White House Down but not out

FILM OF THE WEEK: There is some magnificent trash to be treasured in White House Down.

White House Down but not out

FILM OF THE WEEK: There is some magnificent trash to be treasured in White House Down.

Action fans who want nothing more than a rush, a laugh and a lot of cartoonish collateral damage should book their tickets now.

The following scene alone should seal the deal for anyone who might doubt the deliriously dimwitted charm of this movie.

There's the President of the United States, hanging out the passenger window of an armour-plated limo, speeding across the spacious front lawns of the White House. An SUV full of mercenaries is in hot pursuit.

POTUS is also brandishing a rocket-launcher. I repeat, POTUS is packing serious heat.

As you should have gathered by now, White House Down is not a movie to be taken seriously. It is a movie to be taken in by.

Resistance is useless. Logistics are irrelevant. It's all about the bang-bang-bang, the boom-boom-boom, and Channing Tatum getting his Die Hard groove on.

Tatum plays John Cale - not uncoincidentally, a character whose name is just a few letters shy of Die Hard's John McClane.

This hulking young fellow is a low-ranking Congressional bodyguard who somehow finds himself the sole protector of US President James Sawyer (Jamie Foxx) when the White House comes under an unprecedented terrorist attack.

The bad guys have been hand-picked for the job by forces displeased with the Prez's handling of military operations in the Middle East. Every single one of them is wanted by either the FBI, CIA or Interpol for earlier works of mayhem (some actually performed while on the US black-ops' payroll).

Without revealing too much, I can report the villains take over the White House with ridiculous ease. The ultimate emblem of freedom and democracy becomes a fortified stronghold of evil.

On the roof, missiles are primed and ready to repel. Snipers are positioned everywhere else to see off any incursion from the ground.

Oh, and those who survived the initial storming of the White House are now being held captive for possible future use as human shields. Among them is Cale's 11-year-old daughter Emily (Joey King).

Performances in White House Down are nothing to write home about, nor complain about.

Tatum (Usain Bolt-like in his ability to outrun unfriendly fire) and Foxx (Barrack Obama-like with a street-smart twist) have the right chemistry to match the material.

Australian Jason Clarke does a serviceable take on a screw-loose soldier of fortune. James Woods and Richard Jenkins fit the bill as high-ranking officials with, err, interesting agendas to pursue. Maggie Gyllenhaal looks a little out of place as the President's right-hand-woman, but just about gets away with it.

There is no other apt way of putting it: White House Down is big, dumb fun.

You may never be intellectually challenged by its contents - at one point, Cale and Sawyer try and escape via a secret tunnel JFK supposedly used for dalliances with Marilyn Monroe! - but you will never, ever be bored.

> WHITE HOUSE DOWN [M]

Director: Roland Emmerich (The Day After Tomorrow)

Starring: Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, James Woods, Jason Clarke, Joey King, Richard Jenkins.

"The hunt for a weapon of mass distraction is over"

Rating: 3/5