"Only John can drive somebody that crazy!"

Rating: 10/10 (10 November 2008)

In what has to have been the highlight of Bruce Willis's hardcore action movie career, Die hard is a nonstop adrenaline packed thrill ride that even manages to avoid the Rambo effect, where the single hero takes down the whole world around him. John McClane is just a regular cop, he's just really good at what he does and he's thrust into a situation where he can either act or be killed, or let a lot of innocent people be killed.
A group of terrorists, led by Hans Gruber (a delightfully sinister Alan Rickman) has taken a building-full of hostages in Los Angeles and are demanding the release of prisoners in Northern Ireland, Canada, and Sri Lanka. Clearly this is a pretty lofty goal, but it's only a cover to buy time while the terrorists go after their real goal, which is to steal the$ 640,000,000 in bearer bonds in the building's safe.
What makes John so convincing and so human is that he has not come here to save the world, he came because he's a New York police officer but his wife got a job in Los Angeles that he didn't think she would keep. She has become more and more comfortable, so he came all the way to LA to try to convince her to come back to New York to be with him.
What follows is one of the most skillfully crafted action movies in the genre. Director JohnMcTiernan made his name with this movie, even after the similarly impressive Predator the year before. Robert Davi turns in an outstanding performance as the FBI agent assigned to take over control of the situation from the incompetent LAPD, and the movie even takes time to take a jab at the press, which nearly blows everything near the end of the movie.
Note: There is a point in the movie where we see a gas station which is selling unleaded for $0.75 a gallon! Makes me wonder what gas prices are going to be like in another 20 years! I do have one question though  why does it rain paper at the end of the movie? White Christmas?