Die Hard - Duri a morire

*** 1/2 out of ****

When one thinks of buddy action pictures, Lethal Weapon is immediately the first film to pop into your mind, since it virtually birthed the genre. Another choice would probably be Midnight Run or Rush Hour, the latter of which somehow took pop culture by storm (I recall my friends going around, shouting "My daddy once caught a bullet..."). So often left in the dust, probably because it was the third film of a trilogy and strayed quite a bit from its predecessors, is none other than Die Hard: With a Vengeance which, off the top of my head, is the best buddy action film I've ever seen.

How can this be? Better than Lethal Weapon 1 and 2? Better than Rush Hour? Hell, I'll even say it's better than Die Hard and Die Harder. Here is a film that wisely knows, as a second sequel, not to simply repeat the same material over again. This has partially to do with the numerous Die Hard rip-offs (namely Under Siege and Speed), so those hooks were gone, and I absolutely thank God John Mctiernan and company didn't suddenly decide "we'll do Die Hard on a plane!," which would eventually be done three times (Executive Decision, Air Force One, and Con Air). But what the filmmakers have done here is ingenious, they've widened the setting to include all of New York City.

They do this and still manage to retain the intense claustrophobia that permeated the previous entries, doing so by displaying just how frantic morning traffic is and just how BIG New York is. As nonsensical as that last statement may sound, imagine trying to get from point A to point B in the middle of a traffic jam. Mctiernan really knows how to let the tension ratchet up from just the sound of honking horns.

Then there's the case of John McClane himself. This time around, he's at the whim of a madman named Simon who requires him to perform certain tasks or New York buildings will be demolished by explosives. In the first two films, McClane was an everyman, which added much appeal, but he also acted a bit too much like a superhero to work consistently as an everyman, so what the filmmakers have done here is turn him into a jaded cop. He's seen this stuff before, so he's not as scared as he was before. Willis is great at this role, too, seeing as he's done it before in The Last Boy Scout, but takes it to perfection here.

Rather, who we now have as the everyman is Samuel L. Jackson as Zeus, and he's a brilliant addition. Not only is Jackson simply awesome in his role, he's likeable, tough, and hilarious, but he's also easy to sympathize with because he's not an action hero. He doesn't know how to use a gun, he has no combat training, and he's never had to take on terrorists before. What makes him so effective is his street-wise nature, and this quality of his works perfectly with McClane's own street smarts AND action heroics, which they combine in their day-long adventure. These two have a chemistry that at least equals Riggs and Murtaugh and if there's a Die Hard sequel, Jackson needs to come back.

Too many action movies give us poor villains who aren't menacing, vile, or charismatic enough to make for effective antagonists. Jeremy Irons' Simon Gruber is an exception. He is the best Die Hard villain, oozing charm and snaky intelligence. This was one of the last few roles of Irons' career I could take seriously. He's done what since then, Dungeons and Dragons? Pity how his career has taken such a downward spiral.

And last, there's the story and action. The plot's a lot of fun, with McClane and Zeus having to use both their brains and brawn to save the day. The contrivances in the finale (the scene with the handcuffs, the aspirin bottle) aren't enough to bring the climax down, though it's true the conclusion isn't as exciting as the rest of the film. That's understandable though, since the rest of the action is magnificent, particularly a car "chase" through the streets of New York which is as unstaged as a car chase can possibly look. The film moves at a lightning pace that grips you from the opening scene to the very last. Die Hard: With a Vengeance is an action flick that has it all.

Die Hard With A Vengence is a near-perfect summer movie. This franchise effort is a gleeful no-brainer with nonstop action. It gives some additional perverse pleasure, as we get to watch smartypants Bruce Willis get smacked around for 112 minutes. In this third outing with John McClane, we are faced with yet another mad bomber on the loose. Jeremy Irons plays Simon, a nasty piece of Eurotrash who has a score to settle with Detective McClane. Simon's bombing game comes complete with crafty riddles, which must be solved in a specified time or everything goes boom. McClane has no choice but to play. Along the way, he picks up an unlikely accomplice named Zeus (Samuel L. Jackson), a Harlem shopkeeper. Together they tear all over New York trying to head off disaster. Sure, it's all perfectly preposterous, but DIE HARD 3 has been directed with breathless intensity by John McTiernan, who certainly has a way with wrecking things. Was he very destructive as a child? Loved the spectacular subway crash, John. That hair-raising taxi ride through Central Park wasn't bad, either. Don't forget to fasten your seat belts for this ride.

The movie starts off by re-introducing John McClane, and immediately takes off with non-stop action. Samuel L Jackson has great chemistry with Willis, and they really work with each other. Even thought the movie was made almost 20 years ago, due to the dependence on mainly practical effects, it still looks good.

The one major downfall of the movie was the ending. It is too bad, since that is what the viewer will remember. It could have been easily re- mediated if they went with a less typical Hollywood-type ending, and that would also have been in line with everything else in the movie. Also, the water riddle was solved way too easily by John, and the editing of it didn't even show how he randomly arrived at the answer.

Die Hard:With A Vengeance deserves to be ranked in a top ten list of action movies. The first two Die Hard movies were brilliant but this installment just blows the first two out of the water.

Bruce Willis is back as police officer Lt. John McClane and in this movie he teams with Samuel L. Jackson as Zeus Carver to stop the wicked Jeremy Irons who is planning to cause mayhem and destruction around New York.

If you're a fan of non-stop action movies like Speed, then this is the movie with you. It doesn't let up for a second; it's one of those movies where your heart beats as fast as the characters and by the end of the movie, you'll be feeling like you ran round New York chasing a bomber. That is how all good action movies should be.

I don't think it is any exaggeration to say that Die Hard:With A Vengeance deserves to be rated one of the top action movies of the 1990's. All that has to be done now is to make Die Hard 4 which I hope would top this movie...although that would be quite a feat.

Series note: Although the Die Hard films obviously follow one another chronologically in the film's universe, they are not really constructed as chapters in a novel. You could watch them in any order, but to give the characters more depth, and make better sense of a couple minor references, I would still recommend watching them in order.

In my Die Hard 2 (1990) review, I complained (although apologetically) a bit about the lapses in internal logic. It ended up being somewhat excusable, because I read Die Hard 2 as a satire of the genre as much as a serious action film. With Die Hard 3, John McTiernan is back at the helm, as he was for Die Hard (1988), and the result is once again a more serious action film (containing some comic relief, of course) with very taut internal logic. In fact, Die Hard: With a Vengeance is so well constructed, so well acted and so well directed that I like it just as much, if not better, than Die Hard.

John McClane (Bruce Willis) is once again separated from his wife, and he's once again living and working as a cop in New York City. As the film begins, he is on a temporary suspension for some never-specified infraction (it works better that it isn't specified, as it enables us to imagine all kinds of crazy things that this gruff character might have done). After a bomb explodes at the Bonwit Teller department store, a mysterious person calling himself "Simon" calls the police taking credit and asking to speak with McClane--or he'll detonate further bombs in crowded areas. They rouse McClane from the aftermath of a drunken stupor. He shows up at the police station with a hangover, looking haggard. "Simon" is fond of riddles and makes McClane engage in a bizarre game of "Simon Says". The first task is for McClane to head up to Harlem and stand on a street corner in his skivvies wearing a sandwich board that says only, "I Hate Blacks" (using a more inflammatory epithet than "blacks"). Of course, he almost gets killed, but at the last minute, a reluctant savior in the form of a local shopkeeper, Zeus Carver (Samuel L. Jackson), helps save his butt. Unwittingly, Carver ends up embroiled in the Simon Says games with McClane, with increasingly serious stakes. Just who is Simon? Why is he toying with McClane?

I should note that I was predisposed to like this film. I like Bruce Willis a lot, but I especially love Samuel L. Jackson. The combination of the two here is simply magical. They have remarkable chemistry and the characters that scriptwriter Jonathan Hensleigh has drawn enable both deep tension and hilarious comic moments between the two.

But the film succeeds on more than the charisma of its two principal actors. Die Hard: With a Vengeance has a fantastic, intelligent plot. Hensleigh ties his villain to the story of the first film in a semi-satirical way that gives the motivation for the "Simon Says" games great depth. The Simon Says games manage to be silly, smart, humorous and great catalysts for dramatic tension at the same time. There are subtle jokes about New York City, New York City cops, "reverse racism", European opinions of American intelligence, and so on. And of course, there are many edge-of-your-seat, nail-biting action sequences involving a wide variety of environments in the New York City area. The wide variety of environments was a nice change over the more limited settings of the previous two films, and gives Die Hard: With a Vengeance a feel almost like an adventure film.

It's remarkable that Hensleigh and McTiernan were able to sustain such a high level of excellence throughout. If you look at Die Hard: With a Vengeance from a broader perspective, the whole is constructed something like one of Simon's puzzles. Every scene leads inevitably, logically to the next scene, even though the film takes many "left turns", and the solution of one dilemma to the next often involves split-second timing.

It's often said that McTiernan and Hensleigh simply ignored Die Hard 2, and in terms of direct plot and dialogue references, this may be true, but they still give Die Hard 2 a nod by having an attendant humor--often almost "goofy" humor--in many action scenes. One of the most direct nods occurs with McClane "riding" something of an explosion (of water this time). This is one of the more hilarious scenes of the film.

As for subtexts, they are similar to those of the first Die Hard, with some interesting additions. There is an intriguing parallel between McClane's disheveled state, the typical New York City chaos, and the attempts to further undermine stability from the villain. Focusing on this aspect, Carver provides more of a dependable, even-keeled balance.

There are also direct references to very contemporary political subtexts--with foreigners having in mind that the U.S. has socio-economic power disproportionately in its favor. They claim to want to redress the imbalance, although in this film, at least, the claim may end up being a false representation--there appears to be corruption undermining it. However, it's interesting that there is yet another "twist" towards the end that shows the claim may not have been as corrupt as we initially believed, even if it still seems a bit mad and/or megalomaniacal. It's also interesting that the resolution is reached on foreign ground.

But the subtexts in Die Hard: With a Vengeance may be even more minor focuses than in the previous two films. Instead the focus is on the spectacle of a tightly told, thrilling action/adventure story. That's all the film needs to succeed as well as it does.