A Good Day to Die Hard Review

Over twenty five years ago Bruce Willis made his mark on the action genre with the original ‘’Die Hard’’; it reached classic status with its witty dialogue, memorable villains and tense situations. Regretfully and inevitably the series has now fallen into the trap of uninspired, unoriginal mediocrity thanks to some poor production choices that spirals far from the polished flicks so many enjoyed before.   

In ‘’A Good Day to Die Hard’’ John McLane heads to Russia in search of his son, almost immediately finding trouble yet again in the form of weapons grade uranium. It does have a fairly good premise with the possibilities of placing John out of his element but it quickly falls flat; constant convolutions and other inconsistencies plague the plot from top to bottom. Jack is in contact with the CIA for the first act of the film, what role do they play? The organisation bugs out and any characters associated are killed off. Looking for a strong and memorable villain? For starters we don’t know who the main antagonist is and what he or she wants through the whole movie. The narrative clumsily bounces between a Russian government official  who does little more than talk on the phone (Sergei Koleshnikov), a nameless Russian terrorist who at complete random suddenly begins speaking in cringe worthy English to everyone around him (Radivoje Bukvić) and then a Russian weapons dealer who never reveals why he wanted the uranium so badly (Sebastian Koch). All of these villains have no character traits whatsoever, serving only to live and die at the hands of the seemingly invincible protagonists. Furthermore there are numerous aspects of ‘’A Good Day to Die Hard’’ that were ripped straight from previous Die Hard movies; there’s the villain falling from the building, the helicopter crash and the now pointless hero-villain laughter scene from the original. There’s the friend who soon turns out to be an enemy and a Russian who looks rather similar to the general from Die Hard 2. Finally from Die Hard 4 we have the female antagonist who this time was only drafted into the movie for sex appeal; all this shameless copying means the movie already cannot stand on its own, all mixed and mismatched into a nonsensical plot that requires little thought; a huge set back from the previous films.    

However the greatest sin committed by AGDDH is that Mclaine simply isn’t the same anymore; there’s no witty dialogue, no range of emotions and nothing to distinguish the character from any other generic modern action hero. Why is the quick thinking hero halting his son in the middle of an escape sequence? Why does he crush numerous cars behind the wheel of a land rover with no regard for civilian lives? The interactions with his son are practically non-existent, the complete opposite to the developed bond between John and his daughter Lucy in the previous film. As for John Jr (Jai Courtney) himself, he’s a joke of a character; for over half the movie all he does is complain and moan about his father interrupting his mission and never stops to show a hint of emotion. Only once does the duo ever come close to proper father-son chemistry before the final assault on a Chernobyl base and even that is as miniscule as the thought needed to get through the movie. The other members of the cast are also as non-existent as the development; most either die or otherwise serve tiny cameos that make you wonder whether they should even be included in the cast to begin with.

The words ‘’Die Hard’’ are in the title so surely you’d expect some nail biting, frenetic action that lives up to the series name; unfortunately most will be disappointed to find a mere three action sequences that while filmed mildly well fail to put across the memorable moments we enjoyed about the series, replacing them with endless computer generated effects instead. The problem here is that in past entries John was often forced to make do with whatever resources he came across, which in turn raised the stakes and made the action sequences more unpredictable. Here both Mclaines’ are armed to the teeth with tons of firepower, able to take on an entire platoon of Russian forces including a gunship at one point without any difficulties. Even the first chase sequence is made redundant with few eye popping moments or death defying escapes to set itself apart from other action flicks.   

‘’A Good Day to Die Hard’’ is simply not a Die Hard movie. It takes out everything you love about the series and the characters, replaces it with action that comes nowhere close to matching or surpassing its predecessor and mixes in a senseless plot with no style or substance. The result is yet another mindless action flick that tarnishes the series once high reputation.

   

Rating: 1.5/5 Stars