A Good Day to Die Hard (2013)

I had not heard any good things about this film prior to watching it.  However, I started watching the movie without any high expectations.  I heard people say that it was the fakest movie in the whole series.  I heard people say that it was the worst Die Hard yet.  My question that I have for those people is what did you expect?  This is the fifth Die Hard movie.  It’s the fifth one!  To put that into perspective, the original Die Hard (1988) was 25 years ago.  I was 2 years old when that came out and Ronald Reagan was the President.  It was 2 years until they made the second film.  The next film was 5 years later, then 12, and now 6 years after that.  Willis has played the same character for 25 years and you wonder why A Good Day to Die Hard was not as good as the others?

In this fifth installment of the Die Hard Series, John McClane (Willis) travels to Russia to confront his troubled son Jack, (Jai Courtney) whom he doesn’t know is an undercover CIA agent on a mission.  John unknowingly ruins Jack’s mission and the two are forced to work together to try to repair the damage done.

The film was directed by John Moore, and the rest of the noteworthy cast includes Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Yuliya Snigir, Rasha Bukvic, Cole Hauser, and Amaury Nolasco.

Over the last 25 years, Die Hard movies have become an American tradition.  They are filled with action so far-out, intense, and convenient that it’s unbelievable.  However, the beautiful destruction, explosions, slow-motion debris dodging, and endless one-liners from Willis is enough to keep us entertained.

A Good Day to Die Hard follows in the footsteps of its ancestors, sort of.  The action is just as incredible, but far more convenient and therefore way less realistic.  The destruction is pretty, but not as glorious.  There are still explosions and tons of debris and Willis still has the best one-liners.

Besides Willis, the film lacks credible big name stars.  It felt like the movie was made just to make another Die Hard film.  Everyone just kind of went through the motions and parts of the movie felt like a satire of itself.  The McClane family kept referring to how they do this stuff all of the time.  The film made fun of itself and all that succeeded in doing was to help bring the movie down a notch.

With the addition of Courtney, the film is a father and son shoot-em-up adventure that is still worth the rental, if only to carry on the Die Hard tradition.  It’s good for a few chuckles.  Besides self-destruction, the movie still has some entertaining gun fights and plenty of stuff blows up.

I rate this movie a 6 on scale of 1-10.

Buy, rent, or run?  Rent.

If you liked A Good Day to Die Hard, then you will probably enjoy:

The Last Stand (2013)

Bullet to the Head (2012)