London Has Fallen

For F*** Magazine

LONDON HAS FALLEN

Director : Babak Najafi
Cast : Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Charlotte Riley, Morgan Freeman, Robert Forster, Melissa Leo, Alon Moni Aboutboul, Angela Bassett, Radha Mitchell
Genre : Action/Thriller
Run Time : 99 mins
Opens : 3 March 2016
Rating : NC-16 (Violence And Some Coarse Language)

The city of London: between being decimated by a tungsten rod fired from orbit in G.I. Joe: Retaliation and having Dubai’s Burj Khalifa plonked down on it by aliens in the upcoming Independence Day: Resurgence, it seems Hollywood’s been saying “screw Britannia!” Another round of U.K. landmark destruction is preceded by the untimely death of the British Prime Minister. World leaders, including U.S. President Benjamin Asher (Eckhart), arrive for the state funeral. In the lead-up to the funeral, a brutal, intricately-planned terrorist attack cripples London, and Secret Service agent Mike Banning (Butler) is the only thing keeping Asher alive. Back in Washington D.C., Vice President Alan Trumbull (Freeman) receives a video message from terrorist mastermind Aamir Barkawi (Aboutboul), claiming responsibility for the attacks. Asher and Banning have to rendezvous with MI6 agent Jacquelin Marshal (Riley) as the chaos escalates and terrorists overrun London.

            London Has Fallen is the sequel to Olympus Has Fallen, a film that was generally regarded as taking itself way too seriously, hilariously jingoistic, containing slipshod visual effects work but boasting a decent amount of brutal action. London Has Fallen contains all those traits and kicks them up to 11. There’s an increased sense of scale and the location shooting in London itself means the production values here are an improvement on those of its predecessor. However, in scenes including the destruction of Chelsea Bridge and a sequence in which the presidential helicopters Marines One, Two and Three are evading terrorists’ rockets, the visual effects work is nigh laughable.  

The over-the-top bombast is supposed to be thrilling, but there will be many audiences who will have a difficult time deriving entertainment from seeing terrorists blow up a city, particularly given the tragic frequency with which such incidents occur in real life. Paris, Beirut, Tunis, Istanbul, San Bernadino and Jakarta amongst others were all recently attacked and furthermore, the trailer for London Has Fallen was released during the week of the tenth anniversary of the 2005 7/7 London bombings. We don’t mean to get all self-righteous and this reviewer is a big action movie junkie, but the way London Has Fallen presents itself as topical while revelling in dated action movie tropes, with a one-man army stabbing bad guys and dispensing one-liners, is a little uncomfortable.

It’s pretty funny that this flag-waving, chest-thumping celebration of American jingoism is directed by a Swedish director of Iranian descent and stars an actor who is completely incapable of disguising his unmistakably Scottish brogue. As far as London Has Fallen is concerned, all world leaders are entirely expendable – ersatz versions of Angela Merkel, Silvio Berlusconi and François Hollande bite the dust in quick succession – all except for the American president, of course. The primary villain, a Middle-Eastern arms dealer, seems like a C-grade reject from the TV series Homeland. And yes, drone strikes are a plot point, because total predictability is the name of the game here. At the very least, the villainous scheme is an order of magnitude more plausible than that of the North Korean baddies in Olympus Has Fallen, though that’s still not saying much.

Butler and Eckhart lead a good number of actors who reprise their roles from Olympus Has Fallen. Sure, Butler is completely unbelievable as an American, but he and Eckhart develop a watchable buddy chemistry and Butler’s rough-around-the-edges quality makes him easier to buy as an old-school action hero than other actors out there. Many attempts at badass quips simply come off as silly, but the guy looks like he knows what he’s doing when he’s firing a gun. Bassett isn’t in much of the film and Freeman, Forster and Leo simply sit around the Situation Room back at the White House; their scenes looking like they were all filmed in one day. Jackie Earle Haley as the White House Deputy Chief of Staff is puzzling casting, since the actor isn’t allowed to display any of the quirky energy he’s known for. Riley’s MI6 agent could’ve been a scene stealing character, but God forbid anyone other than Butler kick a significant amount of ass.

Is London Has Fallen enjoyable at all? Yes. It’s fun to guffaw at the clunky lines of dialogue, to appreciate some of the action sequences for being well-executed and others for looking hilariously phony and to pretend that it’s still the 80s-90s, cheering on the clench-jawed hero who charges in guns a-blazing. The clichés are so on-the-nose – for example, Banning’s wife Leah (Mitchell) is pregnant with their first child, pining for the safe return of her husband – it’s impossible to assume the filmmakers didn’t go into this with at least the slightest modicum of self-awareness. Most of all, it’s enjoyable in its thunderous stupidity and those 99 minutes go by fairly quickly.

Summary: This action thriller is often breathtakingly dumb and the “terrorist attacks in the name of entertainment” angle is problematic in this day and age, but the sheer lack of subtlety is enjoyable in its own right. U.S.A! U.S.A! U.S.A!

RATING: 2.5 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong 

I, Frankenstein

For F*** Magazine

I, FRANKENSTEIN 

Director: Stuart Beattie
Cast: Aaron Eckhart, Yvonne Strahovski, Bill Nighy, Socratis Otto, Miranda Otto, Caitlin Stasey, Jai Courtney, Aden Young, Deniz Akdeniz
Genre: Action, Sci-Fi
Run Time: 92 mins
Opens: 23 January 2014
Rating: PG13 (Violence)

So, let’s get this out of the way: yes, he’s “Frankenstein’s Monster”, “Frankenstein” is the name of the scientist who created him. We guess I, Frankenstein’s Monster just doesn’t quite have the same ring to it. This take on Mary Shelley’s classic horror tale is based on the Darkstorm Comics title by writer-actor Kevin Grevioux (who also appears in the film as henchman Dekar). Yes, the titular creature in the comics looks a lot more like how he’s traditionally depicted than what they went with for the movie, but rippling abs and barely noticeable scars notwithstanding, this reviewer was pleasantly surprised by the latest onscreen retelling of The Modern Prometheus.

The film starts with an image familiar to those who have read Mary Shelley’s novel: that of a lone figure trudging across the snow carrying a body on his back. The figure is Frankenstein’s Monster (Eckhart) and the body, that of his creator, Victorian scientist Victor Frankenstein (Young). Without a soul but somehow immortal, the creature finds himself caught in the middle of a celestial battle between the demons of hell and “gargoyles”, a contingent of angels who watch over humanity disguised as those stone sculptures. The Gargoyle queen Leonore (Otto) christens the creature “Adam”, and he takes the last name of his creator. It is more than 200 years later and the demon prince Naberius (Nighy) has his sights set on Adam, who is the key to the formation of a hellish army with which Naberius plans to conquer the world. In his human guise of “Charles Wessex”, Naberius has hired electrophysiologist Terra Ward (Strahovski) to conduct re-animation experiments; Terra keen to learn Adam’s secrets but unaware of the treacherous scheme they will be used to enact.



I, Frankenstein is adapted and directed by Stuart Beattie, whose diverse credits as a screenwriter include Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, Collateral, 30 Days of Night and Australia. His first film as director was Australian young adult novel adaptation Tomorrow When the War Began (stars Caitlin Stasey and Chris Pang both have minor roles in this movie). I, Frankenstein is billed as being “from the producers of Underworld” and it does share a similar aesthetic and urban fantasy setting. Michelle McGahey’s production design is mesmerizing, the majestic cathedral sanctuary of the gargoyles and the horrific, cavernous demon corpse farm lending the picture a genuine sense of scale and grandeur.

There was every chance that I, Frankenstein would end up looking cheap and sloppily-made and there was no shortage of eyes being rolled upon the unveiling of the first trailer. Guess what: I, Frankenstein looks amazing. The visual effects work, mostly done by Australian houses Iloura and Cutting Edge, are top-notch stuff. The character animation on the angels in their gargoyle form is particularly noteworthy - the personality captured in the facial expressions, the mechanics of the wings and feathers, the mottled, stony texture – it reminded this reviewer of the Hulk in The Avengers. The visual representation of the “descending” of the demons and the “ascension” of the gargoyles (analogous to death) is also quite breathtaking, comprising dances of brilliant light and swirling fire. The Australia-based Makeup Effects Group may not be creatively named, but they sure produced some quality prosthetic makeup effects, particularly on the horned, reptilian natural form of the demons. The 3D conversion is not bad, especially in the flying scenes.



Yes, plopping Frankenstein’s Monster into a centuries-old supernatural feud does seem like an absurd and Hollywood-y jumping off point, but admirably enough, the film commits to the tone. Aaron Eckhart is a serviceable leading man, playing Adam as angsty, misunderstood and brooding, but never insufferably so. He never really got very good parts following the role that should have rocketed him up the A-list, that of Harvey “Two-Face” Dent in The Dark Knight. As mentioned earlier, he never convincingly looks like he was the result of a patchwork of multiple corpses, he just looks like Aaron Eckhart with a tiny bit of effects makeup. Eckhart acquits himself well in the action sequences, having trained in kali stick fighting to wield Adam’s weapons of choice. Also, props to Eckhart for delivering the line “I think your boss is a demon prince” with a totally straight face.

Interestingly, nobody in the supporting cast is terrible. This does seem like the kind of movie which would have some weak links acting-wise. Miranda Otto is stately and ethereal as Leonore, Chuck alum Yvonne Strahovski isn’t the least convincing cinematic “hot scientist” ever, Jai Courtney is gruff and grumpy as usual as her right-hand gargoyle Gideon and Hugo Weaving-esque Socratis Otto (no relation) is sufficiently menacing as hench-demon Zuriel.

Of course, it is Bill Nighy, dab hand at stealing the show, who walks away with hell (and the movie) in a handbasket. He relishes every chance to chew the scenery and seems to enjoy it after being denied the chance to make any kind of impact in Total Recall (2012). He bites into each word with entertaining gusto and dramatically arches his eyebrows the way only he can.

At first, I, Frankenstein looks like your run of the mill dumb, derivative CGI-fest and yes, there are goofy moments, the gargoyle concept is reminiscent of the premise of that 90s Disney cartoon series and it’s far from subtle (the demons in human form are all clad in business suits). But it does a fine job at being what it is, is never boring and manages to be sufficiently engrossing. It’s nowhere near as haphazardly sewn together as its protagonist and far as “oh, this is going to be bad” January releases go, it upends expectations.

Summary: Fire bad, but frankly, movie pretty good.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong

Nerd HQ: Conversations with I, Frankenstein and 300: Rise of an Empire

Actor and well-known geek Zachary Levi has set up a nice little outfit called the "Nerd Machine" that has a side event held at Comic-Con every year, known as Nerd HQ. It's been going for about three years. Nerd HQ was set up as a more intimate alternative to Comic-Con, and the highlights are definitely the "In Conversation" panels. Each event is ticketed and the proceeds go to benefit Operation Smile, a charity that gives life-changing surgeries to young children with cleft palettes. I was able to snag tickets to two such panels: one for the upcoming action/horror/sci-fi film I, Frankenstein, and another for the 300 sequel/spinoff 300: Rise of an Empire. Both are films that I'm honestly not all that excited for, but it was great seeing such personalities as Rodrigo Santoro, Eva Green, Aaron Eckhart, Yvonne Strahovski and of course Zachary Levi himself in the flesh. All the panels were recorded, streamed online and are now available for viewing on Nerd Machine's YouTube Channel  Scroll down for embedded vids! 

Skip to 16:47 if you would like to see me make a fool of myself. 

And at 33:32, I asked Eva Green about her role in the upcoming Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, which she was thankfully very happy to talk about.