Coordinates | 20°34′00″N103°40′35″N |
---|---|
name | Die Hard |
director | John McTiernan |
producer | Lawrence GordonJoel SilverBeau Marks Charles Gordon |
screenplay | Steven E. de SouzaJeb Stuart |
based on | |
starring | Bruce WillisAlan RickmanBonnie BedeliaReginald VelJohnsonAlexander Godunov |
music | Michael Kamen |
cinematography | Jan de Bont |
editing | John F. LinkFrank J. Urioste |
studio | Silver PicturesGordon Company |
distributor | 20th Century Fox |
released | |
runtime | 131 minutes |
country | |
language | English |
budget | $28 million | gross $138,708,852 }} |
It stars Bruce Willis as NYPD officer John McClane, Bonnie Bedelia as his wife, Holly, and Alan Rickman in his feature film debut as thief Hans Gruber. The film was followed by three sequels; ''Die Hard 2'' in 1990, ''Die Hard With A Vengeance'' in 1995, and ''Live Free or Die Hard'' in 2007.
Gruber portrays himself to the police as a terrorist, but they are actually trying to steal $640 million in bearer bonds from the Nakatomi vault. When Nakatomi executive Joseph Takagi refuses to reveal the code for one of the vault's seven locks, Gruber executes him. Gruber orders Theo (Clarence Gilyard), the technical member of his team to break through the locks on the vault. Theo reminds Hans that the final lock is powered by circuits that cannot be cut locally.
McClane moves through the building, hiding from or shooting the terrorists he sees. He learns more of their objectives while acquiring a two-way radio and C4 explosives. McClane uses the radio to attract the attention of the LAPD, who send Sergeant Al Powell to investigate. Gruber sends his men, led by Karl, to kill McClane and retrieve the detonators. Fooled by the impostor guard, Powell is about to leave when McClane drops the corpse of a terrorist onto Powell's police car. The terrorists then open fire on Powell, severely damaging his car to prompt Powell to call in back up. McClane explains the situation via the two-way radio as the police, led by Deputy Police Chief Dwayne T. Robinson, arrive.
The police send in a SWAT team and an armored vehicle. McClane and Powell are unable to prevent the SWAT team from being ambushed, but McClane kills two of the terrorists attacking the SWAT team with C4. One of Holly's coworkers, Harry Ellis, tries to negotiate with Hans and McClane for the return of the detonators. McClane refuses to return them, and Gruber shoots Ellis. The FBI arrive and take control from the police. They order the power to the building shut down, which deactivates the vault's final lock as Gruber had anticipated. Theo ransacks the now open vault, and then goes to the garage to retrieve an ambulance to be used as their getaway vehicle. Argyle rams his limo into the ambulance and knocks Theo unconscious.
McClane continues to sneak through the building to detain the terrorists. When he finds Gruber working at the explosives planted on the roof, Gruber passes himself off as a terrified hostage who escaped. McClane makes friendly conversation and gives Gruber a pistol; when Gruber attempts to shoot McClane, however, he discovers that McClane only trusted him enough to give him an unloaded gun. Gruber's men appear from an elevator and fire at McClane, who flees, leaving behind the detonators.
The roof is rigged to explode with the detonators, and Gruber lures the FBI into the trap by asking for helicopter transport for him and his men to Los Angeles International Airport in exchange for the hostages; Gruber plans to use the roof explosion to make the authorities believe him to be dead and allow him to escape with the bonds. As the helicopters travel to the scene, Gruber observes a television news story from investigative reporter Richard Thornburg mentioning that McClane is Holly's husband. With the helicopter nearing with the FBI on board, Gruber orders the hostages to the roof, taking personal control over Holly. McClane arrives at the roof, dispatches the terrorists, including Karl, escorting the hostages, and scares the hostages back downstairs before the roof explodes. The subsequent explosion engulfs the FBI helicopters and kills everyone on board.
Realizing Gruber holds Holly, McClane offers to give himself over, and uses the feint to shoot Gruber in the shoulder and Gruber's last armed henchman in the head. Gruber falls backwards through a window, still hanging onto Holly by her watch, but McClane unclasps Holly's watch in time while Gruber falls to his death.
McClane and Holly are escorted from the building, meeting Powell in person. Karl, whom McClane had thought was dead, is helped out of the building as if he was one of the hostages before he rises up with a gun and points it at McClane. Karl is shot by Powell before he can open fire, and Argyle comes crashing out the parking garage in the limo. Thornburg arrives and attempts to get a quote from McClane but is punched in the nose by Holly for endangering both her and the children earlier. John and Holly are then driven off by Argyle.
''Die Hard'' follows its source material — Roderick Thorp's novel ''Nothing Lasts Forever'' — closely; many of the film's memorable scenes, characters, and dialogue are taken directly from the novel. ''Nothing Lasts Forever'', a sequel to Thorp's earlier novel ''The Detective'', was written with the intention of being adapted into a film sequel to the film adaptation of ''The Detective'', which starred Frank Sinatra. When Sinatra turned down the offer to star in the sequel, the story was altered to be a stand-alone film with no connections to ''The Detective''. Other changes included the older hero of the novel becoming younger, the hero's daughter becoming his wife, and the American Klaxon Oil Corporation becoming the Japanese Nakatomi Corporation. The novel's tone is darker and more serious than the film's, and the politically motivated fighters of the novel became thieves pretending to be terrorists in the film. Director John McTiernan states on the DVD commentary that the change from a tale of political terrorism to a heist film was made because he wanted to bring "joy" to the story, rather than having the villains be overly ponderous. The newly built corporate headquarters of 20th Century Fox, Fox Plaza in Los Angeles, was used for exterior shots of the Nakatomi building.
According to commentary from the film's DVD release, Alan Rickman's surprise when Gruber is dropped from the building is genuine: the director chose to release Rickman a full second before he expected it in order to get genuine surprise, a move which angered Rickman. The text commentary track also reveals that the shooting script did not originally feature the meeting between McClane and Gruber pretending to be a hostage; it was only written in when it was discovered that Rickman could perform a rather convincing American accent. The name Hans Gruber was used by one of the villains in the 1966 film ''Our Man Flint''.
As the film has a Christmas setting, the score also features sleigh bells in some cues, as well as the Christmas pop standard "Winter Wonderland." Two 1987 pop songs are used as source music: near the beginning of the film, limousine driver Argyle plays the rap song "Christmas In Hollis", performed by Run-D.M.C., and later, while talking on the phone in the limousine, Argyle is listening to Stevie Wonder's "Skeletons." The end credits of the film begin with the Christmas song "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!" (performed by Vaughn Monroe) and continues/concludes with Beethoven's 9th Symphony.
The final four minutes of the film were tracked with music from two other Twentieth Century Fox features – these were 'temp tracks' which the studio ultimately decided to leave in the picture. The music heard when McClane and Powell see each other for the first time is from John Scott's score for ''Man on Fire'' (1987). When Karl appears with his rifle, a cut from the 1986 science fiction action film ''Aliens'' composed by James Horner is heard. This music can be found on the ''Aliens'' soundtrack as the first few minutes of the cue "Resolution and Hyperspace".
Similarly to ''Aliens'', the score by Michael Kamen was heavily edited, with music samples looped over and over and cues added to scenes. The most notable example is the "brass blast" heard when John shoots Marco from under a table and later when Hans Gruber falls to his death.
The score as heard in the film was released by Varese Sarabande in February 2002, but was limited to 3000 copies. # The Nakatomi Plaza (1:50) # Gruber's Arrival (3:40) # John's Escape/You Want Money? (5:52) # The Tower (1:49) # The Roof (3:57) # The Fight (1:07) # He Won't Be Joining Us (3:53) # And If He Alters It? (2:39) # Going After John Again (4:33) # Have A Few Laughs (3:29) # Welcome To The Party (1:00) # TV Station/His Bag Is Missing (3:52) # Assault On The Tower (8:16) # John Is Found Out (5:03) # Attention Police (3:38) # Bill Clay (2:02) # I Had An Accident (2:37) # Ode To Joy – Beethoven (3:36) # The Battle (10:15) # Gruber's Departure (1:56) # Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow! (Instrumental Version) – Jule Styne/Sammy Cahn (2:00)
''Die Hard'' had a budget of $28 million. Released in 21 theaters on July 15, 1988 it widened to 1,276 theaters the following weekend, grossing $7.1 million. The film earned $83 million domestically and $140.7 million worldwide. The film was nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Sound Effects Editing, Best Film Editing, Best Sound and Best Visual Effects.
The film spawned three popular sequels: ''Die Hard 2'' (1990), ''Die Hard with a Vengeance'' (1995) and ''Live Free or Die Hard'' (2007), all featuring Willis as McClane. A fifth film in the series, with the working title ''Die Hard 24/7'', is in the scripting stage and is tentatively planned to begin filming in 2011. In 2001, ''Die Hard'' was listed at number 39 on AFI's ''100 Years... 100 Thrills'', a list America's most heart-pounding films. In the June 22, 2007 issue of ''Entertainment Weekly'', it was named the best action film of all time. In 2003, Hans Gruber was listed at #46 on AFI's ''100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains'' list. He was also listed as the 17th greatest movie character by Empire Magazine. John McClane was placed at number 12 on the same list. McClane's catchphrase "Yippee kai yay, motherfucker" was voted as #96 of "The 100 Greatest Movie Lines" by ''Premiere'' magazine in 2007. In 2010, ''Die Hard'' was voted by Empire Magazine as "The Greatest Christmas Film of All Time".
In July 2007, Bruce Willis donated the undershirt worn in the film to the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution. In addition to the shirt, a poster of the film, a prop badge, and a script for the sequel ''Live Free or Die Hard'' were also donated. Museum director Brent Glass called the film "a quintessential Hollywood action movie".
Category:1980s action films Category:1988 films Category:20th Century Fox films Category:American action thriller films Category:Christmas films Category:English-language films Category:Films about terrorism Category:Films based on thriller novels Category:Films directed by John McTiernan Category:Films set in Los Angeles, California Category:Films shot anamorphically Category:Films set within one day Category:Heist films Category:Silver Pictures films Category:Terrorism in fiction
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