Review: "A Good Day to Die Hard"

Unfortunately, the poster is cooler than the movie.

In the original Die Hard, John McClane (Bruce Willis) walks on some broken glass and limps the rest of the film, visibly in pain. That McClane was tough, but human.

Fast forward 25 years to director John Moore's ( Max Payne) A Good Day to Die Hard -- now the fifth movie in the franchise -- and McClane is punched, kicked, jumps out of a moving car, free falls about twenty stories (twice!), is thrown fifty feet from a helicopter -- you see where I'm going here, right? -- and never gets more than a scratch. Seemingly, Moore and the film's writer, Skip Woods (X-Men Origins: Wolverine), have confused the character of John McClane with the one Willis played in Unbreakable. He is now "super fuzz."

The story begins in Russia, where McClane travels to help out his estranged son, Jack (Jai Courtney), who has been arrested for murder. Little does he know, that Jack is actually a CIA agent sent in to help a Russian dissident named Komarov (Sebastian Koch), escape with files that implicate that country's defense minister, Chagarin (Sergey Kolesnikov).

Of course, things are moving along according to plan until John shows up and blows the operation, exposing them all to attacks from Chagarin's men, led by Alik (Radivoje Bukvic) and Irina (Yuliya Snigir). Once John is brought up to speed, father and son will need to work together in order to accomplish the mission, one that ultimately takes them to Chernobyl to stop some bad guys from stealing weapons-grade plutonium.

There is plenty of action, including an extended car chase sequence through the streets of Moscow, but most of the big action scenes are too over-the-top to get your heart racing and not impressive enough to be memorable. Unfortunately, the lackluster action is the highlight of the film. When things are not moving fast, you will be subjected to young McClane's constant fussing about John's poor parenting skills, while John frequently repeats "I'm on vacation!" in Clerks-esque fashion. No kidding, it sounds as bad out loud as it did when you read it just then.

I don't know what I expect from a Die Hard movie anymore. In fact, I'm not sure anyone -- including Bruce Willis, the filmmakers, and the studio -- know what they want from a Die Hard movie either. The series has been steered so far off course, both in concept and in character that this feels like a completely different beast all together -- Die Hard in name only.