A Good Day to Die Hard

Originally posted to the DMI Review on 2/17/13

Old Heroes Die Hard

by Hunter Isham

        John McTiernan's 1988 action masterpiece Die Hard gives us an everyman hero contrary to the hulking Schwarzeneggers and Stallones that constituted the action A-list at the time. Bruce Willis, cast after those popular stars passed, is an unassuming presence as the always-in-the-wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time New York policeman John McClane, and the success of his performance and of the film as a whole created an enduring franchise. No subsequent film matches the original's excellence, but 1990's Die Hard 2, 1995's Die Hard with a Vengeance, and 2007's Live Free or Die Hard are all worthy additions to the series. This generally unwavering quality stops with A Good Day to Die Hard. It's not a terrible film, but it's not a good Die Hard film, and it's not what the franchise, or its leading man, deserves.
        This fifth entry in the series finds McClane, still played with some exasperated wit by Willis, on his way to Moscow to sort out his estranged son's imprisonment. Jack, who we haven't seen since he was a little boy waiting for his parents to come home from a Christmas party gone wrong, is on trial alongside government whistleblower Yuri Komarov (Sebastian Koch). To cut to the chase (literally), the two escape, and John follows them (and some Russian bad guys out to get Komarov) in a massive, occassionaly inventive, but not terribly well shot car chase. MILD SPOILERS Once John catches up to his son and Komarov, it's revealed that Jack is actually an agent working to extract Komarov for the CIA. The reasons for this are easy to follow but never provide much weight as a reason to keep the story moving. SPOILERS END To explain any more of the weak plot would be a waste of time for both you and me, and it would spoil some twists that aren't particularly surprising but help to pad the 97-minute run time. At the end of the day, this film is really just about McClane and son fighting Russian "scumbags," as John calls them, and to a much lesser extent, about mending their relationship.
        A lacking story aside, why does this film fail to live up to what we have come to expect of John McClane and his previous adventures? Let's start with the cast, which has no weak link, but which lacks the screen presence of the preceding films' ensembles. The last four films combined give us performances by Bonnie Bedelia, William Atherton, Fred Thompson, Reginald VelJohnson, John Amos, Dennis Franz, Jeremy Irons, Samuel L. Jackson, Justin Long, Timothy Olyphant, Mary Elizabeth Winstead (who cameos here as McClane's daughter), and last but not least, Alan Rickman as the first film's villain, Hans Gruber. This list serves only as a reminder of the great actors who have filled out the casts of each film around an always dependable Willis, and while they may not have been well known at the time (Rickman made his film debut in Die Hard), they are worth remembering in those roles. The same cannot be said for anyone in this film, except perhaps for Australian actor Jai Courtney as Jack McClane, because with a better script he seems as though he would be capable of something more than what he delivers here. We believe Jack as John's son, if only because their repartee is all about life as a McClane, but the moments of real heart simply do not deliver. At the end of the first two films, when John is reunited with his wife after two of the longest nights of his life, we feel something, especially in the first film. He has gone to hell and back, fighting for her, but in A Good Day, we see more of a father-son bonding experience, which could have worked, but the moments where they open up to each other fall flat.
        The Die Hard films have always been able to deliver on a character level, and that is what sets them apart from more rote action films, but they also have fantastic moments of thrilling chases, shootouts, and massive explosions. Big dumb action has the potential to be fun, and some of this fifth film's action is very enjoyable, but the Die Hard series is also fairly grounded when it comes to unbelievable stunts. John McClane is always battered, bruised, and possibly limping by the time one of his adventures has come to a close, but in the first major action sequence of the film, the aforementioned car chase, we see John get into two major accidents in which his vehicles roll several times, and then emerge with hardly any difficulty or visible damage. Not a single scratch. In fact, it's not until he takes a long trip down some scaffolding with his son that he bleeds even a little, at which point he's already endured not just the car chase but also a few harsh punches. The original film has a sequence where John, not wearing any shoes, must walk across a room blanketed with broken glass, and then pull the shards out one by one before returning to the fight. Many argue that he became too much of a super hero in his last outing, but this film outdoes Live Free or Die Hard's outrageous action simply by waiting too long to apply fake blood to Willis' face. The action as a whole in this film isn't anything special. Stunts ranging from that extended car chase to a truck hanging out of a helicopter at Chernobyl (no joke) are fun to look at, and some of it is well staged, but director John Moore takes a shaky-cam, in the action approach that does not suit Die Hard well. It's a modern and overused technique that has its moments with the right material, such as the Bourne franchise, but which does not have a place in the more traditional action of Die Hard.
        Perhaps the most disappointing shift away from the series is John McClane's motivation in this film. In the first film he just wants to reconcile with his wife, but must fight terrorists holding her hostage. The second film works similarly, with the third and fourth films demonstrating McClane's ability to fight the bad guys because he's the only one who can. A Good Day to Die Hard has McClane jump into a major car chase simply because he's trying to follow his son, not because he knows he's chasing dangerous terrorists seeking to steal from or kill innocent civilians. In the process, he causes a great deal of damage to those civilians' cars, putting many of their lives in danger. To put it in Die Hard terms, John McClane doesn't take bullshit from anyone when he's working to stop injustice, but here he's just on a rampage because his son is acting like a criminal, and more criminals are out to get his son. McClane is a cop, so one would expect him to get some lawful cooperation from local police before jumping into a hazardous situation among thousands of people, but apparently Die Hard is just about the carnage now.
        All of this may make A Good Day to Die Hard sound like an absolutely dreadful experience, which it certainly is not. However, this is not the Die Hard the audience deserves, and hopefully not the one it wants either. The premise is solid, but a weak script by Skip Woods, whose work on 2010's The A-Team would make him seem like a good fit while his script for X-Men Origins: Wolverine demonstrates he is not, and direction from John Moore (helmer of Max Payne and other bad movies) that is at best uninspiring and at worst confusing make this film simply mediocre. Bruce Willis saves the day as much as possible by being his charming self, but his one liners don't always land (look once more to the script), making the movie's hour and a half runtime merciful. This film is enjoyable from the standpoint of it being an adequate action yarn with a likable lead, and although the periodic character moments are part of what makes Die Hard what it is, the lack of those moments in this film relieve us of having to sit through poorly written scenes, allowing us instead to simply enjoy the big, dumb explosions. This is not what we want from Die Hard, but at this time of the year, when terrible but reasonably profitable films are dumped by the studios in the long trek to summer, it's a nice enough distraction. Go in with low expectations, and you will not be disappointed. 5.5/10

*On a side note, Willis hopes to make a Die Hard 6 in the future, and I sincerely hope A Good Day to Die Hard makes enough money to make that possible. As much as this film does not really deserve to stand alongside the other four, giving the character a proper sendoff would be a nice way to end this beloved franchise. And perhaps 20th Century Fox would consider hiring some better talent behind the scenes the next time around.