I have no doubt that when the rapture occurs, and we all end up in Heaven, there must be a special place for one John McClane. After all, a man who has endured so much in his life must certainly be up there among the best cinematic heroes of all time. The Die Hard series has, for so long now, been a staple part of action cinema fare that it’s almost impossible to remember a time before it. Since 1988, when John first blew up the Nakatomi Plaza building in downtown LA, with most of the incarcerated hostages still inside, audiences the world over have thronged to see the continued adventures of this one man band army of destruction. McClane has entered the popular vernacular. His trademark catchcry, “Yippee Ki Yay, Motherf***r” has pretty much been copyrighted by the series, and is associated immediately with imminent death and devastation.

The problem for McClane was that he was always a rogue. He was always the smart cop caught in a bad situation surrounded (usually) by idiots. Unlike other cinematic heroes like Rambo, and Arnie’s Commando, McClane was a human being first, action hero second. He bled, got tired, screwed up and made mistakes. He never had an answer for everything all the time; in fact, oftentimes he never really knew what he was doing. But he was just trying to make a difference. His everyman persona, portrayed by Bruce Willis in an almost cliche of himself, was what appealed to audiences across the globe.

Die Hard began the saga in 1988, with the fist installment seeing McClane holed up in the Nakatomi Building fighting off a number of terrorists. Back then, terrorism really didn’t have the same chilling meaning that it does now, as terrorists were always wannabe bad guys, with bad aim and even worse accents. They were the ones who strapped dynamite to themselves and thought that would make people do what they want. Nowdays, of course, post 9/11, that situation is very different. But back then, in the halcyon days of Action Hollywood, nobody thought any different. They were “terrorists”, which meant that they all had to be killed by the end of the film and in various grotesque ways by our screen hero.

The wonderful Alan Rickman tears up the screen and out-acts Willis in the original film, blasting his way through the film with dry wit and a sense of the absurd always present in his performance. Willis has way too much fun as McClane, getting filthier and filthier as the movie progresses. Bonnie Bedelia, who I always thought of as a poor choice for McClanes wife, gets to provoke audience sympathy as the hostage wife, although not without a few tricks up her sleeve herself.

The cast is uniformly good, especially Reginald VelJohnson as Al, the police officer on the ground who spends the entire film talking to McClane via two-way radio. His performance is quite moving for somebody acting to himself most of the time.

Where Die Hard as a film changed the face of modern action cinema was in it’s editing, and the way the characters responded to a given situation. For the first time, jump-cuts were used for a mainstream action film, adding to the tension and amping up the bone-jarring incidents of violence. The characters were portrayed as realistic, in unrealistic situations. This gave the film a level of realism audiences craved. Following Die Hard, actions films began to develop a realistic edge to them that hasn’t waned since. While new technology and digital effects have played heavily into the market, the old masters, such as John McTiernan and Richard Donner, have maintained a certain level of realism in their films, to which most people are grateful.

While the original Die Hard was an unqualified success, it’s sequel only proved the old Hollywood adage that you cannot simply make the same film again, tack a number on the end of the title, and guarantee profits. Die Hard 2: Die Harder was a headache inducing foray into the bigger-is-better mantra of the studio system. Once the original film had been finished with, a sequel was never far behind, and scripting and filming moved swiftly forward. Taking the same premise as the original, terrorists taking people hostage in return for something important (this time, political prisoners) and setting it in an airport, throw in John McClane and a series of inept (but still trying) cops and managers, and you get Die Hard 2. Directed with style by Renny Harlin (whose film credits up to that point had been A Nightmare On Elm Street 4 and The Adventures Of Ford Fairlane!) and featuring a returning cast from the original (those who survived, anyway) Die Hard 2 should have been a dead-set certainty for a thrilling success. Critically, though, the film was mauled, as the logic and panache displayed with the original film seemed to be lacking in the return. McClane was still the same guy, and his wife as well, but the film moved along almost trying to up the ante over the previous film: more property damage, more deaths, greater stakes, a more evil and coldblooded bad guy (William Sadler in fine form) but ultimately, less heart. McClane comes across as a tonne more arrogant here, making him less liked that before, and turning the audience off.

Harlin tired valiantly to produce a film of equal calibre to the original, but was undone by a number of things. One, the overwhelming pressure to equal the original must have been daunting. Two, the diabolically nasty script was just as dark as the overtly night-time shot film. Three, not a whole bunch of character development went on; it’s almost as if the audience were expected to know and love everybody they saw on screen. This can’t happen, you have to earn the viewers respect and trust, before taking them on a journey. Sure, it’s an action film, but that doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice the characters for the sake of an explosion.

Then, a few years later, in 1995, John McTiernan returned to direct the second sequel, Die Hard With A Vengeance, which saw McClane as the only original Die Hard alumnus returning this time out, to battle the evil Jeremy Irons’ “Simon”. Again, terrorists, and again, hidden agendas. But while film 1 was set outside McClane’s comfort zone (he was a NY cop in LA) and film two in an airport, film three expanded the playing field even further and pit McClane against an enemy across the entire city of New York. Finally, McClane’s caustic attitude would be played out in his home town, with his fellow New Yorkers, none of whom would be impartial to giving some back to him. Throw in Samuel L Jackson, who was in career best form following a resurgence in Pulp Fiction the previous year, and some crazy stunts, and Vengeance scored a direct hit with the fans, many proclaiming it a welcome return to form. McTiernans magic touch had worked. The formula that had worked so well in the original had returned, and the characterization audiences craved was again on display, squeezed in amongst the gunfire and explosions. Of course, the stunts in the third film had to outdo those in both the first two films, so McTiernan obliged, creating such carnage through New York that it looked for all the world like a war zone.

The reason the third film worked so well was, I believe, to the credit of Mr Jackson. By partnering McClane up with somebody (VelJohnson in the original, even though they never met until the final reel… no partner in Die Hard 2…) and giving him someone to bounce off, it creates a template for character building screen chemistry. The partner represent us, the viewer, trying to fathom the logic of McClane as he goes about hunting down the bad guys. In this way, both film 1 and 3 are a step up from the second, and still rank as two of the great action films of all time. They allow us to join McClane on the hunt, rather than merely observe like we did in film 2. As far as a script went, the film was back to the lustre of the original, with plenty of spark and humor coupled with the action. Jackson, in his role as the loud mouth wise-guy, gave us somebody to laugh with, to feel pain with (after all, McClane obviously has no sense of feeling… or is that no sense no feeling?) and this made the whole thing feel somehow more…. human.

Following Vengeance, Willis declared that he had finished with the character, as he felt he had done all he could emotionally with it. Fair enough, go out on top, leave them clamoring for more, right?

Well, it would seem that as our major action stars approached middle age, and their respective mid-life crisees, that it would soon be time to saddle up once more. Stallone had done so with Rocky and Rambo, Schwazeneggar had decided to go into politics, and Bruce Willis had done so many genre action/adventure/thriller pictures (as well as Signs and Unbreakable for Shayamalan) that he felt it was time to return after 12 years away to the character that he had made his name with. So, in 2007, Willis signed up for the fourth installment, Live Free Or Die Hard (AKA Die Hard 4.0). This time round, directed by Len Wiseman, who had previously filmed Underworld and it’s sequel, Willis would go up against one foe he had no chance of understanding: the cyberterrorist. Of course, the fact that McClane was obviously “too old for this shit” made for a lengthy series of jokes at his expense throughout the film. Paired up with another jokester, Justin Long (Dodgeball & Jeepers Creepers) as his sidekick, the film actually turned out better than people had expected, although there were some significant issues with the movie’s end result.

Live Free was an exercise in how not to make a Die Hard film: make sure McClane cannot swear too much (studio interference made sure this film recieved a PG rating, much lower than the R ratings the previous films were given) and you can’t be gratuitously gory violent, so keep things simple and all will be well. Problem is, that was like tearing out all McClane’s teeth and giving him a set of dentures. The film was a slick, clean cut version of a Die Hard movie, almost unworthy to bear the tag of Die Hard were it not for the fact that McClane was the main character and he almost says f**k a few times. Even the “yippee ki yay” line was fudged for younger audiences, losing out on so much valuable screen currency it ultimately neutred the effect overall.

The other major issue with Live Free was the abuse of logic by the scriptwriters. People fall from great heights and get up with nary a scratch. Massive explosions going off nearby, and people get up with nary a scratch. People leap from exploding helicopters and walk away with nary a scratch. Spare me; this film is as unrealistic and illogical as any you’ll see soon. Gone was the gritty realism embodied by the original films makers. Gone is the sense of action that saw audiences lap up McClane and his rough diamond approach. Nope, this is a souped up, CGI enhanced eunuch of a film, with about as much credibility as a hooker on a Harley. The final reel, with McClane driving a truck through a freeway, and then jumping onto a flying harrier jet, makes you throw popcorn at the screen and shout “this is NOT a Die Hard film!”.

What Live Free managed to become was merely another great action film, rather than a great Die Hard film. And that was the dissapointing thing about it.

With this latest inslallment, you’d almost guarantee that with Die Hard 4.0, we’ve seen the back of John McClane. I for one am glad he’s gone out on top, rather than hanging around making sequel after sequel and gradually getting worse and worse. Plus Willis is getting a little long in the tooth for this kind of stuff.

Late Edit: I have added to this post the YouTube clip from guyznite.com their tribute to the Die Hard series of films. Please be aware that there is a Coarse Language Warning appropriate to this clip.

Ratings:

Die Hard: 9/10

Die Hard 2: Die Harder: 5/10

Die Hard With A Vengeance: 9.5/10

Live Free or Die Hard: 6.5/10