Sticks and stones may break his bones, but kung fu kicks don’t seem to harm John McClane. He’s older, but not wiser as he takes on machine gun-toting crooks,a few black belts and an entire helicopter, in what is sure to be the action movie of the summer.
Yippee-ki-yay, uh, you people.
The latest installment in the DIE HARD franchise proves that the AARP is right. Older people can live useful and productive lives. In fact, they can even save the world. I refer, of course, to Det. John McClane (Bruce Willis). It’s been 19 years since DIE HARD, and while the old gray (bald, actually) McClane ain’t what he used to be, he still does OK. LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD lives up to the previous outings — and in many ways out-DIE HARDs them.
This time around, Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant) is a former Defense Department consultant who tried to warn officials that the nation’s computer structure is subject to cyber-attack. Did they listen? Of course not. They forced him to resign, so in retribution, he hatches a plan to run a fire sale. That is computer lingo for everything must go; he plans to shut down all the nation’s computers.
Because it’s 4th of July weekend and everyone is off on vacation, McClane is asked to bring a young computer hacker, Matt Farrell (Justin Long) to D.C., where he can be questioned by the FBI. But, when he gets to Farrell’s apartment, he’s joined by machine-gun-toting baddies who intend to eliminate the geek.
Despite the obstacles and bullets thrown in his way, McClane gets Farrell to D.C., to Gabriel’s consternation. Gabriel tells him, “You’re a Timex in a digital age.” There’s more truth to that than Gabriel suspects, because McClane really takes a lickin’ and keeps on tickin’. A lot of lickin’.