Directed by:
Len WisemanScreenplay:
Mark BombackComposer:
Marco BeltramiCast:
Bruce Willis, Timothy Olyphant, Justin Long, Maggie Q, Cliff Curtis, Jonathan Sadowski, Kevin Smith, Cyril Raffaelli, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Sung Kang (more)VOD (4)
Plots(1)
John McClane takes on an Internet-based terrorist organization who is systematically shutting down the United States. (20th Century Fox)
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Reviews (12)
Len Wiseman, the eclectic and soulless vampire son and John McClane? Are you kidding? No! Unless... Bruce Willis was at his best, and Len made fun of what he embodied in his two previous films - from a state-of-the-art action room. Well, miracles do happen. Live Free or Die Hard is exactly the kind of action cocktail that old lovers of the genre like to drink. Explosive, ironic, witty... charming and captivating. How so? In order: Willis is at his best, and his John could carry the film, even if the script was a level weaker. The script is not a level weaker - it is exactly as sparse as it needs to be. Wiseman was being honest and made a film without unnecessary modern buck-passing, and with enthusiasm and a clear vision. In the old way, but also very brisk. Timothy Olyphant is the ideal villain. The perfect contradiction to the bald detective - a guy who doesn't stain his hands with blood, but uses the conveniences of the modern world. A world that will become a deadly arena in which an aging detective, the last Mohican of his kind, must face modernity. He won't be able get around it, he won't dance around it with the elegance of a Kung Fu master, and he won't deceive it with hacking or supernatural abilities... he will break it with his fist, bullets, or simply the manly force we are used to from John. The NYPD detective does not want to make friends with the modern world. He makes his way from point A to point B, says one-liners just like when he was young (and later), skates through jacked and breathtaking action sequences, puts on armor made of clichés and the pathos of "good cops", which is an integral part of the 1980s. Live Free or Die Hard is a whiff of old times - honest filmmaking with a hero who is a loser (and therefore cool), with a hero who is so perfectly incompatible with all hi-tech culture that he resembles an angry Don Quixote. But unlike Cervantes, he flattens windmills to the ground, gets into an ambulance covered in blood and leaves for the Hollywood gold fund. A perfectly good film from a genre that I had thought had died out. Yippee-ki-yay, bastard!
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The nightmare of every IT specialist, or rather, the best comedy of their lives, depending on how you look at it. Wiseman totally blew it. It's definitely an above average action film, but that's about it unfortunately. If I were a hardcore fan of the Die Hard franchise, I’d wonder where are the cynical, dry wisecracks typical of John McClane, and where are the plot twists that worked so well in the second and third films. Wiseman's film is closest to the first in its directness, but unlike it, it lacks tension, because Willis has a skeleton made of titanium and wouldn't be stopped even if a Boeing fell on him. In other words, the almost comic-book exaggeration kills the movie. This is especially true of McClane's adversaries, a dashing guy, undoubtedly Spider-Man's older brother, who falls 10 metres from a helicopter onto concrete and it's all good. But that's nothing against Maggie Q – you can punch her several times with your fist (without breaking her make-up), slam her against the wall several times (her make-up still sticks) and then hit her with a car at full speed and she won't even flinch and will still kick your ass. Sorry, Wiseman, but I'm not interested in Aeon Flux 2, I'm getting a bit bored of these feminist superheroes.
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I was a little weary, but yippee, John is back in full strength. Even more wisecracks than before, he’s full of laughs and eliminates baddies one after another. The story is, well in short, fine. Technological advances haven’t hurt John as much as I had feared (what’s more it prompted a couple more wisecracks). Olyphant is one of the best villains to Die Hard and I must say that I understood his motives. I would also be pissed if someone did to me what they did to him. And he had a nice shirt, too. Justin Long was also a pleasant surprise and he makes a pretty decent sidekick (I bet you can’t pronounce the Czech equivalent: “přicmrndávač"). Maggie Q was gorgeous, as always. And if John weren’t John, she would have won, same as the French Spiderboy Cyril Raffaelli who put on a nice show in the little room he was given. Live Free or Die Hard worked out just fine. Wiseman did some great work and you can tell that he’s a fan. Despite all of his blue filters and logical nonsense, you just have to forgive him for that. And maybe. Just maybe I would like to see a Die Hard 5.0. Hope to see you again, John.
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The fact that Wiseman is an enthusiastic filmmaker who has a lot of experience with action films and then only proves on screen what wonders can be done with a big budget doesn't bother me all that much. What bothers me is that he completely misunderstands the poetics of Die Hard, especially McLane’s character, whose tragic cop with a touch of sad comic relief has become the killing machine that dominated cinema 25 years ago and whose renaissance McLane created as an action hero. Overall, I find the concept of digital terrorism juxtaposed with a 1980s hero rather dull, given that political correctness and pandering to American politics of today are at play. Willis is good at being a tough guy, but the rating tames his vocabulary and character, so the result is ultimately (from my perspective) an expected loss. Die Hard itself didn't deserve this kind of eating of its own stupidity through non-stop action. McTiernan should have got the last crack at it - it couldn't have ended up worse than this.
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Poor John McTiernan will have to come to terms with the fact that his cult classic original and the veritable watershed moment of the third installment will remain in the shadow of the fantastic even-numbered films. When I once read in an interview with Bruce Willis that the screenwriters drew inspiration from the TV series 24, I had no idea that I would pretty much witness a feature-length version of it. McClane has problems with his daughter, he advances in eliminating the villains almost exactly according to their hierarchy – and he is such an amazing action hero that I couldn't help but gape. And after the tired third installment, I expected anything but this. I was looking for a lot of humor and fan nods in the fourth Die Hard, but I also got John as an indestructible dinosaur who beats up women without hesitation and swears at them with all his might. And the viewer feels the desire to cheer out loud. The threat this time is perfectly terrifying and chilling at certain moments. Timothy Olyphant adds to this with his delightful performance, his sarcastic remarks full of anger raised my adrenaline, and when he tells McClane that he will destroy his life and kill his loved ones, I instinctively cowered in my seat. Moreover, the connection between the old fox and the young, restrained rebel works, everything is as it should be. Although there are occasionally overly calm moments in those two hours, I still have to convert those 90% into five stars. This matador will not be ashamed of his comeback.
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