A Towering action thriller full of wit, style & drama

Rating: Null/10 (16 July 2000)

Of all the action films to come out of Hollywood in the late 80s early 90s, Die Hard is perhaps the Mother of all of them. There is something strangely comforting about Bruce Willis' role as cop John McClane. We know the plot is quite ridiculous and yet Willis is so believable as the all action anti-hero that we go along with it all.
DH is superior to movies like Lethal Weapon, Terminator, Speed & Mission Impossible because of Willis' charisma & personal charm which is not generally found with actors like Gibson, Arnie & Cruise.
Another bonus about DH is that even though there are a lot of special effects we don't get bombarded with hi-tech unrealistic gadgets & hardware. Everything in the film is played with a genuine style & substance that is such a key factor with any John McTiernan movie. McClaine has to rely on his own wits & spirit for human survival while his contemporaries (Arnie, Cruise etc) can fall back on all those gadgets to get them out of a fix.

Ably supporting Willis is Alan Rickman, a theatrical actor by nature, but really excels as the rather civilised yet evil German terrorist Hans Gruber, adding a little European style to heaps of American panache.
It sometimes gets bogged down with the buddie-buddie relationship between white cop/black cop, while adding the FBI into the story is more of a distraction than an aid.
DH is still the best of the trilogy, although whether Bruce feels up to donning the White Vest again in DH4 we will have to wait and see.

***/*****