Angel Has Fallen

Some decent action, especially the one in the explosions in the forest, but the CGI was bad (I understand they wanted to keep the budget low, but they seem to overextend themselves) and the plot and in particular villains were predictable; I knew one of them and at least didn't string it out before the reveal, but the second one was too obvious and the motives had shades of Murder at 1600 which came out 22 years ago. But still like Gerard Butler, even though he seems to be getting... um, puffier lately, Morgan Freeman as always was good and Nick Nolte had a couple fun scenes. Shame, for whatever reason, they couldn't get Radha Mitchell back as Banning's wife, she at least wasn't as a stark difference from when Rachel Weisz was replaced by Maria Bello in that third Mummy movie... This was a serviceable enough action-thriller but nothing special on the whole. **3.0/5**

If you are expecting Martin Scorsese or David Lean, then you can safely stop now. This is not a film that the critics need to get their pencils sharpened about. It's a pretty run of the mill shoot 'em up with special agent Gerard Butler out to prove his innocence after being framed for the attempted murder of the US president (and just about everyone else). He doesn't know who to trust and must combat both friend and foe to realise his goals. Morgan Freeman turns in a likeable performance as the President (again) in this fast paced action-drama, but it hasn't an original bone in it's body.

Better than _London Has Fallen_ at least. Seems like it's stealing most of its ideas from better franchises, most notably _Bourne_ and _Punisher_, but it was still a pretty good time. And nice to see the script sort of flipped after the last two, and have Butler facing up against the Secret Service (even if the reason why is made painfully obvious from the opening sequence). _Final rating:★★½ - Had a lot that appealed to me, didn’t quite work as a whole._