White House Down (2013)
White House Down is a 2013 American political action thriller film directed by Roland Emmerich and written by James Vanderbilt. In the film, a divorced US Capitol Police officer named John Cale attempts to rescue both his daughter Emily and the President of the United States James Sawyer when a massively destructive terrorist assault by a paramilitary group occurs in the White House. The film stars Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Joey King, Jason Clarke, Richard Jenkins, Michael Murphy and James Woods. Released on June 28, 2013 by Sony Pictures, White House Down received mixed reviews from critics toward the screenwriting and the clichéd storyline, although the performances and action sequences were praised. The film grossed over $205 million worldwide at the box office, against a budget of $150 million. White House Down was one of two films released in 2013 that dealt with a terrorist attack on the White House; the other, Olympus Has Fallen, was released three months earlier.
Plot.
U.S. President James Sawyer makes a controversial proposal to remove military forces from the Middle East. Divorced veteran John Cale works as a Capitol Police officer assigned to Speaker of the House Eli Raphelson, whose nephew he saved while serving in Afghanistan. Cale hopes to impress his daughter Emily by interviewing for the Secret Service, getting tickets for them to tour the White House. His interviewer, Deputy Special Agent-in-Charge Carol Finnerty, a college acquaintance, deems him unqualified for the job. Meanwhile, a bomb is detonated in the United States Capitol, collapsing the rotunda and sending Washington, D.C. into lockdown. Finnerty escorts Raphelson to an underground command center in the Pentagon, while Vice President Alvin Hammond is taken aboard Air Force One. A team of mercenaries led by ex-Delta Force and CIA operative Emil Stenz infiltrate the White House and overwhelm the Secret Service, seizing the building. The tour group is taken hostage in the Blue Room by white nationalist Carl Killick, but Cale escapes to search for Emily, separated during the tour.
Retiring Head of the Presidential Detail, Special Agent-in-Charge Martin Walker brings Sawyer to the PEOC beneath the White House Library. Inside, Walker kills Sawyer’s detail, including fellow agent Ted Hope, revealing himself as the leader of the attack, apparently seeking vengeance against Sawyer for his Marine son, Kevin Walker, who was killed in a botched mission in Iran the year prior. Cale kills a mercenary, taking his weapon and radio, and rescues Sawyer after overhearing Walker.
Walker brings in ex-NSA analyst Skip Tyler to hack the PEOC’s defense system, but requires Sawyer to activate the nuclear football. Killick catches Emily filming the intruders on her phone and takes her hostage. Cale and Sawyer contact the command structure via a scrambled satellite phone in the residence, whereas Finnerty uses Emily’s YouTube video to discover the mercenaries’ identities.
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Cale and Sawyer try to escape via a secret tunnel, but find the exit rigged with explosives. They escape in the presidential limo but are chased by Stenz and fall into the White House pool. With Sawyer and Cale presumed dead in an explosion in the cabana, the 25th amendment is invoked; Hammond is sworn in as president. Cale and Sawyer, still alive, learn Hammond has ordered an aerial incursion to re-acquire the White House, but the mercenaries shoot down the helicopters. Learning Emily’s identity from the video, Stenz takes her to Walker in the Oval Office. Hacking into NORAD, Tyler launches a laser-guided missile at Air Force One from Piketon, Ohio, killing Hammond and everyone on board. Raphelson is sworn in as president and orders an air strike on the White House.
Production, Release.
White House Down is directed by Roland Emmerich and based on a screenplay by James Vanderbilt, who is also one of the film’s producers. Sony Pictures purchased Vanderbilt’s spec script in March 2012 for $3 million, in what The Hollywood Reporter called “one of the biggest spec sales in quite a while”. The journal said the script was similar “tonally and thematically” to the films Die Hard and Air Force One. In the following April, Sony hired Roland Emmerich as director. Emmerich began filming in July 2012 at the La Cité Du Cinéma in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Cinematographer Anna Foerster shot the film with Arri Alexa Plus digital cameras. In 2012, Sony competed with Millennium Films, who were producing Olympus Has Fallen (also about a takeover of the White House) to complete casting and to begin filming. White House Down was originally scheduled for a November 1, 2013 release, but was moved up to a June 28, 2013 release. The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on November 5, 2013.