My Favourite Movies: Die Hard
I’ve been a fan of Bruce Willis since his days playing David Addison alongside Cybill Shepherd in Moonlighting. The role of rogue New York cop John McClean was idea for the wise cracking Willis – who apparently ad-libbed most of his lines. Called to LA over Christmas to meet up with estranged wife Holly (played by the sexy Bonnie Bedelia) he becomes involved in what at first seems like a terrorist hostage situation in the newly constructed Nakitomi Plaza. In an attempt to thwart their plans McClean begins to slowly pick off the bad-guys acquiring more deadly hardware as he goes. Pitted against him (at least inside the building) in the razor sharp mind of ex-terrorist Hans Gruber – isn’t it funny that most believable bad guys are European? – played to perfection by the fantastic Alan Rickman. A fun time (with explosions and countless witticisms) ensues.
This is such a fun film. It’s an ideal vehicle for Willis’s style of acting and his delivery of the killer one-liner. It also showed that he can pull off a staring role in an all action movie. I loved the scene where he’s trying to radio for help only to be told he’s breaking regulations and the channel should only be used in emergencies to which he responds “What does it sound like lady, I’m ordering pizza?” followed by a hail of deafening gunfire – hilarious! Of course being that kind of film Willis needs to basically destroy the building in order to save the people inside it which, I suspect, is one of several unsubtle swipes at corporate America. There’s another wonderful scene where Alan Rickman is discussing men’s fashion with the head of the Japanese head of the US operation – just before he cold bloodily executes him for not providing the information the gang needs to open the safe. No wonder it was an 18 Certificate. It is infinitely watchable though and the sequel “Die Harder” is almost as good. After that things begin to tale off a bit. I thought “With a Vengeance” was OK but not great and didn’t care for “4.0” very much, though it did have some wonderful moments. All in all I still think the first in the franchise is still the best. Simply good dirty violent fun.
5 comments:
I am not a big Willis fan...And admitedly it has to do with an altercation he was involved in with a dear dear friend--whom he screwed, so to speak...So, I have never been able to look at him the same way after that. I realize that shouldn't have anything to do with his actibg ability---which, I think he is mostly playing himself.
But....sad to say, he lost me, Big Time, when he did what he did to my friend. Believe me, it was very very bad.
I ADORE Die Hard.
For me it is the paradigm action movie franchise.
I love the first one but I like all the sequels.
This is probably the only franchise in which ALL of the sequels are good. By today's standards I'd say that's pretty impressive.
John Sessions did an excellent imitation of Alan Rickman the other night on QI.
"Mr. Takagi won't be joining us for the rest of his life"
and yeah, you pretty much nailed my favourite one-liner with the 'pizza order' quote.
Though, I must admit that this:
"You just killed a helicopter with a car!"
"I was out of bullets"
from Die Hard 4.0, is PURE awesome.
I was a big fan of Moonlighting. People forget, but it was very original and completely different than anything else on at the time. It often had actors speaking directly to the camera and it's quick dialog spawned a lot of imitators, including Ally McBeal.
I do like Die Hard and Willis the majority of the time. I've especially liked him in the sci-fi stuff he has done, including Fifth Element and 12 Monkeys.
Naomi said: I am not a big Willis fan...And admitedly it has to do with an altercation he was involved in with a dear dear friend--whom he screwed, so to speak...So, I have never been able to look at him the same way after that.
I'm sorry to hear that. I'm not surprised that it would colour your opinion of him.
TF said: and yeah, you pretty much nailed my favourite one-liner with the 'pizza order' quote.
It *is* a good one!
TF said: "You just killed a helicopter with a car!"
"I was out of bullets"
One of the best things about the movie......
dbackdad said: I do like Die Hard and Willis the majority of the time. I've especially liked him in the sci-fi stuff he has done, including Fifth Element and 12 Monkeys.
Oh, I'm sure that there will be more Willis in my movie list at some point.....
Die Hard is bloody brilliant, one of the best action flicks of all time!
And ditto on Moonlighting, Fifth Element and 12 Monkeys...
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