Secret Service Agent Channing Tatum and President Jamie Foxx run for cover in ‘White House Down’ (Columbia Pictures/Reiner Bajo)

Let’s just get this out of the way: Yes, Roland Emmerich’s White House Down is pretty much exactly the same movie as Olympus Has Fallen. But, unlike Antoine Fuqua’s machismo-pumped jingoistic cringe-fest, Emmerich’s film succeeds in that it knows not to take itself too seriously. Offering enough bombs, bullets, and bombastic one-liners to win over its target audience of moviegoers raised on ’80s action flicks, White House Down knows its place: A big, dumb, fun action movie that’s a total throwback to the days when big, dumb action movies weren’t trying to be anything more.

Like Olympus Has Fallen, the premise is an overt Die Hard-nod (right down to its stained white tank top-clad protagonist also named John), but Emmerich’s film, developed from a screenplay from Zodiac and The Amazing Spider-Man scribe James Vanderbilt, rises above its clearly derivative predecessor. Not to become something more, mind you, but it at least above its understandably low expectations as the second movie this year wherein terrorists take over the White House and things go boom.

Emmerich—who is wont to destroying the White House from time to time—once again demonstrates his seemingly effortless competence in crafting well-paced action flicks. The film opens in the bunker of Marine One during the wee hours of the morning as President James Sawyer (Jamie Foxx) and trusted Secret Service Agent Carol Finnerty (Maggie Gyllenhaal) fly low and slow over the National Mall and around iconic D.C. landmarks, evoking not-so-subtle imagery for the thematic gravitas of the mayhem that’s soon to come. After establishing Sawyer as the peace-in-the-Middle East-platform President (which, obviously, is the motivation behind the terrorist’s takeover), we’re introduced to Channing Tatum’s John Cale; a quick-witted ex-military man who now spends his unfulfilled days as a U.S. Capitol Police officer working the protection detail of House Speaker Eli Raphelson (Richard Jenkins). With dreams of grandeur working as a Secret Service Agent, Cale finally lands an interview with Finnerty in the White House, and brings along his precocious, politics-obsessed 11-year old daughter (Joey King) for the interview and an exclusive White House tour. You could almost feel a riff on the “I’m not even supposed to be here!” line taken out from an earlier draft.

Like his work on Independence Day, 2012, and The Day After Tomorrow, Emmerich knows how to properly build tension and exposition before breaking out into all out destruction. In White House Down, nearly half an hour passes before the first explosion rips the dome off the U.S. Capitol and the terrorists (who turn out to be cold-blooded American citizens, frustrated with Sawyer’s peaceful politics, rather than [insert foreign terrorist stereotype here]) storm the White House, taking hostages and killing off Secret Service agents. But the wait is worth it, as the film goes into overdrive, never slowing down while Cale rescues Sawyer and the duo evade bullets, bombs, and baddies throughout the White House’s every nook and cranny (even managing to take the presidential limo out for an amusing spin on the North Lawn as horrified spectators and press look on).

While Tatum continues to demonstrate why he’s one of the more tolerable action stars these days—blending the appropriate amount of humor and badassery, without ever inducing too many eyerolls—it’s the supporting cast that really boosts this film. Foxx plays the charismatic leader of the free world with the restrained coolness we’ve come to expect, and the rest of the cast, which includes Jenkins, Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke, a delightfully maniacal James Woods, and Nicolas Wright as a White House tour guide (the unsung hero of the film), are all valuable players in Emmerich’s ensemble.

Playfully dumb with self-aware winks and nods to the sheer preposterousness of its plot, White House Down plays out like a live-action cartoon. Though it is, ostensibly, another exercise in jingoism and the triumph of the American spirit, Emmerich manages to keep the blatant patriotism to a minimum (only three gratuitous shots of the American flag compared to Olympus Has Fallen’s 15, by my count). Between Star Trek Into Darkness, Man of Steel, and the upcoming Pacific Rim, our planet has taken quite the beating, so it’s refreshing to see an action flick that can stand on its own by depicting the decimation of a single building rather than the leveling an entire city. And considering that it’s coming from the guy who’s developed something of a fetish for depicting the total annihilation of Earth, that’s a pretty impressive feat.

—

White House Down
Directed by Roland Emmerich
Written by James Vanderbilt
With Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke, James Woods, and Richard Jenkins.
Rated PG-13 for shooting, explosions, fighting, constitutional crises, and everything else that happens when terrorists take over the White House.
Running time 131 minutes

Opens today at Landmark E Street Cinema, The Avalon and Angelika Mosaic.