Still the best of the series.

Rating: 10/10 (8 August 2013)

The first time I ever saw Die Hard it was at the Film On The Square screening, part of the London Film Festival in Leicester Square, November 1988; I spent the following weeks—up until the film's official UK release date on February 3rd—trying to convince people that Bruce Willis would be the next big Hollywood action star and that Die Hard would change the face of the action genre forever. 'Bruce Willis from Moonlighting?' they would say, 'I don't think so.' 'Just wait and see', I would reply...
A quarter of a century later and Bruce is still proving me right (the fifth Die Hard movie came out earlier this year and Red 2 is on general release as I type); but no matter how long the guy keeps on blowing stuff up and shooting bad guys on screen, I doubt he will ever match the brilliance of Die Hard, which remains the pinnacle of action cinema as far as I am concerned, a film where everything came together to create pure cinematic gold.
Director John McTiernan at the top of his game, fresh from the success of Schwarzenegger vehicle Predator; perfect casting throughout, from Alan Rickman's loathsome lead villain Hans Gruber and Bonnie Bedelia's plucky Holly McClean, right down to Al Leong as mustachioed henchman Uli and Playboy Playmate Terri Lynn Doss as the blonde hottie at the airport; a great soundtrack that combines hip-hop and classical music with a seasonal flavour; visual effects from Richard Edlund that still hold up well against any of today's CGI; superb cinematography courtesy of Jan De Bont; a brilliant script with cracking dialogue and a wry sense of humour (that scene with the SWAT member catching himself on a rose bush still cracks me up!): Die Hard is virtually flawless in every department.
Unless you've been in a coma or living in a cave for the past two and a half decades, you'll no doubt be familiar with the plot, so I won't waste any time summarising what happens, suffice to say that the set-up is lean, mean and full of explosive, edge-of-the-seat action, and is still influencing action film-makers today, recent examples being comic-book sci-fi flick Dredd and martial arts actioner The Raid. But no matter how many derivatives (or sequels) it spawns, the original will always be the best—a white knuckle ride of a movie with the power to thrill your socks off even after all of these years (so watch out for broken glass!).