Yippee-Ki-Yay!

Rating: 8/10 (6 August 2007)

I worried about "Live Free or Die Hard" before it was released. While the first 3 were rated R, this one would be rated PG-13. I didn't like "Die Hard 2" because it was missing John McTiernan's intelligence, and McTiernan was also sitting this one out. And as much as I like Bruce Willis, I was worried that he might be a little long in the tooth to be an action hero again. Then I saw the movie, and my fears were put to rest.
In "Live Free", John McLane (Willis) is an old man who doesn't do much chasing and shooting after bad guys anymore. Instead, he's called on to escort nerdy hacker Matt Farrell (Justin Long) from New Jersey to Washington, DC to advise the FBI about someone who's hacked into their database. Unfortunately for them both, Farrell has been targeted for assassination that very night by the same hacker. By the time they elude the killers and get to DC, the hacker Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant) has infiltrated every government computer and brought the country to a complete halt. And that's when McLane decides to go after Gabriel using the same M.O. of the first three films: blowing up everything between himself and the bad guy. But he needs Farrell's help in finding the bad guy and undoing the techno-damage, and so they become an unlikely team.
As to my first worry (the PG-13 rating), it really doesn't make that much of a difference. There are still enough explosions and killings to appease action fans. The only thing toned down from the first three films is the language ("Yippee-Ki-Yay motherf*cker" is replaced by simply "Yippee-Ki-Yay"). Also, there is a break from violence in the middle to form a subplot involving Matt's even-nerdier friend "Warlock" (Kevin Smith) that is played for laughs rather than thrills. While I liked the first and third installments, I thought the second was stupid. But this movie is actually reasonably smart, and based on real tech issues (the script is based on an article from "Wired" magazine). And although by part four, the lead actor (or actors) usually sleepwalk through a role, Bruce Willis is still believable as an older, wiser John McLane who would prefer not to have to be a hero.
There were some things I didn't like about this installment. For one, it is filmed on DV instead of film. This makes the scenes at night or in dim light look really cool, but the scenes in daylight or well-lit rooms look washed out and hazy. Also, one of the things I liked about the first Die Hard was that unlike most of the other action films of the 1980's, the female leads were three-dimensional. But in this film, Gabriel is aided by his exotic Asian girlfriend (Maggie Q) with lots of sex appeal and not much else. And McLane's daughter (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is the typical action-movie damsel in distress.
But for the most part, this was a fun action flick worthy of its heritage. Can't wait for part 5. 8 out of 10.