets, Equalizer is a joy. - Most people who have experienced random violence will find it easy to revel in having a guy like Washington clean up the tables of rot which society can't manage by itself.
Richard Wenk (16 Blocks (2006)) has written the simple, solid script. Dissatisfied customers will claim that Equalizer is too much at times, - but I'll say they ordered the wrong dish. This dish is revenge, and that's gotta be cold, just as it is here.
The script's most satisfying turn in my opinion is its finale, SPOILER which is set inside the Home Depot where our hero works: As the militarized Russians enter the Home (Mart), they've sort of asked for what's coming, haven't they? Needless to say, such a location abounds with booby-trap materials...
The Equalizer first of all has bad-ass Washington going for it, and fans of the great will appreciate hit turn here, even if it isn't among his dramatically powerful films. The Equalizer is also a tad long at 131 minutes. - It doesn't have annoyingly superfluous passages but just takes its time telling its story. There's well-produced, fine, professional photography by Mauro Fiore (Avatar (2009)) and a good, tight, slightly Drive (2011)-reminiscent score by Harry Gregson-Williams (Deja Vu (2006)).

The nasty villain is played effectively by New Zealander Marton Csokas (Noah (2014)), who gave me goosebumps at least once. Happening young actress Chloë Grace Moretz (Kick-Ass (2010)) is alright as an imperiled prostitute; and David Harbour (Revolutionary Road (2008)) is great as a troubled corrupt cop.
The Equalizer is a vigilante movie with its heart in the right place. I liked the way that the film takes its time closing up shop as well, and finally I must say that I loved the last scene SPOILER of Washington in the American diner, answering some stranger's distress post on Craigslist, just because he can. The Equalizer is all about that guy. The good guy that we all hope is out there.

Watch the excellent trailer for the film here

Cost: 55 mil. $
Box office: 191.3 mil. $ and counting
= Big hit
[The Equalizer continued Washington's impressive box office sway in the US, where it opened first with a 35 mil. $ opening weekend and broke some records, including biggest R-rated September opening as well as becoming Fuqua's best weekend opening. The film has also made decent business abroad and Fuqua has announced interest in a sequel with writer Wenk, if Washington wants to...]

What do you think of The Equalizer?