One Line Review: The most underrated film of the Die Hard series.

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YouTube Trailer Die Hard 2- Die Harder

Starring: Bruce Willis, William Atherton

Director: Renny Harlin

Release Date: 4th July 1990

Introduction

You guys have heard me complaining about realism in movies, especially in action movies. Today, I’m going to talk about a movie that has action and realism mixed up in the right quantity, Die Hard 2.

The one thing That is very commendable in Die Hard 2, which I find very rare, shows the hero as a “Human Being”. Unlike most movies, especially Bollywood movies, the hero is indestructible. He kills everyone but not even a single bullet touches him.

Our review for Die Hard 2 – Die Harder is 8/10.

Trivia

The fighting scene of Mclain and Conole took several nights to shoot because it was supposed to be shot in the snowfall but there it wasn’t consistent, so they installed huge fans which threw fake snow at them.

Plot summary

A group of missionaries hijacks the Washington airport communication system so that they can help pass a drug lord from the security. They hold the airport long and misguides the aircraft’s landing results in big destruction. John McClain was waiting for his wife who is also going to land at the same airport. Now, it’s up to him to save the capital from what could be a disaster.

Storytelling and Direction

I’ll start with these two things first. Honestly, for a sequel, this level of story writing is very impressive. Usually, sequels to some superhit films are downright disappointing and not good at all. But, Die Hard turned out to be an exception to the fact. The story writers are so good in this project. You’ll know what I mean once you watch it (I know you have already watched it). For three fourth parts of the film, it remains very hard to guess what will happen next. The moment you predict something, the otherwise happens and your eyes get filled with surprise.

I’ve heard the same old argument about the movie; it is Die Harder but not Die Hard. For a while, I got under the impression. But, It all turned out to be bogus when I watched the film. Let me tell you a good thing about the story writing of this film. Apart from the main characters (the heroes and the villains), you will have a head time guessing who’s on the evil side and who’s John’s side. I’m telling you, the guessing and predicting game are not going to help you here. YOu have to sit and go with the flow of the movie. The sidekicks to the main characters will keep you wondering who’s going to kill who.

The reason why the sequel didn’t blow off was the change of director. Don’t get me wrong, Die Hard 1 was great. John McTiernan did a phenomenal job bringing the masterpiece to us. But, for this sequel, the production team did a gamble and they hired Renny Harlin to direct it. It turned out that the new director bought some fresh vision to the theme and did things from his own point of view. This created a sense of freshness to the concept.

Action and John McClane

Die-hard 1 was insane with its action. That’s why the young blokes loved it. But in order to sell people something which they have already seen and familiar with, you have to make it even better. So, in order to make Die Hard 2 better, they have to add even more action to it. That’s right even more action to something which had plenty of action already. They did it with sheer cleverness. They chose the open and wide area to make the film so that they will have more options to consider to create mind-blowing action scenes. The attempt turns out to be a boom. John McClane was all over. Be it on a wing of a plane or on the cold wide runway. He squeezed every drop of action from the surrounding. The benefit of choosing a wide area is you can add endless props to the scenes. In this film, they added a snowstorm to it. Honestly, it looks dope.

Conclusion

The film should have written: “now with 25% more action” on its banner. There is a scene where john jumps out o the plane just before it explodes, This is the best action scene I’ve ever seen. The best part is that there is close to zero CGI in the movie and the majority of the scene is performed by Willis himself. Isn’t that Great? I remember a fan writing in a Facebook comment that this film is like going to a circus: you sit back and watch crazy stuff happen, laugh, cheer, joke, and just have a good time.