Angel Has Fallen Review: 6 Ups & 4 Downs

A return to form for the action franchise.

Angel Has Fallen
Lionsgate

Arriving with little fanfare in cinemas this week is the third and maybe final entry into the unexpected "...Has Fallen" action film franchise.

And while audiences would be sensible to have basement-low expectations for Angel Has Fallen after the morally dubious, sloppily executed trash-fire that was 2016's London Has Fallen, it's a pleasant surprise to report that this threequel is something akin to a return to form for the series.

If 2013's Olympus Has Fallen was an unambitious but entertaining riff on all the cheesy post-Die Hard action flicks of the 1990s, Angel feels much closer to that tone, dialling back the genuinely hateful violence and discomforting xenophobia of London.

Instead, the focus is on a simple yet efficient plot, a shedload of action, and there's even some room in there for relatively decent character development.

It's certainly not a classy action flick, but it knows exactly what it is and delivers the zany thrills audiences expect without lurching into icky hoo-rah territory.

Whether this is in fact the end of the series or not will depend entirely on its box office performance, so wait and see on that one. But first off, here's everything the movie sadly doesn't get right...

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Contributor
Contributor

Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.