Olympus Has Fallen


Olympus Has Fallen is a 2013 American action thriller film directed by Antoine Fuqua, and written by Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt. It is the first installment in the Fallen film series. The film stars Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman, Angela Bassett, Robert Forster, Cole Hauser, Ashley Judd, Melissa Leo, Dylan McDermott, Radha Mitchell, and Rick Yune. The plot depicts a North Korean-led guerrilla assault on the White House, and focuses on disgraced United States Secret Service agent Mike Banning's efforts to rescue the US President, Benjamin Asher.
The film was released in the United States on March 22, 2013, by FilmDistrict. It earned $170 million against a $70 million production budget. The film received mixed reviews from critics, who praised Fuqua's direction and Butler's performance, but criticized the violence and screenplay. Olympus Has Fallen was one of two films released in 2013 that dealt with a terrorist attack on the White House; the other was White House Down.
A sequel, titled London Has Fallen, was released on March 4, 2016, with the principal cast members reprising their roles. Another sequel, Angel Has Fallen, was released in 2019.

Plot

Former U.S. Army Ranger Mike Banning is a Secret Service agent assigned to head the U.S. presidential detail, maintaining a personal, friendly relationship with President Benjamin Asher, First Lady Margaret, and their son Connor. On a snowy Christmas drive from Camp David to a campaign fundraiser, the car transporting the First Family spins out of control on an icy bridge. Banning pulls Asher from the vehicle, but fails to save Margaret as she falls to her death.
Eighteen months later, Banning works at the Treasury Department, having been removed from the presidential detail. During Asher's meeting with South Korean Prime Minister Lee Tae-Woo at the White House, the Koreans for United Freedom, a North Korean terrorist group led by Kang Yeonsak, mounts an air attack and hundreds of ground assault mercenaries to capture the building, killing most of the White House defending workforce. Aided by rogue members of the prime minister's own detail, including former Secret Service agent-turned-private contractor Dave Forbes, they hold Asher and several top officials hostage in the PEOC, where Lee is executed on live video. Before being killed, agent Roma alerts Secret Service Director Lynne Jacobs that "Olympus has fallen." Banning joins the White House's defenders during KUF's initial assault. He falls back into the White House, disabling internal surveillance and gaining access to Asher's satellite ear phone, which he uses to maintain contact with Jacobs and Speaker of the House Allan Trumbull, now acting president, in the Pentagon's emergency briefing room.
Kang uses Asher's hostage status to force Trumbull to withdraw the Seventh Fleet and U.S. forces from the Korean Peninsula, thus removing American opposition to a North Korean invasion of South Korea, and seeks to detonate the American nuclear arsenal, turning the United States into an irradiated wasteland in revenge for his mother's death. To do this, he requires access codes to the Cerberus system, held only by Asher, Secretary of Defense Ruth McMillan, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Joseph Hoenig, all of whom are inside the PEOC. Asher orders McMillan and Hoenig to reveal their codes to save their lives, certain that he will not give up his own code.
Authorized to proceed, Banning's first act is to save Connor, whom Kang plans to use to force Asher to reveal his Cerberus code. Banning finds Connor hiding in the building's walls and sneaks him to safety. On reconnaissance, Banning kills several of the terrorists, including Forbes. Army Chief of Staff General Edward Clegg convinces Trumbull to order an aerial SEAL assault on the White House. The KUF discovers the assault force and activates the advanced Hydra 6 anti-aircraft system. Kang retaliates by executing Vice President Charlie Rodriguez.
After Banning disables Kang's communications, Kang tries to execute McMillan outside the White House in front of the media, but Banning rescues her. Banning takes out most of Kang's forces, but Kang escapes and retreats back to the bunker. With the KUF dwindling, Kang fakes his and Asher's death by sacrificing several of his commandos and the remaining hostages in a helicopter explosion. Having two of the codes to Cerberus already, Kang eventually cracks Asher's code using a brute-force attack and activates the system. As Kang and his remaining men in the KUF attempt to escape, Banning ambushes and kills all of them except Kang. After Asher is shot, Banning confronts and engages in hand-to-hand combat with Kang. Asher, momentarily, distracts Kang, causing Banning to kill him. After Asher informs him of Cerberus, Banning disables it with the assistance of Trumbull and his staff.
Banning escorts Asher out of the White House as the latter receives medical attention. Afterwards, Banning is reappointed to the head of the president's security detail as Asher speaks to everyone of the aftermath of the attack.

Cast

Olympus Has Fallen was directed by Antoine Fuqua, based on a script by Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt in their first screenwriting effort. The production company Millennium Films acquired the spec script in March 2012, and Gerard Butler was cast later in the month as the star. The rest of the characters were cast throughout June and July.
In 2012, Millennium Films competed against Sony Pictures, which was producing White House Down to complete casting and to begin filming.
Filming began in Shreveport, Louisiana, in mid-July 2012. Because Olympus Has Fallen was filmed so far from its actual setting of Washington, D.C., the entire production relied heavily upon visual effects, particularly computer-generated imagery. For example, computers were used to create nearly all of the opening sequence in which the First Lady is killed in a car accident, with chroma key greenscreen technology used to composite the actors into the computer-generated snowy scenery. For scenes where actors walked in or out of the White House, a first-floor façade and entrance were built; computers added the second floor, roof, and downtown D.C. cityscape. Action scenes with the White House in the background were filmed in open fields and the White House and D.C. were added in post-production.

Score

The score was composed by Trevor Morris whose past projects included The Tudors and The Borgias. The score was recorded at Trevor Morris Studios in Santa Monica with the Bratislava Slovak National Orchestra.
The record was released on March 15, 2013 via Relativity Music Group label.
All music composed by Trevor Morris

Release

Olympus Has Fallen was released in the United States on, 2013. It was initially scheduled for an, 2013 release, but moved to avoid competition with The Heat, which was to open at the same time. FilmDistrict distributed the film.
The film's trailer was criticized for using the U.S. Emergency Alert System, and several cable companies were fined by the Federal Communications Commission for airing the ad.
Olympus Has Fallen grossed $98.9 million in the U.S. and Canada and $71.3 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $170.2 million against a budget of $70 million. In its first weekend, the film earned $30.5 million finishing second at the box office, and exceeded predictions of $23 million.
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on August 13, 2013, in the U.S. It earned $38.2 million in video rental sales in the U.S.

Dispute as to Authorship

There is contemporaneous evidence that suggests that Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt were not the sole authors of Olympus has Fallen, but in fact Mr. Rothenberger's former partner, John S. Green, a lawyer in Pennsylvania and a fellow University of Pennsylvania alumnus with Rothenberger, was the source of the movie's characters and material.
In 2013, Rothenberger sued Green in federal district court in California, seeking a declaration that he was sole author. Green counterclaimed that he was the source of substantial material in the 41-page treatment that was registered with the WGA in the year 2002. The project languished for several years, and the partners began working on it again in 2009. In 2012, the screenplay was completed and then sold, but Rothenberger failed to disclose that Green had been a co-author.
The California federal case between Rothenberger and Green was settled as to Olympus has Fallen for $175,000, the public later discovered in an unrelated Pennsylvania state court lawsuit involving the property sharing agreement in a divorce between Green and his ex-spouse. See

Reception

website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a rating of 49% based on 192 reviews and a weighted average rating of 5.39/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "It's far from original, but Olympus Has Fallen benefits from Antoine Fuqua's tense direction and a strong performance from Gerard Butler—which might be just enough for action junkies". Metacritic assigns the film a weighted average score of 41 out of 100 based on 30 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film a grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale.
Richard Roeper compared Olympus Has Fallen with the Die Hard series for sharing the same style and momentum, calling it as "just too much of a pale Die Hard ripoff." He gave the film a C.
David Edelstein was much more negative about the film. While praising Butler's role as a "solid" character, Edelstein criticized the script and the violence of the film, writing "Olympus Has Fallen is a disgusting piece of work, but it certainly hits its marks – it makes you sick with suspense."

Sequel

Gerard Butler, Morgan Freeman, Aaron Eckhart, Angela Bassett and Radha Mitchell returned for a sequel titled London Has Fallen revolving around a major terrorist strike on London during the funeral of the British Prime Minister. Production was scheduled to begin in May 2014 in London, with Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt returning to pen the script. Director Antoine Fuqua, however, did not return due to his commitments on The Equalizer.
On May 1, 2014, it was announced that Focus Features had acquired distribution rights to the sequel and would release it on October 2, 2015, though this was later pushed back to January 22, 2016. However, the film's release was delayed to March 4, 2016. On August 18, 2014, it was announced that Charlie Countryman director Fredrik Bond would take over direction from Fuqua, but Bond left the film on September 18, just six weeks before shooting was set to begin. However, on September 28, 2014, it was announced that Babak Najafi would take over direction of the sequel.
On October 10, 2014, it was announced that Jackie Earle Haley would join London Has Fallen as a Deputy Chief Mason. Filming for the sequel began on October 24, 2014. The film was released on March 4, 2016.