Die Hard (1988)
Director: John McTiernan
Had I seen this before: Yes
I can't say with certainty where we are in the "Die Hard is a Christmas movie" discourse at the moment. It started as a lightly amusing observation--a sort of "huh yeah I guess so" passing thought--then due to the nature of the internet became a deeply annoying and weirdly combative stance, asserted with increasingly irritating confidence. But then, like many annoying internet things, it shifted into a sort of ironic "I'm saying the annoying thing but I'm winking" bit, and I suspect we may even be past that now--if anything we may have all memed it into the actual holiday canon. So I guess...good job, everyone. At any rate, here I am, bringing up the rear on this fading cultural quirk, ready to spend the month diving into films that are not necessarily traditional but do involve some level of Christmas ornamentation.
I feel like I should explain that I had seen Die Hard before this viewing but it had been a long time and it was never one of my go-to movies. My inordinate affection in this genre is reserved almost entirely for 1994's Speed, and usually all I have left to give other movies of its ilk is muted appreciation. Now, Speed director Jan de Bont was the cinematographer for this movie, which does give it a slight edge, because visually, the L.A. of Die Hard is 100% the same as the L.A. of Speed, so I am immediately in a comforting and familiar environment. You know who is not in a comforting or familiar environment? John McClane, who is looking pretty tense on an airplane, prompting the man next to him to give him some unsolicited post-flight relaxation advice: ditch the shoes and socks and "make fists with your toes" in the rug. Little does this anonymous frequent flyer know, he has just single-handedly bumped this film from very good to iconic, because Bruce Willis's bare feet are about to be the real star of this show.
One of my thoughts in the first few minutes of this movie was that it was surprisingly absent of any real 80s signifiers--the clothes are pretty muted, the plane just looks like a plane, the airport looks like an airport--and then about one second after my synapses had floated that idea, McClane lights up the first of I want to say 273 or so cigarettes right there at baggage claim. John McClane smokes more cigarettes in this movie than any of last month's noir characters ever dreamed of. This is fundamentally a movie about a man whose lungs exist outside any understanding of modern science. McClane, who is carrying a comically large teddy bear, is greeted by his limo driver, the enchantingly-named Argyle. We learn that John is a New York cop, here in L.A. to see his estranged wife and kids for Christmas, and hoping to salvage his marriage. First stop: said wife's company holiday party at Nakatomi Plaza.
Of course, McClane is only at the party long enough to be annoyed by everyone there and California in general, squabble with said estranged wife, and dig those feet into the carpet before the building is taken over by ostensibly German but uhhhh let's say "European" thieves who are preposterously well-supplied and prepared and led by one of the decade's great villains, Hans Gruber. One of the reasons this movie works is that it is smart enough to know when to just let us look at Alan Rickman's face for a minute. You're never going to go wrong letting an audience look at Alan Rickman's face. John, however, cannot see Alan Rickman's face because he was not with the rest of the party-goers when it became a hostage situation, so he is loose in the building and ready to cause some trouble for the bad guys, in between cigarettes.
Most of the rest of the movie is some fun cat-and-mouse stuff, a lot and I mean a lot of gunfire, things exploding, the LAPD being worthless, the Feds being straight up evil, the media being parasitic, and John McClane finding superhuman strength through the nourishing power of nicotine. I wasn't kidding about the bare feet being the elevating factor here--the jokes really hit and the action is, you know, actiony, but Bruce Willis' look is really the thing that makes this movie a classic. Being shoeless and having only an undershirt makes McClane more vulnerable but also more stealthy, and offers up an easily-assembled Halloween costume, which is a boon to any film's longevity.
It's also not quite the copaganda situation I was dreading, it's really only about one resourceful and slightly insane man running up and down flights of stairs while breathing smoke like a dragon. As much as I rolled my eyes at John's whole bit in the beginning where he's like "I had to stay in NYC because I'm a New York cop, can't be supporting my wife's apparently very very successful career on the west coast," once you are actually introduced to how the LAPD operates in this movie, I have to say, I sort of understood what he meant. Is it partly just that the guy in charge of the scene is the "mess with the bull get the horns" principal from The Breakfast Club? Well, it doesn't help. There is of course one LA cop we are rooting for here, Reginald VelJohnson's Al, who is in communication with and supportive of McClane from the ground, and whom first we meet buying just a remarkable haul of Twinkies. I personally am a child of the golden era of ABC's TGIF programming, and therefore have a warm and nostalgic reaction to RVJ's face, so it was especially jarring to be reminded that his character arc is "cop we feel sorry for because shooting a 13-year-old caused him to not want to shoot people anymore" to "cop who overcomes his past trauma of shooting a child in order to triumphantly start shooting people again." So..a lot of high highs and a few pretty low lows in this one, but sometimes with movies of a certain age you just have to dig your toes into the carpet and get through it.
Odds and ends: most of the actors playing the "terrorists" are not actually German, but Bruce Willis was born in Germany; one of the thugs reminded me of a big angry version of James van der Beek; gas cost 75 cents a gallon in 1988; knowing how gray sweatsuit guy is going to end up does take some of the tension out of his scene; the "yippee kay yay motherfucker" line is tossed off much more casually and amusingly than I remembered; my favorite character bit is Bruce Willis admonishing himself with increasing volume to "think, THINK" throughout the movie; I would like Reginald VelJohnson to tell me to hang in there.
Line I repeated quietly to myself: "I am an exceptional thief, Mrs. McClane."
Is it under two hours: No
Is it actually a Christmas movie: Just one long holiday party, when you think about it! It can be argued that McClane's major motivation, aside from saving innocent people, is to get back to his wife so that their argument isn't the last exchange they ever have, which could be categorized as an "importance of family" sort of lesson. 7/10
Homemade Twinkies from Brown Eyed Baker
Although Hans is hilariously munching on some party appetizers at one point in the hostage-taking, it was impossible to get a good look at what he had on his plate, so Sgt. Al's Twinkies it is. Please know that I individually crafted these cake molds from aluminum foil, in case you were worried that I had lost my ability to sacrifice significant amounts of time at the altar of deeply unnecessary blog posts.
Up next: He can learn to pass as a pilot, a lawyer, and a doctor, but can he learn the true meaning of Christmas?
