Die Hard With A Vengeance
After the rip roaring, smashing successes that were the first two Die Hard films, it was perhaps inevitable that the third film in the franchise was going to be a bit of a letdown, especially given two semi related events that managed to cast a bit of a shadow over the whole thing prior to release. First, Bonnie Bedelia in the role of John McClaneâs wife (whom he had fought tooth and nail to rescue in the previous films) did NOT return and worse, we are told early on that they are divorced which immediately ruins the mood somewhat as they could have either given her a non endangered cameo or at least have made some reference to them still being together without actually having her be onscreen. Secondly, just one day before the movie opened, Alexander Godunov who had been so memorably underrated as the secondary villain in the original film was found dead of undisclosed causes, tragically reminding everyone of just what a stone cold classic the first Die Hard had been before we even were subjected to this entry. There was also the problem that after Die Hard 1 and 2âs success, EVERYBODY wanted to make their own versions of the terrorists vs one lone man template, which led to script ideas for setting it on a cruise ship being dropped after the releases of both Under Siege and Speed 2: Cruise Control. Eventually, the producers decided to change up the formula entirely by outright buying an original, unrelated action movie script (a practice that has been in play for franchise sequels going back to the Dirty Harry days) and rewriting it to suit the requirements of the series. In this case, it was a script called Simon Says, a story about a meticulous psychopath engaging the police in a series of cat and mouse games along with threatening them with bomb attacks. Once star Bruce Willis and director John McTiernan (returning to the helm after the 1st movie) had both agreed that the script would work, production began with a film that brought several jarring changes to the format, setting it in the summer instead of at Christmas, having McClane dealing with the terrorists in his home base of New York City (and working with a number of fellow cops who have presumably known him for many years) and being put in a situation that requires him to run all over the city to defeat the villains instead of just being in one isolated location. The biggest change though (not surprising since Simon Says was originally considered for the Lethal Weapon franchise) was the decision to give McClane a full time sidekick here and essentially turn the whole thing into a buddy movie. Of course, a lot of hype was generated by the casting of Samuel L. Jackson (in his absolute prime coming off his career defining role in Pulp Fiction) as said sidekick, a Harlem store owner named Zeus who first encounters McClane in front of his store as part of one of Simonâs games and who also happens to be somewhat of an armchair black militant. This leads to some pointless dialogue bits where Jackson clearly tries to bait McClane into admitting heâs racist (a far cry from Gibsonâs and Gloverâs schtick) after he too is roped into the whole affair when the police are told by Simon that he must accompany McClane or else that will be reason enough to set off another bomb. Of course, by transforming the original Simon Says script into an actual Die Hard movie, the producers knew that they still needed a killer hook to make it all work (and explain Simonâs inexplicable hatred for McClane himself) and they actually managed to get that right by making the villainous character of Simon into one Simon GRUBER, none other than the brother of Alan Rickmanâs legendary Hans Gruber who was dropped out of a building by McClane at the end of the first movie. Even better in that regard was with the casting of Oscar winning acting heavyweight Jeremy Irons in the role, for even as nearly the entire first hour of the film utilizes the annoying gimmick of only hearing Simon over the phone, when Irons finally does emerge on camera he projects a sleek, no nonsense badass who ironically probably made his biggest mistake even using McClane as a part of his master plan. Ironsâ objective is to use terrorist bomb attacks (including the opening scene of the movie), McClane being forced to play along with his stupid plans and the threats of further bomb attacks including his intentions of detonating one at a NYC school to create distraction and ultimately chaos in the city for the police to have to deal with while he and his men go and rob the New York Federal Reserve, the largest collection of pure gold bullion in the world, even throwing in the idea that the gold would actually be destroyed so that the balance of wealth and power between the 1% and the 99% would be made even (although McClane correctly ascertains that Irons will indeed be keeping it all for himself). Overall, this is a fairly good concept for a Die Hard movie, but along with the absence of Bedelia, the problems here are many, starting off with Simonâs actual games where in a fast paced action movie one literally finds himself scratching his head at the dense stupidity of many of these clues, some of which are so simple that Simon unwittingly gives himself away while others actually involve math and riddles that tries to make the viewer think too hard when we really shouldnât, ultimately coming off as being both a childish and dumb gimmick for a master villain to have (albeit that was the driving point of the unrelated original story). Secondly, the film manages to fall into that terrible practice of early to mid 90s action films of literally having EVERYONE (including the bit players with only a couple of lines) be overly endowed with a goofy sense of humor and always being given funny lines that are usually delivered with a straight face, a strange attempt to make the minor characters relatable even as NOBODY in real life would ever crack jokes in the middle of a crisis. Never is this more evident than with the characters of McClaneâs fellow cops, a chatty, wisecracking group (which includes real prestige actors like Graham Greene and Colleen Camp) whose near constant attempts at humor always fall flat on its collective faces with just how unfunny they turn out to be. On top of that, we get an awfully haggard, hammy and hangdog performance from little known soap opera actor Larry Bryggman as McClaneâs seemingly long suffering (of course) commanding officer, an actor who appears to be completely out of his league here amidst the prestige of a Die Hard movie where he is taking on arguably the 3rd or 4th biggest role in the film. Most of the time the main focus seems to be on Willis and Jackson buddying up (with Irons still lurking in the shadows) exchanging insults and wisecracks as the bulk of the action is them racing around the city to various locations in order to meet Ironsâ various deadlines and demands. This just drives home the point that the 1st two Die Hards worked because the irritable McClane was forced to work alone and usually only dealt with others (mostly authority figures) whenever he actually had to. Here in working with Jackson (whose stated mistrust of white people is where the source of their chemistry and tension is derived from), McClane is dealing with a guy who at any time could disagree with and stand up to him even if by the end this black small business owner is also doing death defying stunts hand in hand with McClane that no normal human being could ever survive and even tagging along unnecessarily in the final moments of the hunt for Irons just so that he could say that he was there. Indeed, the ending of the film was a reshoot from the original scripted and filmed ending, a rather quiet face to face confrontation between Willis and Irons somewhere in Europe where McClane (now fired from The NYPD in the context of this ending) calmly and coldly executes his prey in cold blood after having had a short conversation with him, an ending that was deemed out of character for McClane (and rightfully so) and certainly not the proper way to end a Die Hard movie. Add to that two very direct and ham handed references (in 1995) to both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton (where she is literally referred to as being the ânext Presidentâ) and you have this breakdown on the chain of great movies in the franchise, one where certainly all of the components were in place but the script and filmmakers just dropped the ball utterly and completelyâŚ
5/10