Production Year: 1988 - Action/Adventure - Director: John McTiernan - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring:Bruce Willis, Bonnie Bedelia, Paul Gleason, William Atherton, Hart Bochner, Alexander Godunov, Robert Davi, James Shigeta, Alan Rickman more
On Christmas Eve, a New York cop comes to L.A. to see his estranged wife at her company's Christmas party, held on the top floor of a sparkling skyscraper. When terrorists capture... more
Die Hard DVD
High above the city of LA a team of terrorists has seized a building taken hostages and ... more
declared war. But one man has managed to escape detection.. An off-duty cop. He's alone..tired..and the only chance anyone has. Bruce Willis stars as New York Ci...
estranged wife Holly (Bonnie Bedelia) and their kids in an attempt to patch things up. He arrives at his wife's high tech office building in the middle of their Christma...
Die Hard
High above the city of L.A., a team of terrorists has seized a building, taken hostages, ... more
and declared war. But one man slips away unnoticed - an off-duty cop named John McClane (Bruce Willis) - and now he's the only chance anyone has. A crackling action thriller from beginning to end, Die Hard explodes with heart-stopping suspense!
Die Hard
High above the city of L.A. a team of terrorists has seized a building, taken hostages, ... more
and declared war. But one man has managed to escape detection...an off-duty cop. He's alone...tired...and the only chance anyone has.Bruce Willis stars as New York City Detective John McClane, newly arrived in Los Angeles to spend the Christmas holiday with his estranged wife (Bonnie Bedelia). But as McClane waits for his wife's office party to break-up, terrorists seize control of the building. While the terrorist leader, Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) and his savage henchman (Alexander Godunov) round up hostages, McClane slips away unnoticed. Armed with only a service revolver and his wits, McClane launches his own one-man war. A crackling thriller from beginning to end, DIE HARD explodes with heartstopping suspense.
Die Hard
On Christmas Eve a New York cop goes to Los Angeles to visit his estranged wife at her ... more
company's Christmas party, held on the top floor of a huge skyscraper. The building is invaded by terrorists, leaving the cop, who's escaped to the roof, as the other partygoers' only hope for survival.
is seen twice.* Sturdy metal ring holds your keys securely.* Full color printed images or messages are included.* If you have new ideas or need help selecting text for your custom keychains please contact us.* Size: 1 3/4" x 1 1/2" (45 x 35 mm) plus frameShipping might take 5 business days.
selected original 35mm film from Die Hard. The collection has a black mount with black frame, an individually numbered plaque and certificate of authenticity.
Die Hard- Trilogy Film Cell
This limited edition film cell presentation features a medley of hand selected original ... more
35mm film and pictures from the first three Die Hard movies. The collection has a black mount with black angular frame, an individually numbered plaque and certificate of authenticity.
Production Year: 2003 - Action/Adventure - Director: John Singleton - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over, 12 years and over - Starring:Paul Walker, Eva Mendes, Tyrese Gibson, Cole Hauser, Ludacris, James Remar, Devon Aoki
Production Year: 2002 - Action/Adventure - Director: Vincenzo Natali - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring:Lucy Liu, David Hewlett, Anne Marie Scheffler, Joseph Scoren, Matthew Sharp, Jeremy Northam
Production Year: 1964 - Action/Adventure - Director: Cyril Endfield - Original Language: English - Classification: Parental Guidance - Starring:Stanley Baker, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Michael Caine, Nigel Green
A review by Seresecros on Die Hard (DVD) June 21st, 2007
Author's product rating:
Did you enjoy it?
Loved it
Story
Good
Characters / Performances
Outstanding
Special Effects
Good
Soundtrack
Average
Advantages:
The bad - assery of it all, the script, the direction, the acting . . .
Disadvantages:
Could do with more explosions .
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
John McClane has had better Christmasses. He’s been arguing with his wife, who moved to Los Angeles with the kids to pursue her career while he’s been stuck on the New York beat, a run-down cop with a drinking habit. Now, coming off a plane to see his family again, he finds himself stuck in a slightly unusual situation. A hostage situation.
Die Hard sees McClane in the Nakatomi Plaza building, where his wife is having a Christmas Party with the rest of her office. After meeting her, and having yet another argument, John goes to freshen up and try to recover his wits from the jetlag he’s suffering. But while he’s off, the party is crashed by some sinister Germans (are there any other kind?) who carry guns and some hefty bags of explosives. They take the party hostage, and that’s where things go from bad to worse for McClane. As he runs off and hides, and tries to get a grasp on the situation, the leader of the Germans, the lip-curlingly evil Hans Gruber starts interrogating several of the employees, including the boss of the company… and Mrs McClane. John is determined to save his wife, but if he’s to do so it’ll mean picking the right moment for attack and taking down Gruber one man at a time.
It’s not your typical Christmas film. I mean, sure, we have snow and Christmas Trees and at the end “Let It Snow” plays over the credits, but Jimmy Stewart never had to deal with gun-toting terrorists before, did he? The film takes place almost exclusively in and around the skyscraper, with McClane finding himself in all sorts of awkward positions as he races to save the day. However, it’s probably one of the best Christmas films around. Die Hard is at times hilarious, over-the-top, cheesy and there are more explosions than at a Girl-Guides firework party (strange metaphor, that one). But it works! As a film, Die Hard is never anything less than entertaining, whether McClane is exchanging wisecracks with his wife, or hanging by his fingers from an air-vent, or throwing people off buildings. You find yourself gripped by it all, and it leaves you wanting more (which luckily, there was, in the form of Die Hard 3, 3… and the soon-to-be-here Die Hard 4.0).
Let’s go into a little detail. John McTiernan’s 1987 blockbuster was one of the new breed of action films, where an everyman (albeit a superactiony everyman) was put in a situation and forced to save the day, even though they didn’t want to be the hero. Rambo, every flick with Arnie in, and this one, they all featured the same basic premise. You know that the hero is going to survive, which means that the only thing to keep you interested in the film is if the hero happens to be interesting. And handily, John McClane just so happens to be one of the best protagonists in move history. Bruce Willis plays the role, wearing a dirty vest, no shoes, and an eternal look of bemusement. McClane is in a situation where by all rights he shouldn’t win, so if he finds himself any advantages he’s going to exploit them. He’s hilarious, too. Trying to get the attention of on-duty policeman Al (Reginald Veljohnson), who is about 15 storeys below him, John hits upon the idea of tossing one of the bad guys onto Al’s policecar. It’s this attitude of ‘If I don’t get this done, I’m toast’ that makes McClane such a formidable opponent for the bad guys.
Alan Rickman, as principal ne’er-do-well Hans Gruber, is a delight, stealing every scene he’s in for most of the movie. He’s camp, but he’s so villainous you want to boos every time he appears onscreen. And because he steals every scene he’s in, and Willis steals every scene he’s in, it builds up the excitement for their eventual meeting. Their back-and-forth makes for some genuinely tense moments in the film. Bonnie Bedelia, as the put-upon Mrs McClane, delivers several moments of girl-power, as she works hard to make sure her husband isn’t discovered and that the villains won’t get away with it. Final words go to Veljohnson and William Atherton, who overplay their roles nicely as the only policeman who believes in John and as a slimy reporter (again, is there any other kind?) respectively.
The film is a giant variant of a cat-and-mouse chase, as the villains don’t know who John is, or who his wife is, but in turn the police outside don’t know who Gruber is, and the FBI certainly seem to have no idea what Gruber’s up to. Everything twists and snakes along quickly, thanks to McTiernan’s dominance behind the camera. He’s not afraid to take his time with a scene, to build up tension, and there are few scenes which distract from the main body of the plot. Seeing John getting beat up is important for us, to see that he is a fallible hero who is really running on luck and bravery alone. He gets the crap kicked out of him in this film, and it’s really a miracle that he keeps going. McTiernan shows McClane as a real person, but he also throws in several hero-shots, most famous of which is probably seeing McClane in a tight air vent, crawling along holding a lighter, saying “Now I know how a TV dinner feels”. As the film goes on, the writers decide to introduce numerous dead-ends and loose pieces of plot, such as the role of the bickering FBI agents (one of whom is played by a sneering Robert Davi, who is always fun to hate) or Al’s dark past as a cop. These add to the realism, and don’t take anything away from the main body of the story.
The film plays upon the characters, at the end of the day, and they are wonderfully drawn out, from McClane to Gruber. Sadly, only a few of the supporting nasties make any real impression, as the Germans all tend to look the same (i.e. sinister). Only the American baddies seem to have any interesting character developments, and the development where one of the baddies is the brother to one of the people McClane kills is thrown away somewhat. However, what you have is a nasty, brutal thriller. It’s an 18-Certifiate, and rightly so, as people get killed in all sorts of nasty ways. Plus – and this could well be the main appeal of the film – it’s not afraid to throw f-bombs at you from all directions, most obviously in McClane’s final declaration “Yippee-Ki-Yay…..” you know the rest. The relentlessness of the film, along with the characters, the tight pacing and direction, and not forgetting the fact that there are loads of really cool explosions, means that Die Hard is one of the definitive action films, a film you can watch again and again and enjoy every single time.
More Reviews
Yippe Ki Yay! Review ofDie Hard (DVD)by
Great_reviewer07
Advantages: Brilliant story, great action Disadvantages: None
Die Hard is an iconic action film from way back in 1998, it’s the film that catapulted Bruce Willis to fame and made him the superstar that we all know and love today. Die Hard grossed an estimated $138,708,852 at the box office on a budget of $30,000,000. The critics loved Die Hard, the film received 93% of positive ratings, upon released Die Hard was named ‘the best action film of all time’ and that’s something that still stands today, to this ... ...a number of German terrorists. Die Hard has of course spawned three sequels: Die Hard 2: Die Harder(1990), Die Hard With A Vengeance (1995) and Die Hard 4.0 (2007). Unfortunately, although good films they never managed to live up to the sheer brilliance of the original, something which happens with a lot of sequels.
Die Hard is directed by John McTiernan, McTiernan is renowned for his action films; most notably: Predator, The Hunt For Red October, ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: One of the best DVD sets available Disadvantages: Not out in the UK, only for us multi-regionners (On way though)
...AMERICAN DVD RELEASE OF THE DIE HARD TRILOGY – NOT THE UK RELEASE OF THE FIRST FILM. I FELT IT WAS SO GOOD THAT IT DESERVED A REVIEW HERE. THEREFORE I ACCEOT THAT TECHNICALLY I AM IN THE WRONG CATEGORY, BUT PLEASE ACCEPT THIS. CHEERS – MARTIN !!! Right now I can begin :o)
Oh yes!! We are talking the ultimate DVD boxset here, we are talking a must for every single fan of the Die Hard Series of films, we are talking extras galore, glorious ... ...interested? Check your pulse!
Die Hard was the original and ultimate action film. Bangs, bullets and more corny one-liners than you can imagine. For anyone who doesn’t know (does anyone not know about Die Hard?) the film focussed on Lieutenant John McClane of the New York Police Department. On a trip to L.A. to see his estranged wife Hollie and his kids at Christmas, McClane inadvertently becomes the centre of a terrorist plot to raid a vault ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
...pinnacle of 80s action movies, Die Hard is one of the enduring classics of modern action cinema. Not a movie to provoke much thought or reaction, but one filled with high octane thrills and spills which is enough to keep anyone on the edge oftheir seat - I defy you not to enjoy it. New York cop, John McClane(Bruce Willis) arrives in Los Angeles to spnd the Christmas period with his ex-wife(Bonnie Bedelia) and their two children. He meets her at a ... ...a high rise office complex, but whilst he is in her executive bathroom, a group of international terrorists seize the building, holding everyone hostage whilst they attempt to break into the safe and steal $670m in negotiable bonds. Isolated from the others, Willis tries single-handedly to overcome the terrorists... Yes, it sounds a little cookie, but once the action starts you'll forget all the macho cr*p, weak plot and dodgy scripts and just go ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: great after all these years, excellent villain Disadvantages: poor extras
...lovers would be familiar with Die Hard. It's the movie that really out Bruce Willis in the big hollywood league and still remains a movie quite a lot of others try to imitate. For those not familiar with the story let me explain. In a sky rise LA office building a team of terrorists have taken over and claimed hostages all with the goal of finanacial gain. Leading this gang of euro-baddies is one Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman). Many consider Rickman ... ...many years and with his laid back sleazy attitude it's deserved. All thw hile one detective John McClane has come to visit his estranged wife at her work place whihc happens to be the building where all hell is breaking loose. Unknown to the terrorists John McClane sets about saving the day single handed with only a white vest and gun and the help of an overweight cop on the outside. It's a great action film with an everyday hero who has a stack ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
...the universe who haven't seen Die Hard then you're highly unlikely to be a member of Ciao!
And you're right, Die Hard is an exceptional piece of film-making in every sense of the word. The other reviews on Ciao (and elsewhere) speak for themselves - Recommended by 100% of authors and if you care to check, I think you'll find that every single opinion on this site gives it the full 5 stars. (Please correct me if I'm wrong on that). So why add another? ... ...great many people rate Die Hard as one of, if not THE greatest action movie ever. I dare to take it one step further and say that Die Hard could well be the greatest FILM ever. Period. Now that's a strong statement, and I fully expect to be bombarded with reasons as to why it isn't so, but let me explain. Die Hard succeeds brilliantly in everything that it was designed to do and that, above all else is being an Action-Thriller, with heavy emphasis ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Better than the second and third Die Hard outings Disadvantages: Creates a difficult path for other action movies to follow
...created a path that was very difficult to follow.
DieHard 4.0 is due out on DVD in early December, it will come in three different version:
A Vanilla Edition with no special features.
A Special Edition ? This will include behind the scenes, deleted scenes, special effects, and an audio commentary with Bruce Willis, Justin Long and Director Len Wiseman.
Finally a box set featuring all four movies with a fifth disc of special features....
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Brucie's back... Disadvantages: No "Richard Thornburg" or "Holly Gennero McClane" !
...is directed by John McTiernan, who also directed the first DieHard movie.
John McTiernan, prior to directing the original DieHard, was already established as a great director following his work on "Predator".
His vision and ability to translate a paper screenplay onto the big screen can only be described as "genious" ! Watching the special features, you will see how dedicated he is in creating celluloid greatness.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
This Special Edition comes with two DVD's - the first carrying the main feature, along with a commentary by the director, John McTiernan.
The second disk is packed full of special features, as detailed below...
Featurettes -
The DVD has three featurettes, or short programs designed to promote the main feature.
The first is a "Behind The Scenes" look at the production of the movie...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: The Best Action Movie Ever... With Added Bits Disadvantages: Lack Of Commentary Feature From "Brucie".
...to video format. In brief, it clearly demonstrates the differences between the letterbox format and full screen by talking you through a scene in both formats. It's short... but interesting !
Then there is a short feature which allows you to view scenes and shots from different camera angles.
An essential part of any "Special Features" section on DVD's is the outtakes and deleted scenes section.
You can also view the entire deleted scene which has been inserted into the branched version on disk 1.
Throughout the movie, there are numerous news broadcasts. These can be viewed in full on the special features, along with alternative versions and some errors that were made during shooting.
A major part to the success of "DieHard" is down to the publicity. The production took a huge gamble in casting Bruce Willis in the leading role...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Plot: On Christmas Eve a New York cop goes to Los Angeles to visit his estranged wife at her company's Christmas party, held on the top floor of a huge skyscraper. The building is invaded by terrorists, leaving the cop, who's escaped to the roof, as the other partygoers' only hope for survival.
Video Category: Feature Film
Country Of Origin: United States of America
DVD Description
On Christmas Eve, a New York cop comes to L.A. to see his estranged wife at her company's Christmas party, held on the top floor of a sparkling skyscraper. When terrorists capture the building, the incredulous cop is the hostages' only hope for survival. A superior action flick based on Roderick Thorpe's novel 'Nothing Lasts Forever'. Academy Award Nominations: Best Sound, Best Sound Effects Editing, Best Visual Effects.
Release details
DVD Region: DVD
Studio(s): 20TH CENTURY FOX HOME ENTERTAINMENT, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment; Deluxe Video Service - Fox
Special Features: Audio Commentary Featuring Director John McTiernan And Production Designer Jackson DeGonia, Text Commentary Featuring Cast And Crew, Special Branching Version View The Film With A Deleted Scene Re inserted, The Cutting Room, Audio Mixing, Why Letterbox Featurette, Outtakes, Deleted Scenes, Alternate Scenes, Newscasts, Magazine Articles, Glossary, 3 Theatrical Trailers, Ad Campaign Featurette, Entire Shooting Script, Interactive Slide Show, Original theatrical trailer, Filmography, Biography, Featurette
![Die Hard (Special Edition) [DVD] [1988]](http://picnica.ciao.com/uk/76770162.jpg)
![Die Hard [Special Edition]-DVD](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/103280579.jpg)
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10.05.2005
