FILMBRATS - REVIEWS

New York cop John McClane is in Washington DC’s Dulles Airport on Christmas Eve, awaiting the arrival of his wife’s plane. Once again, his Christmas plans are in jeopardy, because a group of terrorists have set up shop inside and nearby the international airport. The group overrides air traffic control and threatens to crash every plane that’s now forced to circle around in the air if their demands are not met. Thousands could die as the jets run out of fuel. Time is short, but luckily so is John McClane’s patience. It looks like lightning has struck twice…and harder.

Your first clue as to how bad this movie is should be the title. Sure it sounds like their making fun of themselves (I mean, let’s be honest here. “Die Hard” is a pretty bad title, too), but once you get just a few minutes into this picture, you see how unintentionally ridiculous the whole package is. The title suggests they’re trying to up the ante, and it certainly does try. But in the process, it completely neglects all of the positive aspects of the first film, thus turning it into another mindless, unbearable action flick with no substance.

I honestly can’t think of a positive thing to say about this movie. The music score is a cartoony, over-punctuated mess with synch cues that should never have been included. The editing is so bad that they wait a couple seconds sometimes before starting the action of the scene (such as zipping up the body bag). The acting is just horrendous from the stop-motion delivery of the reporter girl to the overly sinister henchman to the irrationally over-the-top angry police captain trying to thwart the now extra cheesy John McClane from saving everyone’s butts. Of course it doesn’t help that the dialogue their given equally abysmal. It’s just painful to watch these people interact with each other. Steven E. de Souza is back from the first one to write the script with first-timer Doug Richardson. Look, I understand there were one-liners in the previous film, but even these are roundabout and stretches some times. Just the fax? You seriously went through all that trouble to deliver that line? And when do I get my money back?

So the dialogue is bad, but the story is even worse. Right away, we’re shown some man ass as what turns out to be the main baddy practices naked karate. Well, those skills never come into play and the unexpected sight of this detracts from listening to the key plot points the newscast is relaying in the background. Sort of a minor point in comparison, but still worth mentioning. The majority of the story is really spent by filling time in between the next stupid action scene. It’s not that things like the conveyor belt fight are unrealistic, they’re just not fun. The snow mobile chase, the fight on the wing of an airplane, the overuse of slow motion during the gun fight scene (ever roll? Really? Don’t you think the movie is long enough as it is?) – they’re all laughably bad. I have no problem suspending my disbelief for an action movie, but how can you possibly ask me to do that when absolutely nothing else works? Maybe if the characters seemed like they could be real people. Maybe if the inner workings of the airport didn’t look like elaborate sets built around the fight choreography. Maybe if there was a couple of redeeming qualities in here that would allow me to get lost in the excitement, then some of these unrealistic stunts would be okay. Instead, I can’t decide what was worse – the ejector seat shot with McClane flying high above the flames, or the icicle through the skull. Do you think the first “Die Hard” would have that? Yeah, me either. That one was good.

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