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Reviews
A Good Day to Die Hard (2013)
What did I just watch?
Director John Moore has committed yet another atrocity, in the same vein as his awful rendition of the Max Payne franchise.
Not five minutes into this movie it explodes into a veritable pandemonium of car chases, gun fights, miserable one-liners, explosions and bad guys dying by the truck load, with no explanation or background as to why any of these things are happening. It's a ridiculous orgy of violence strung along a thin plot that is littered with holes, and this bland cocktail is accompanied by worst dialogue in recent history. Uwe Boll makes better movies than this.
Screenwriter Skip Woods completely misunderstands what makes John McClane a likable character. The John McClane we know and love has integrity. He's a good guy who gets thrust into a bad situation and tries to deal with it the only way he knows how - like a bull in a porcelain shop. The character that Skip Woods has come up with, is a reckless, irresponsible maniac, as illustrated by the scene John inexplicably assaults a random civilian in the streets of Moscow, steals his car and then wise-cracks about the man not being able to speak English. This version of McClane is little more than a misogynistic flag-waving idiot, and even the good acting of Bruce Willis can't get you to accept him as John McClane, because the guy on the screen simply doesn't do anything the way McClane would.
Willis' acting is up to his usual standard, but unfortunately we only see some of it in the few tiny moments between the gunfire and explosions, and there's just not enough room in there to both tell a story and develop characters. In part, this is due to the short running time of 97 minutes, which makes it the shortest Die Hard movie yet. Likely, 95% of the films budget was blown on that ridiculous opening action scene, leaving us the production scraps for everything else.
Dear Hollywood, stop crapping on all the franchises of my youth. You've taken Star Wars, Indiana Jones and now also Die Hard. It's not enough to just take the name of these great franchises, you have to have some understanding of what made those movies great!
Bailout: The Age of Greed (2013)
Poorly written, badly directed, bleakly acted - don't recommend this one
I've made it a bit of a principle to steer clear of anything with Uwe Boll on the poster, but after reading a few of the reviews from other IMDb users, I decided to once more give him the benefit of the doubt. Big mistake.
The narrative is so ridiculously obvious that it makes your head hurt after watching for just a few minutes, but the film keeps on painting this utterly one-dimensional picture of the beautiful and hard-working American couple who are victimized by the evil and greedy bankers. First goes the investments, then the health insurance, then the job, then the house, and then someone dies ... and now it's payback time (one man, out for revenge!).
Anyone who has anything to do with the financial services industry are vilified and then later gunned down in a banker conspiracy theory nut's wet dream. Secretaries and office clerks are just as valid targets as CFOs and CEOs.
The acting is thin and strained, the characters are cardboard stereotypes, the story not very believable and at the end of it all, the glorification of a mass-shooting just left me with a bad taste in my mouth.
There is nothing new or improved here, in comparison with other Uwe Boll films. I suspect the only reason other people are giving it any kind of decent rating, is simply because they enjoy the subject matter of someone taking "justice" to Wall Street ... indulging in some kind of murder fantasy that is frankly disgusting to watch.