Review of Live Free or Die Hard (2007) by Jack H — 04 Apr 2013

Initially, I said that this "looked" interesting. In hindsight, it was middling at best. Bruce Willis is in fine form as everyone's favorite irascible NYPD cop John McClane, Maggie Q is fun to watch, and Timothy Olyphant makes an interesting turn as a villain, but there are a couple of glaring issues that really detract from the overall experience.

The first of these is the inclusion of Justin Long in the cast. Long works best in comedies (and some would lump romantic comedies in there, as well), but in an action film like this, his brand of comedy is distracting rather than complementary.

Also not well thought out was the character of Lucy, McClane's daughter. Simply a plot device to motivate McClane to catch the bad guys, it was a shallow attempt at making the story personal. Instead, it falls flat.

The final detractor from this movie was the big stunt sequence toward the end. Jumping onto an F35?! What?! Not even in the just-released GI Joe Retaliation was there a stunt quite this ridiculous. Asks for the suspension of disbelief one time too many.