The new trailer for "White House Down" includes much of the same terrifying imagery presented in the film's first teaser -- the U.S. Capitol exploding from the inside out, for instance -- but with one key addition: jokes. The latest look at Roland Emmerich's upcoming summer blockbuster shines a spotlight on the interaction between stars Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx.
"It has a lot of humor, a lot of great characters, and -- at the center -- this relationship between an ex-soldier who wants to become a Secret Service agent (Tatum) but gets denied, and the President of the United States (Foxx)," Emmerich told HuffPost Entertainment when the first "White House Down" trailer debuted in March.
That relationship -- which, in this new trailer, includes elements of "Lethal Weapon" and "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" -- puts "White House Down" on the same level as a host of other 2013 summer blockbusters. Which raises the question: Is 2013 the year of buddy movie?
Last year, only five of the top-25 grossing films had what would count as "buddy movie" elements, at least as defined by films like "The Defiant Ones," "48 Hrs." and the aforementioned "Lethal Weapon": "Safe House" (with Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds), "21 Jump Street" (with Tatum and Jonah Hill), "Django Unchained" (Foxx and Christoph Waltz), "Men In Black 3" (with Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones/Josh Brolin) and "Ted" (with Mark Wahlberg and the Seth MacFarlane-voiced Ted). Even if you count "Marvel's The Avengers," which featured a playfully antagonistic relationship between Tony Stark and Dr. Bruce Banner (Robert Downey Jr. and Mark Ruffalo), that still brings the number to just six. (To say nothing of the fact that "Safe House" is a dour affair without many opportunities for friendly banter between Washington and Reynolds.)
This year alone, however, movies like "Identity Thief" (with Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy), "A Good Day to Die Hard" (Bruce Willis and Jai Courtney), "Pain and Gain" (Wahlberg and Dwayne Johnson and/or Anthony Mackie) and the early portions of "G.I. Joe: Retaliation" (with Johnson and Tatum) already fit into the criteria. "Iron Man 3," meanwhile, is often a straight-up buddy movie, especially in the third act when Downey's Tony Stark and Don Cheadle's Jim Rhodes get together for a final assault on the film's evildoers. (Since Shane Black, screenwriter of "Lethal Weapon," "The Last Boy Scout" and "The Long Kiss Goodnight" wrote and directed "Iron Man 3," its buddy-movie bona fides aren't all that surprising.)
It doesn't, of course, stop with "Iron Man 3" and "White House Down": "Star Trek Into Darkness," "Fast and Furious 6," "The Hangover Part III," "The Internship," "Monsters University," "The Heat," "The Lone Ranger," "R.I.P.D." and "2 Guns" all hinge on a key, platonic relationship between mismatched partners. It's a roster of films that does Riggs and Murtaugh proud. Or at least Shane Black.
