Review of Krepkiy Oreshek (1968) by Tom R — 17 Feb 2013

(A Perfect 5 Stars) Die Hard is hands-down THE quintessential action movie. Citizen Kane? Maybe not; but it IS the Citizen Kane of action cinema. It is one of the few movies that I watch many times a year that never gets old or unexciting. It's also one of the greatest Christmas movies of all time.

If I'm ever flipping through channels and Die Hard is playing, I will always watch the rest it. It's such a pure action movie that even the television-edited version can't ruin it. Its contribution to cinema is so great that a lot of action movies are described as "Die Hard on..." (ie Die Hard on a bus, Die Hard on a plane, Die Hard in a mall). I can name countless reasons why this is one of the best movies ever made. First, it's why people go to the movies: to escape from real life for two hours and watch a story about a man fighting unbeatable odds. Everyone loves a good underdog story. When someone gets shot in Die Hard, their bullet wounds are explosions of blood, serving the purpose of both looking awesome and going over the top as to not take the movie as real life... after all, you're watching a movie. The formula for one man taking on an army of people and predictably winning seems very cliche nowadays, but Die Hard perfected it... and while many movies have gotten close to it, none have been as entertaining as this one.

I don't know a single person who doesn't like John McClaine; he's the perfect hero. He's not perfect, he's messy, he bleeds, but most of all, he's human. In a world where Superman is only a comic book hero, we can all turn to McClaine to save the world. Much of his dialog is quotable and he is played unforgettably by Bruce Willis.

Another great moment of the movie is probably my favorite antagonist ever put to film. Alan Rickman as Hans Gruber is, for my money, is a better villain than Darth Vader. The great thing about Rickman is that he plays Gruber with a ruthless but refined demeanor and his evil plans are actually genius. Much like the great James Bond villain Auric Goldfinger, his hostage scheme was just a ploy for a much bigger plan.

Why do people continue to go to action movies even though they're clearly very cheesy? It's because of the inventive action scenes, occasionally witty dialog, and escapist plot. Die Hard spawned four sequels and while all are good, it's impossible to top the original. I would like to close with asking someone to contact AFI because they forgot to put "Yippee ki-yay, motherf***er" on their "100 Best Movie Quotes" list. I love Die Hard!!