Olympus Has Fallen (2013)

All Critics (170) | Top Critics (34) | Fresh (81) | Rotten (89)

The thrills and the effects are cheap, but this is in hard-driving, good-humoured command of its own silliness.

April 17, 2013 Full Review

Guy Lodge

Time Out

Top Critic

This ludicrous actioner strives to be as loud, violent, and patriotic as possible.

March 28, 2013 Full Review

Drew Hunt

Chicago Reader

Top Critic

Fuqua doesn't deliver on what he has set up.

March 28, 2013 Full Review

David Denby

New Yorker

Top Critic

Olympus Has Fallen is a disgusting piece of work, but it certainly hits its marks - it makes you sick with suspense.

March 24, 2013 Full Review

David Edelstein

Vulture

Top Critic

The carnage is cruel and crude.

March 22, 2013 Full Review

David Edelstein

New York Magazine

Top Critic

A typical slab of Hollywood action in which the White House crumbles under attack, the American flag is tattered and tossed aside by baddies, and clichés rise like gods.

March 22, 2013 Full Review

Robert Abele

Los Angeles Times

Top Critic

A fiery pile of turdy dialogue, turgid action, and xenophobic boosterism for the frequently 'God bless!'-ed US of A. This movie's so stupid, the only suspense it offers is if your brain can avoid falling into a coma before the screen finally goes to black

May 6, 2013 Full Review

Brian Gibson

Vue Weekly (Edmonton, Canada)

Provided you can handle such deliberate over-kill in the chaotic swirl that goes on here, Olympus Has Fallen offers a super-sized serving of grit-tinged fantasy action guaranteed to satisfy those who don't mind splatter over style.

May 4, 2013 Full Review

Jim Schembri

3AW

In reinventing an old tale in a smart and engaging way, it's a thoroughly entertaining and often riveting way to spend two hours.

May 2, 2013 Full Review

Christopher Lloyd

Sarasota Herald-Tribune

With guns blazing and spouting one-liners, Gerard Butler revels in being the tough guy and leads a decent cast, with all-American Aaron Eckhart a worthy addition to the hallowed list of movie presidents.

April 26, 2013 Full Review

David 'Mad Dog' Bradley

Rip It Up

Olympus Has Fallen is the stupid, dark fantasy of backward white trash America that needs another domestic threat to trigger war.

April 26, 2013 Full Review

Blake Howard

2UE That Movie Show

Gruesome, cliché-ridden terrorist attack on the White House actioner has a lot of energy to go along with its relentless and well-choreographed carnage.

April 25, 2013 Full Review

Bruce Bennett

Spectrum (St. George, Utah)

t's a terrible action film but a brilliant piece of North Korean propaganda. The American characters act so stupidly that you're pretty much rooting for Kim Jong-un. THAT'S HOW BAD IT IS.

April 22, 2013 Full Review

Marc Fennell

Triple J

There's a single line of dialogue that interrogates America's sanctions against some of the poorest people in the world. And who said this kind of thing couldn't be thought provoking?

April 21, 2013 Full Review

Ed Whitfield

The Ooh Tray

The movie is preposterous, paranoid, solemn and - though not I think intentionally - something of a laughing matter.

April 21, 2013 Full Review

Philip French

Observer [UK]

What the studio's calling 'an action movie' - the Secret Service will call 'a comedy'.

April 21, 2013 Full Review

Tom Glasson

Concrete Playground

As bystanders get mown down, the Washington monument topples and the Stars and Stripes is shredded, the onslaught delivers a real taboo-busting frisson... the sequence would pack an even bigger punch if the CGI special effects weren't quite so cheesy.

April 20, 2013 Full Review

Jason Best

Movie Talk

Having stayed up much of the night to watch the hunt for, and ultimate take down, of Suspect 2 in the Marathon Bombings, it was particularly distressing to watch this vile abomination of a movie whose "relevance" only adds to its dishonor.

April 20, 2013 Full Review

CJ Johnson

ABC Radio (Australia)

Whether Hollywood is right to keep prodding North Korea simply because it's not a valuable trading partner, only time will tell.

April 19, 2013 Full Review

Graham Young

Birmingham Mail

Antoine Fuqua is a dependable action director whose talents will never be maximised while the 1980s continue to be over.

April 19, 2013 Full Review

Tara Brady

Irish Times

As this massive blockbuster thriller progresses, it's impossible not to become amused by how ridiculous its script becomes.

April 19, 2013 Full Review

Rich Cline

Contactmusic.com

Reactionary fantasy, then - but what else are action films for?

April 19, 2013 Full Review

David Sexton

This is London

Some will find it ridiculously entertaining. I found it entertainingly ridiculous. Either way, it's a guilty pleasure.

April 18, 2013 Full Review

Christopher Tookey

Daily Mail [UK]

Olympus Has Fallen may be pure Hollywood hokum but it remains tense, exciting and credible enough right through to the suspenseful climax, even if the dialogue is laughable at times.

April 18, 2013 Full Review

Henry Fitzherbert

Daily Express

A movie that looks like a Die Hard film, feels (sporadically) like a Die Hard film, but lacks the wit and coiled adrenaline that made that series' debut a classic.

April 18, 2013 Full Review

Chris Buckle

The Skinny

Has more bloody on-screen deaths than any action film in recent memory.

April 18, 2013 Full Review

Dominic Corry

Flicks.co.nz

• 1. Army Lieutenant: Olympus has fallen! Olympus has fallen!
  – Submitted by Kyle R (4 days ago)
• 1. President Benjamin Asher: You should be.
  – Submitted by Lucas B (16 days ago)
• 1. Mike Banning: Let's play a game of "fuck off", you go first.
  – Submitted by Dan E (34 days ago)
• 1. Mike Banning: In English.
  – Submitted by Ausautas V (36 days ago)
• 1. Mike Banning: Maybe I'll leak pictures of your body to the press because I know how much you like that shit.
  – Submitted by Jay S (38 days ago)
• 1. Secretary of Defense Ruth McMillan: How's my hair?
  2. Speaker Allan Trumbull: Not a hair out of place!
  – Submitted by Sophie G (38 days ago)