Die Hard 4 or Live Free or Die Hard if you like, was, when it was announced, one of my most anticipated movies to get a green light. I couldn’t believe it. John McLane was coming back. It was going to be amazing. Die Hard and Die Hard With a Vengeance are two of my favorutie action movies and I just had this feeling that Live Free or Die Hard would be up there with those two movies. I couldn’t wait guys.
It was 2007. The cast was getting mad hype, with the likes of Timothy Olyphant (Justified, Scream 2, Go) and Maggie Q (Mission Impossible 3) on board as the baddies and (then) up and coming Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Final Destination 3, 10 Cloverfield Lane) on board as McLane’s daughter Lucy! Then the director got announced. Len Wiseman. Who at that point had directed Underworld and it’s sequel. My expectations got into check REAL fast. I was nervous. Thankfully, while not a patch on the first three, Live Free or Die Hard ended up being a decent, if not great, addition to the series.
This fourth ‘bad day’ for John McLane (a wiser yet still ass kicking Bruce Willis) has the NYC cop take a young hacker (Justin Long) under his protection. McLane has to escort the guy to Washington as he’s the sole surviour in relation to a cyber terrorist plot that could bring the whole of the United States back to the stone age. Everything is online now right? So what if there was no banking? No emergency servies? No contact? The plot is quite good. This was the 00’s guys. Cyber stuff was a hot topic and the movie rode that and was able to build a movie around a topical issue at that time, and still today, relating to the implications of online terrorisim.
Wiseman does good work too on the action side, with several big action scenes scattered throughout the film’s running time. Sometimes the action get’s ridiculous. Jet plane. That’s all I’m saying. No need for that. The smaller, more confined action stuff is well done here so I don’t know what the heck they were thinking when someone suggested bringing a fighter jet into the mix.
The film looks good, but the pace is off. Most of the Die Hard movies are two hour flicks but this one feels like it is. I think there’s an even stronger, say, 98 minute action movie somehwere in Live Free or Die Hard. There’s this scene where Long’s character and McLane have to steal a car right? It’s beyond silly and just had me asking “What where they thinking and why is that here?” There’s a few scenes like that I’d have just cut. Also, sorry to sound like I’m throwing shade, but I did not care for Justin Long’s hacker character. He’s a good actor but the character, at least in my opinion, isn’t likeable and you’re stuck with him right the way through. Thankfully Willis is great, Winstead leaves you wishing Lucy was dad’s partner this time out instead of the hacker and Maggie Q’s villian gets an outstanding showdown with McLane.
All in all Live Free or Die Hard isn’t bad. It could have been but it’s not. It just managed, for me, to pull off that Die Hard style and I own it along with the other three. I’d throw it just slightly under Die Hard 2, with the first and third some way above.
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