Thus spake Alik, the latest in a long (and usually misguided) line of heinous cads to lock horns with Detective John McClane (Bruce Willis) in the Die Hard film franchise.
This carrot crunching, hoofer, furthers his impromptu history lesson, whilst holding our heroes at gun point, by adding,"Reagan is dead !" The dastardly mercenary is opining to John McClane's archaic methods of law enforcement. After that as we get back on track and everything started to splinter and shatter again, i had some time to think.
There is a delicious irony here, which was also sniffed at, but not as successfully integrated into the narrative as it could have been, in Die Hard 4.0 as well.
Justin Long asks McClane, in that last installment, "why are you still THAT GUY" ? (i'm paraphrasing), to which McClane retorts that no one else is offering to fill his shoes (or lack thereof, geddit ?).
The irony, to me, being that every ranting review of this film i've cast an eye over this week, is asking the same question from the opposite side of the screen, "why are they still doing this" ?
Maybe for opposite reasons, to the audience, they feel that the better tropes of the series have been allowed to slide, villains, viscera and a good plot. From McClane's point of view, that the people in charge of the world he inhabits refuse to meet the constant threat of scumbags and dirtballs it faces, with the more direct methods he favours.
Yet, there's the question, why still bother, well based on this entry it could be seen to be puzzling (although i would challenge you to offer me any franchise where the fourth sequel is even approaching the quality of the original movie).
The Die Hard films have been with us twenty five years now and the zeitgeist our friend Alik is referring to has shifted, i think in anyone's view, to the wholly different mindset of today and "action films" have changed right along with it.
People will still turn out for this franchise, it would seem from recent box office, but its two feet are planted in different worlds. The makers struggling with past content and modern form.
I feel these issues, as i said, that have been mentioned in passing, could, in the right hands, be the saviour of the series (if a sixth episode is at hand) and what an ironic rescue it would be.
To address these issues, of past versus present, that McClane's ability to "Die Hard" is not just physical (which is far more what the last two films have interpreted it as), but it is also his whole personal ideology.
The first two films tested McClane's principal's and metal, against not only a physical threat, but against redundant bureaucracy. Since then, (particularly in the two recent movies) his only impediments have been physical. Don't struggle with McClane's persona being out of step with the modern world, embrace it, remind the audience (and the villains) why we still need "that guy" in the wrong place at ANY time !
With regards to the present, A Good Day To Die Hard, is loud (whew is it loud), bombastic and fairly brief. There is enjoyment to be had from it, its not as terrible as runaway emotions would have you believe, but its not brilliant either. When U.S. Secretary of Defense Charles Erwin Wilson referred to "bang for your buck" he was talking about this movie (i think).
This carrot crunching, hoofer, furthers his impromptu history lesson, whilst holding our heroes at gun point, by adding,"Reagan is dead !" The dastardly mercenary is opining to John McClane's archaic methods of law enforcement. After that as we get back on track and everything started to splinter and shatter again, i had some time to think.
There is a delicious irony here, which was also sniffed at, but not as successfully integrated into the narrative as it could have been, in Die Hard 4.0 as well.
Justin Long asks McClane, in that last installment, "why are you still THAT GUY" ? (i'm paraphrasing), to which McClane retorts that no one else is offering to fill his shoes (or lack thereof, geddit ?).
The irony, to me, being that every ranting review of this film i've cast an eye over this week, is asking the same question from the opposite side of the screen, "why are they still doing this" ?
Maybe for opposite reasons, to the audience, they feel that the better tropes of the series have been allowed to slide, villains, viscera and a good plot. From McClane's point of view, that the people in charge of the world he inhabits refuse to meet the constant threat of scumbags and dirtballs it faces, with the more direct methods he favours.
Yet, there's the question, why still bother, well based on this entry it could be seen to be puzzling (although i would challenge you to offer me any franchise where the fourth sequel is even approaching the quality of the original movie).
The Die Hard films have been with us twenty five years now and the zeitgeist our friend Alik is referring to has shifted, i think in anyone's view, to the wholly different mindset of today and "action films" have changed right along with it.
People will still turn out for this franchise, it would seem from recent box office, but its two feet are planted in different worlds. The makers struggling with past content and modern form.
I feel these issues, as i said, that have been mentioned in passing, could, in the right hands, be the saviour of the series (if a sixth episode is at hand) and what an ironic rescue it would be.
To address these issues, of past versus present, that McClane's ability to "Die Hard" is not just physical (which is far more what the last two films have interpreted it as), but it is also his whole personal ideology.
The first two films tested McClane's principal's and metal, against not only a physical threat, but against redundant bureaucracy. Since then, (particularly in the two recent movies) his only impediments have been physical. Don't struggle with McClane's persona being out of step with the modern world, embrace it, remind the audience (and the villains) why we still need "that guy" in the wrong place at ANY time !
With regards to the present, A Good Day To Die Hard, is loud (whew is it loud), bombastic and fairly brief. There is enjoyment to be had from it, its not as terrible as runaway emotions would have you believe, but its not brilliant either. When U.S. Secretary of Defense Charles Erwin Wilson referred to "bang for your buck" he was talking about this movie (i think).