Perhaps the intended central relationship was meant to be between Channing Tatum and his daughter, with whom he’s attempting to build a relationship. Of course we only expect so much character development from a summer action flick, but there just wasn’t the chemistry nor the snappy dialogue that really brings the fun to a film like this. Unfortunately, these characters just don’t have the spark needed to keep things together.

Looking back at the various successes of Emmerich’s career, there has always been a mismatched pairing at the center, providing great chemistry, humor, and tension, continued here with the book-smart POTUS and his streetwise body guard. This identity crisis is what keeps the film from being the fun ride we’ve come to expect from Emmerich and company, destruction and all.įor better and for worse, the central characters of White House Down are the President, played by Jamie Foxx, and the impromptu Secret Service agent protecting him, played by Channing Tatum. Part buddy-cop, part hostage film, part spectacle, White House Down seems to want to be about the characters, but just can’t resist turning its focus towards impressive explosions and threats of nuclear war.

Of course, Emmerich has claimed that 2009’s 2012 was his last disaster picture, so with White House Down we get a chamber piece hostage film - at least relative to the other films from a man who has made a career out of global-scale destruction and mayhem.Īs the second film of 2013 to center around the White House being under attack (the other being Olympus Has Fallen), it is somewhat difficult to determine what kind of movie the filmmakers set out to make. Even all these years later, it’s still pretty shocking to see the White House under attack in a movie, and who better to do it than the master of disaster (movies), Roland Emmerich. It’s hard to believe that it has been almost 20 years since Roland Emmerich first destroyed the White House in 1996’s Independence Day.

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