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John McClane (Bruce Willis) has to dust off his hand cannon once again when a group of cyber terrorists shut down the U.S. of A. The terrorists, under command of Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant) and his martial artist lass Mai Lihn (Maggie Q ), are simultaneously trying to hunt down and kill Matt Farrell (Justin Long) who is being protected by none other than mister McClane.
What we thought of it:
Predictably, this film has no shortage of impressive action sequences. Despite the fact that we don’t watch the Die Hard series for a sense of reality, some of the stunts and sequences are so bombastic that they border on parody of the action genre. Don’t get me wrong, I like action as much as any pop-corn munching cinemaniac, but I prefer a level of credibility. Casino Royale pulled it off successfully, as has the Bourne franchise so far; even Batman Returns lent a level of authenticity to its action sequences. This lack of realism could be due to director Wiseman’s previous directing duties being limited to the two Underworld flicks.
As far as Die Hard villains go, Gabriel comes nowhere near to the charisma of the original’s legendary Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) or even his poisonous brother Simon (Jeremy Irons) seen marinating in evil in Die Hard with a Vengeance. As forThomas Gabrielhe’s mostly just there. Evil? Not sure. Motivated? Yes. Forgettable? Unfortunately. This is not to say he doesn’t have some winning lines and quirky reaction shots, but in the book of villains, he’s no Dr Evil.
Even the henchmen only manage to impress on the action (and not the acting) front. Maggie Q has some impressive fighting scenes, yet is one of the main reasons of the above-mentioned credibility problems (I won’t ruin it for you, but trust me, you’ll see what I mean). The incredibly impressive French stuntman Cyril Raffaeli is the exception to this statement; although his inclusion in the cast seems to have been prompted by the jaw-dropping acrobatics ofCasino Royale’s Sebastien Foucan.
Willis obviously relishes playing the character that made him an A-lister. Yet McClane is no longer the foul-mouthed rebel of yesteryear. He’s toned down his tongue severely, which is fine by me, although it does detract in the yippee-kai-yay front.
Similarly, since Die Hard with a Vengeance, it seems McClane’s been getting by with a little help from his friends.. His trusty the trusty sidekick this time around, is a young hacker played by Justin Long who learns a thing or two about caring for others courtesy of McClane.
Compared to the Die Hard films so far, this one is slightly below part 3 but better than part 2, with the original still leading the pack convincingly. Nonetheless, it’s enjoyable to see McClane on our silver screens one more time, along with his fellow 80’s iconic actioners Rocky Balboa and John Rambo. Welcome back John… Yippee kayyay….
-Evert Lombaert
