Big Game (2014)
Directed by Jalmari Helander
Air Force One is shot down by terrorists, leaving the President of the United States stranded in the wilderness of Finland. 13-year-old Oskari is on a hunting mission to prove his maturity to his kinsfolk by tracking down a deer, but instead discovers the President in an escape pod. With the terrorists closing in to capture their prize, the unlikely duo team up to escape their hunters.
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4 films that influenced Big Game
What critics say influenced Big Game
Those expecting a presidential action romp along the lines of White House Down, Olympus Has Fallen or even Air Force One will be disappointed as this is far more of a family-friendly adventure.
It's more that this is so clearly his world, and these characters out of a fourth-rate White House Down ripoff can't help but seem trivial in comparison.
And although the absurdly high concept for Big Game conjures over the top images along the same lines of the similarly ludicrous White House Down, Jalmari Helander lets his characters talk to each other.
Finally, a movie for everyone who got a charge out of the slick presidential jeopardy of “White House Down” and “Olympus Has Fallen,” but lamented that they weren’t really suitable for family viewing.
Big Game feels like it’s aimed right at recent “presidency in peril” movies like White House Down and Olympus Has Fallen, brawny, dopey productions meant to recall the glory days of ’80s action iconography.
Helander cites 80s action and rites-of-passage movies as an inspiration (he was aiming for Die Hard meets The Karate Kid, apparently), but there’s a touch of Airport 1975 about the proceedings, which may not be entirely parodic.
At one point, Oskari transports a blanket-shrouded POTUS on his quad bike (surely a nod to E.T. ), while the downed Air Force One blazing through the trees recalls the train wreck in J.J. Abrams’ own love letter to The Beard, Super 8 .
In a nice change, Moore’s staff, including terrorist expert Herbert (Jim Broadbent, Cloud Atlas ), the CIA director (Felicity Huffman) and Gen. Underwood (Ted Levine) are surprisingly competent and not bickering over who has the best plan.