Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So, here is a review that I think will help anyone sitting on the fence.

I went to see London Has Fallen yesterday.

It's a modern take on the action movie genre that arguably peaked in the late 80s with films like Commando (1985), Die Hard (1988) and Point Break (1991). This genre was supposed to have gone into a decline in recent years, but perhaps with modern light weight cameras and CGI it is making a comeback, due to being cheaper to make.

The plot is a bit silly and there are many obvious holes, but you hopefully ignore these and enjoy the fast roller-coaster ride as the US president is shunted from one dangerous situation to the next, while all the time his bodyguard is piling up an impressive body count of bad guys, usually with a witty quip.

In the brief calm interludes, the characters trade snippets of bonding chit-chat.

It's the right length at 99 minutes running time.

I liked Morgan Freeman as the vice-president. He's got a lovely rich voice.

I give the film three stars out of five.

There is definitely a problem with film distribution in the UK. I would have liked to see Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and also Gods of Egypt, but neither of these films has been shown at the 30+ screens of four different chains that are easily available for me to visit.

The poor ticket sales are a self-fulfilling prophecy if people are not even allowed to go and see these supposedly bad films.

I think the cinema industry in the UK has gone into meltdown a bit recently - there's something really screwy that's been going on since around the time of that Hateful 8 argument, I think.

What was the Hateful 8 argument?

It's kinda detailed here.

It's sorta crazy, I think and kinda smacks of someone biting their nose off to spite their face.

A statement from Entertainment Film said: "Due to the special facilities required for the unique 70mm Ultra Panavision presentation we needed the largest theatre and screen possible in the West End and the Odeon Leicester Square was the natural choice.
"The technical elements and costs involved with this special presentation meant that this would need to be the exclusive West End venue."
Cineworld objected to the fact it could not be shown at one of its West End venues, according to Entertainment Film.

I don't really understand the story in full, but it appears that the film was still available at at least two major chains.

I thought of going to see Hateful 8 but it kind of seemed like hard work, so I gave it a miss, and it's no longer showing anywhere.

I have easy access to Cineworld (plus Picturehouse,) Empire, Vue and Odeon cinemas, which between them have 30 or more screens. None of them seem to have screened Gods Of Egypt or Pride and Zombies.

It's hard to avoid a film being "straight to DVD" if it never gets exhibited cinematically.

Yeah, I mentioned it more as a case of something weird has been going on with the cinemas recently, especially to have something like that blow up big enough that the BBC are reporting on it.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I went to see London Has Fallen yesterday.

It's a modern take on the action movie genre that arguably peaked in the late 80s with films like Commando (1985), Die Hard (1988) and Point Break (1991). This genre was supposed to have gone into a decline in recent years, but perhaps with modern light weight cameras and CGI it is making a comeback, due to being cheaper to make.

The plot is a bit silly and there are many obvious holes, but you hopefully ignore these and enjoy the fast roller-coaster ride as the US president is shunted from one dangerous situation to the next, while all the time his bodyguard is piling up an impressive body count of bad guys, usually with a witty quip.

In the brief calm interludes, the characters trade snippets of bonding chit-chat.

It's the right length at 99 minutes running time.

I liked Morgan Freeman as the vice-president. He's got a lovely rich voice.

I give the film three stars out of five.

There is definitely a problem with film distribution in the UK. I would have liked to see Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and also Gods of Egypt, but neither of these films has been shown at the 30+ screens of four different chains that are easily available for me to visit.

The poor ticket sales are a self-fulfilling prophecy if people are not even allowed to go and see these supposedly bad films.

As some of the cast interviews have pointed out, the whole premise of both films was based more or less on, "what happens when all the security protocols fail!?"

While completely in the realms of 'total BS/would never happen', both movies are super fun from a hypothetical 'what IF someone really could pull off the unthinkable?!'

The character of Mike Banning in both films managed to rack up a Jack Bauer level body count! And of course, we also got a bit of Jack Bauer style torture moments when Banning interrogates a couple baddies in each film.

Both films for me, came off as an awesome mix of Die Hard meets Air Force One meets 24.

Apparently London opened up domestically with about $21.5 mil, which isn't that bad at all for an adult action popcorn flick. If it can take in another 18-20 domestically this weekend, it'll be a good sign, and hopefully along with the success of Deadpool, it'll finally prove to Hollywood that there's a good market for R-rated actioners.
IMHO, what's really led to 99% of modern action flicks being complete gak fests, is how studios keep dumbing everything down to PG13 levels so that kids can see them... That may be fine for the Marvel/DC stuff and old school cartoon-based stuff like Transformers/TMNT, but for 's sake, there has to be proper adult stuff as well for the 20-50's+ crow to enjoy!!

Hollywood wants to know why the likes of HBO are kings right now?! Maybe it's because they don't treat everything with kid gloves.