First off this is a totally absurd idea for a movie. But if you're going to have an absurd idea for a story line, you might as run with it and go for broke, which means go full on absurdity. This movie does, it pushes all the chips in. Two things whole hardheartedly save this film from falling over the absurdness of the story line, that is the characters and the actors playing the characters. Also this movie isn't out to make a statement about politics or politicians, it sets out to be a good action movie,and well it succeeds at this. This is basically what you would pitch as Die Hard in the White House, that's pretty much the bare bones of everything in this movie.
As I said earlier, two things save this movie and help it to be much more than the sum of its parts: the characters and the acting. This is something I've noticed over the years with books and movies, no matter what kind of crazy, insane, absurd, or good story line you have, if you put some good characters into those story lines they will help them breath and will help people actually care about what is going on. This movie is living proof of this. Gerard Butler completely sells the action man scenario and embodies the Bruce Willis role with ease. He's funny when he needs to be, cracking wise with the best of them but yet he's brutal and ruthless when the situation calls for it. It's like watching Liam Nesson, in Taken all over again. Butler also plays his character with smarts and gives him a charm that makes him completely likeable from the moment you see him on screen. Morgan Freeman, is well Morgan Freeman. I don't believe he can play a bad part even in a bad movie because there's just something about him that's interesting. Aaron Eckhart proves once again what an actor he is, despite not being one of the main characters in this movie, he still brings a life to the president of the United States. Angela Bassett proves once again that Halle Berry winning an Oscar, while she has none, is an epic fail on Hollywood's part.
Antoine Fuqa's direction is actually the third thing that helps this movie rise above the absurdness into the entertaining category. His direction is actually a thing to behold as he helps to give everything a truly authentic feel. His crisp, flowing direction never gets lost in the actions scenes or action set pieces. His communication with the audience during the action is competent and clear, I never felt lost as to what was happening when hell breaks loose during those scenes. And he doesn't result to the over use of the hand held camera, because, you know he actually directs the scenes without letting shaky cam take over. He's in charge and he knows it. I think he also helped to bring the brutality of Training Day into character Butler plays, and if he did, it truly helped to make his character all the more engaging and interesting. As Butler's character fights to stay alive not to play around, when he has a chance to kill, he does it, ruthlessly and without reproach. This movie is all the better for it.
This is entertainment on an absurdly high scale. But with characters you actually care about, embodied by actors and actresses, who aren't the A-list starts but are some really good character actors, that help bring them to life. You follow all of that up with a good director and you got one good entertaining movie for the night. Enjoy.
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