Olympus Has Fallen

Terrorists seize the White House and the president (Aaron Eckhart), virtually annihilating the Secret Service; only one agent (Gerard Butler) remains—the one who sacrificed the first lady (Ashley Judd) to save the president in an auto accident 18 months earlier. Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt's script is soaked in post-9/11 nightmare images and mayhem to cover all the whoppers along the way (a garbage truck that converts into an assault vehicle? Really?), and they get away with it more than they have a right to expect. Director Antoine Fuqua hammers the action out with all the breakneck abandon and CGI $70 million can buy, and there's a good supporting cast to sell it: Angela Bassett as Butler's boss, Morgan Freeman as the acting president, Robert Forster as a trigger-happy general are some.