Die Hard With a Vengeance Review
by Rob Furr (rfurr AT jazz DOT ncren DOT net)June 1st, 1995
DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE
A film review by Rob Furr
Copyright 1995 Rob Furr
Last week, I saw a Jackie Chan movie in a theatre for the first time. Aside from the incredible non-stop physical comedy, the most notable thing about DRUNKEN MASTER was the extent that Chan made of his surroundings. Where an American action film would simply have two characters enage in a stand-up fight, possibly but not probably using a chair as a weapon, Chan and his antagonists constantly made use of their environment; chairs, tables, trees, rocks, doors, windows, pots, jugs, sticks, anything and everything in their surroundings could be and was used and involved in the fight sequences.
I was reminded of DRUNKEN MASTER while I watched DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE, the third installment in Bruce Willis' caper-film series. The distinguishing factor of all DIE HARD-like films is their use of their environment; last summer's SPEED and the first DIE HARD are possibly the best of the sort in their use of their premises. Like Chan, the combatants in a DIE HARD film make use of or are affected by their environments--and usually these environments are strictly limited. The hero is on a bus, or in a building, or on a battleship, or a plane. DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE, on the other hand, shares its stomping ground with THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE: New York.
That's both the problem with DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE and its best aspect. The problem is that the tight confinement that comes with planes, buses, buildings, and boats limits the screenwriter's options and thus improves the Chan-like action. Instead of having to ask the question "Okay, what does the hero obtain to solve this problem," the screenwriter merely has to ask "How can the hero use what is available to solve the problem," which usually provides a far more interesting answer. John MacClane (according to the end credits of this film; I'd thought that the hero's name was John MacClaine in the previous outings. Que sera sera...) was handed an extremely limited set of options in his first appearance, and it made for one of the all-time great action movies. His options and choices were enlarged for DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER, and the tension was reduced. His third film is set in an extremely large place ... and it *is* harmed by it, when compared to the majesty of the original.
However, ... this *is* New York. Everyone in the *world* knows New York, just like everyone knows what a building is, or a plane, or a boat, and the potential for creative use of New York is endless. We *know* what Central Park is, we know Harlem, we know Wall Street ... and when DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE is *using* New York, it almost reaches the heights of its illustrious predecessor. Just as we're astonished and amused when Jackie Chan fights off a horde of enraged waiters with chopsticks, we can be entertained by creative use of New York, and we are. Or, at least, I was when DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE showed me the fastest way to go ninety blocks in a cab, when it demonstrated exactly what the wrong thing to wear on 121st street was, what the best way to get fourteen dump trucks sixty miles north was, and so on. The creative use of New York in DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE is easily the equal of SPEED's creative use of the L.A. highway system, and far superior to THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE's use of the New York subway system.
So we have the down side--an enormous place for action to take place in--and the up side--a really good enormous place for the action to take place in. On the down side, we also have the fact that this is a DIE HARD movie, and therefore the glorious surprise of the original DIE HARD is no longer possible. DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER tried and failed to shock the audience with the creativity of its caper, and DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE doesn't even really try. We know very early in the film what the scam is and how things are supposed to go ... at least initially. This removes another element of tension from the movie, but it's replaced by the finest in Hollywood skill. DIE HARD was a demonstration of John McTiernan's genius; DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE is a demonstration of his masterful craftsmanship. While it won't be studied in years to come in film class, it will in no way subtract from his reputation and it is in no way a black mark on his or anyone else's record. The special effects are, for the most part, excellent, primarily because of their subtlety. The direction is crisp and assured, the cinematography is uniformly good, and there are some *damn* good roles in this movie. Instead of giving us another character in the mold of Dwayne T. Robinson (played by Paul Gleason in the original film) or William Atherton's Thornburg (the two false notes in an otherwise perfect movie,) DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE presents us with competent and engaging, if not deep, characters who are played by actors in full command of their abilities. Of especial note is a character whose name I unfortunately did not catch and could therefore not look up in the credits: the role of the bomb disposal expert, which could have been a cheap joke, is filled by an actor who I've never seen before but look forward to seeing again. The music is also of note: just as Beethoven was used in the original, "Johnny Comes Marching Home" is a recurring and highly effective theme in this film--I plan on buying the soundtrack, which, considering that the last soundtrack I bought was for THE RIGHT STUFF, is saying something.
There are, of course, some leaps of logic, some coincidences, and some rather silly events that happen, but for the most part, DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE moves forward with assurance, with a reasonably good story (which I have carefully tried not to spoil. The problem with writing a review of this sort of movie is not ruining it ahead of time,) decent if sketchy characters, and a high level of craftsmanship. DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE may not be the summer's biggest hit, but I can definitely say that it begins the summer season on a relatively high note. On the Furr Scale (of quality and ambition: I rate films based on how well they achieve what they want to do. A four-star one star film, such as EVIL DEAD II cannot be rated on the same scale with any justice as a one-star four star film such as HEAVEN'S GATE. Suffice it to say that I consider ROBOCOP to be a three-star three star movie, or, a reasonably ambitious movie that fufillis its ambitions well. THE SPECIALIST was a one star three star movie, or a reasonably ambitious movie that failed utterly, and LOCAL HERO was a four-star two star movie, or a movie that didn't aim too high, but did what it tried to do *insanely* well,) I give DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE the rating of a three-star three star movie.
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