The character played by Morgan Freeman in London Has Fallen (who happens to be on this screen the vice-president of the USA) says at one moment about the master-terrorist that plans the 9/11 like events described in this film: ‘This man has killed more people than the plague.” This is actually true about the film as well. It’s an action thriller with a pace of bombings, gun fights, and other means of having people killed that exceeds by at least one degree of magnitude everything that you have recently seen on screens.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3300542/
The film starts with a targeted assassination. It’s a wedding taking place somewhere in the Orient (maybe Pakistan). The whole family is gathered, father and sons for the wedding of the daughter when the guided bomb explodes. The targeted person was the master terrorist Aamir Barkawi (played by an Israeli actor expert in such roles – Alon Aboutboul). He survives, but many collateral victims including his daughter die. Two years later he takes revenge by staging a high profile terror attack in London which practically liquidates almost all the leadership of the free world. The stake is however even higher – the execution on live TV in ISIS style of the president of the United States. Of course, the plan will fail, but many people will die before the 95 minutes of screening end.
(video source KinoCheck International)
The targeted assassination is the only hint about the possible reasons of the attacks, and even this is some how trivializing, as terror has deeper and darker roots. It is not this film that will clarify any of these, as the goal of Iranian-born director Babak Najafi and of the authors of the script was just to create patriotic American entertainment around the events. On this specific track they did succeed, as the pace is alert, the action keeps interest high for the fans of the genre, all provided that you accept the premises of the film. Some of the effects are spectacular, London never looked so much in ruin since the blitz. Acting is efficient within its limited scope borders, with Morgan Freeman wasting (again) his huge talent, and Gerard Butler and Aaron Eckhart competing on the number of terrorist shot dead and on the squareness of their respective chins.
Action thrillers of this kind were riding high in the 1980s with folks like Chuck Norris enjoying their moments of glory. Two things have happened since then: special effects highly improved and terror has become part of the daily news reality and part of life (to say so) in the big cities of the world. Some may doubt action thrillers about terror (be they as well made as this film is) are still entertaining. Those folks should leave any hope – Angel Has Fallen is announced for 2018!