Movie Review: Live Free or Die Hard

Last night I was in the mood to see things explode so I went to the latest Die Hard film, Live Free or Die Hard. Hard to believe it's been a dozen years since the last Die Hard film. I think the first one is the best action film made. This one wasn't that good but in the theater it was fun. I laughed a lot during this film. I'd say half the time was with the film and the other half was at the film. And unlike the first one which I remember very well almost 20 (!) years later, this one I'm already forgetting lots of.

Bruce Willis is back as John McClane. Justin Long is his hacker sidekick Matt Farrell. I'm not sure they have actual chemistry together but they both do well in their roles. The film opens with a glitch at the DHS cyber office or some such place. Think CTU from 24. Suspecting it was an attack, the commander orders the round up of anyone capable of doing this. I hope that's still illegal in country but ok. Since there were enough federal agents to do this, they call local police departments to get the suspects and bring them to DC! So to catch a kid in Camden NJ which is right outside Philadelpha, they call the New York City police who send detective John McClane who at the time (3 am) is in Rutgers NJ. Riiiight. Ok we begin the film just ignoring time and space. It only gets worse on this front.

Later the characters go from DC to West Virgina. The bad guys by helicopter and the good guys by car which takes only slightly longer. The helicopter then makes it to Maryland without refueling. There's a big chase scene at the end. An F-35 fighter jet vs a truck. You read that right. The truck is driving on the lower deck of an elevated concrete highway. At one point the jet slowy passes the truck in the background; cause that's how mach 1 compares to say 70 mph. The jet fires a missile at the truck and misses. So then it hovers between the decks just in front of the truck. In this scene, McClane is in the truck. Yep the truck wins and at one point McClane is surfing on the plane. It made the ridiculous scene in True Lies with the jet hovering for 15 minutes seem possible. But by far the worst part of this scene was that after this whole exchange takes place, the van with the bad guys which sped away in front of McClane is only about 400 yards away; close enough for McClane to limp to them.

Ok, evaluating this film on physics probably isn't fair. The plot involves the bad guys hacking into various computers and screwing up traffic lights, TV, powerplants, etc. Not just in once city but across the whole east coast. This isn't small time and I think it loses something from the more human scale of the previous Die Hards. The Cholefication of films (and know it was around long before 24) is starting to bother me. I'm actually depressed that the computer industry has done such horrible job of presenting the machines that virtually everyone uses in so horrible a way that they don't understand to the degree that this plot (and most every plot involving computers) was impossible. Donald Norman would say we don't present a model to the user so that they can understand things.

Some things I have to say: Cell phones don't use satellites. CBs have short ranges. When the east coast has a power failure, the networks go down too, even if you have your own personal generator. When a gas line explodes, gas doesn't continue approaching. If a building explodes, hiding in a van won't help.

I was very happy to see that cars in this film don't typically explode, which is an improvement over many action films. One (or was it two) of the villains lept around like Trinity in the Matrix or Sebastien Foucan in Casino Royale or Spider-Man. It was a bit ridiculous. People don't just get hit by cars, they hold onto them as they drive really fast and then are thrown off them. And they getup just fine. At another point McClane is thrown several stories out of a window and just gets up. Later when someone fell down an elevator shaft I wondered if they would just get up. But then a van fell on them (yes down the elevator shaft) and exploded so that settled my confusion.

What about the rest of the cast? Maggie Q is fine as an assistant villain hacker geek ninja. This is probably possible because the character has no depth other than a serious look. The rest of the casting is questionable. I liked Timothy Olyphant in Deadwood but I didn't like him as the underwritten villain Thomas Gabriel. He's no Alan Rickman or even a Jeremy Irons. Tim Russ who was supposed to be a useless White House liason thought he was still playing Tuvok from Star Trek Voyager. I found Kevin Smith as the hacker Warlock living in his mom's basement to just be ridiculous.

Ok. It may possibly sound like I didn't enjoy the film. Oddly I did. I really did. It was fun and as I said I laughed a lot. it has some very good lines. When McClane asks "Doesn't the government have dozens of agencies setup to deal with situations like this?", Matt replies "The government? After Katrina FEMA couldn't get water to the Superdome in 5 days." It doesn't take itself too seriously and for that reason doesn't come close to the original Die Hard. Maybe that's too much to expect from Hollywood these days; then again, I'm looking forward to The Bourne Ultimatum. If you're in the mood to see things explode this will kinda do the trick. If you're in the mood for a mindless summer action flick Live Free or Die Hard will definitely satisfy.