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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: Live Free or Die Hard

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#1 of 1 Posted 6/26/07 2:04 PM

From Harveycritic Posts 1637 Last Jan-30
To All [Msg # 22493.1 ]

LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD

Reviewed for CompuServe by Harvey S. Karten
20th CENTURY FOX
Grade: B
Directed by:    Len Wiseman
Written By: Mark Bomback, story by Mark Bomback, David Marconi, from John Carlin's article "A
Farewell to Arms"
Cast:   Bruce Willis, Timothy Olyphant, Justin Long, Cliff Curtis, Maggie Q, Mary Elizabeth Winstead,
Kevin Smith
Screened at: AMC Empire, 6/25/07
Opens: June 27, 2007

They say that the average New York City cop has never fired his or her gun during an entire forty-year
career. Not once. That figure has now changed. If you total up all the villains shot by NYPD Detective
John McClane (Bruce Willis) while hunting down a bad guy who insists that he's doing a good thing for
our country, then divide that into the number of New York cops, that would mean that the average New
York City cop has shot two people during a lifetime career. If McClane were a freshman in Her Majesty's
Secret Service, he would have received his double-o license to kill in three and one-half minutes.

"Live Free or Die Hard" follows the "Die Hard" series that hit the screens in 1988, 1990 and 1995, still
featuring Bruce Willis whose character has not yet retired from the New York police detective unit though
he looks about fifty-two years of age. He loves his job as much as he dotes on his rebellious daughter,
Lucy (Mary Elziabeth Winstead), though his feelings are hardly reciprocated by the young woman who
refuses even to use the name "McClane," but stays with with her divorced mom's appellation.   John
would do anything to get Lucy back into his good graces, so he does what any dad would do. He goes
out to kick butt. If he can bring down an empire of cyber-criminals, he just might have a chance to
reunite with his daughter, even get her proudly to wear the name "McClane" once again.

You've probably been told that "Live Free or Die Hard" is full of preposterous, unbelievable actions, but
don't believe any of that negative chatter. In my neighborhood, at least four buildings explode daily,
approximately 17.3 automobiles are immobilized by loud crashes, gangsters with Uzis and AK-47's roam
the streets picking off people at will, choppers are steered not by weather forecasters but people tracking
cops with extreme prejudice, and people in their fifties are getting shot at, swinging on moving vehicles,
jumping on roofs and clinging for dear life to metal rafters. Just the other day, a car being chased by a
helicopter was able deliberately to crash, roll over, and smash into the chopper, causing the bird to
explode with a huge fireball. This being New York, nobody on the street even looked up. Once, a driver
being targeted by a fighter jet was able to leap onto the wing of the plane and destroy it. If this does not
happen in your ‘nabe, don't worry. You can see all of it on the big screen in "Live Free or Die Hard." As
for what the movie fans may mean when they say the movie is unbelievable is: Why would a New York
City cop be told to pick up a New Jersey hacker and deliver him to the FBI in Washington? As for
inaccuracies, the villain states that he has just wiped out the detective's 401(k). New York City cops,
happily, have pensions, not 401(k)'s. So much for the few things that are unbelievable in the movie.

The plot of this "Die Hard 4," oh yes, there is a plot, is not so far out either. The other day the New York
Times had a report on how the U.S. and China are not only trading mightily with each other, or at least
the U.S. is buying Chinese goods while the Chinese are buying up our bonds and propping up our
economy. The two countries are preparing for cyberwar, each getting ready to knock out the other's
communications, transportation and security systems in the event that we don't like what they're selling
or they're tired of bailing our economy out. In the movie, a brilliant, frustrated Thomas Gabriel (Timothy
Olyphant), having failed to persuade the U.S. government to adopt his system of security after 9/11, is
determined to show Uncle Sam what "religious nuts" could do by taking out our computer networks.
"Better I should do this than outsiders," he says, but he has to kill quite a few people to make this point,
principally about 1,000 young hackers who might be able to reverse the damage. What to do about
them? Blow ‘em all up, which he and his thugs do, though Det. McClane saves Matt Farrell (Justin
Long), a geeky hacker, from getting machine-gunned by the domestic terrorists, while the kid provides
the brains to McClane's brawn.

Judging this as an action pic, we find that it has the usual set pieces and destruction of same, the bad
guys getting the drop at first but not in the end (sorry for that little spoiler). Timothy Olyphant nicely plays
a clean-shaven, intellectual villain as do the computer people who take his orders, while the machine-
gunners in the field are not clean shaven or intellectual and they have foreign accents, a sure giveaway
to their ill will. We're sorry that a beauty like Maiu (Maggie Q) chooses the wrong side to play on as
Thomas Gabriel's main squeeze and Ninja girl, though she had the best chance of downing the
detective via Kung Fu of anyone. Cliff Curtis is an impressive FBI deputy chief as Bowman while Kevin
Smith turns up as a super-geek who helps his country while working in his harridan mother's
basement–Mr. Smith's presence in the film telling us something about the seriousness of purpose of
director Len Wiseman ("Underworld," "Underworld: Evolution"). All's filmed sharply by Simon Duggan
amid Patrick Tatopoulos's ornate production design filled with computers and numbers, numbers,
numbers. And kids say that math is boring. All those macho men who said that typing is for women are
out of luck: the men's fingers almost literally fly on laptops, desktops, and anything else that's digital and
can shut down traffic lights, blank out financial statements, cut off electric power throughout the land and
show up our nation's complete dependence on computers. Since this is the first "Die Hard" pic that's
rater PG-13 rather than R, John McClane does say "Yippee Ki Yay Mo," but Steve Nelson's booming
sound drowns out most of the last word.

Rated PG-13.    130 minutes   © 2007 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online

Edited 6/26/07 by Don D. (Sysop)

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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: Live Free or Die Hard

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