Live Free or Die Hard

This is another movie we went to see as a next-best choice when we couldn't see our first pick (Rescue Dawn).

The movie theater in question wasn't near us and I had never seen one like it. It had only 2 screens and instead of the regular rows of chairs that you find in the average movie theater, these were cushier and laid out around small side tables. Each theater also had its own bar and you could order food and drinks from a menu to a waitress like in a regular restaurant. It was a nice experience, and I would definitely go to a place like this if there were one near us.

However, because of the setup, whenever there were individual people sitting at a table, the chair next to them was empty and no one wanted to sit in it, because obviously it looks like you're on a date with the person sitting next to you. As a result, many chairs were empty here and there, but since Ray and I were there to enjoy the movie together, not split and sit next to a stranger, we had to go to the other show, where many double chairs were still available.

Anyway, we enjoyed a drink and some appetizers (I had brie and foie gras, and I'm salivating just thinking of it...) while watching the movie, almost as if we were at home.

As for the movie itself, it wasn't horrible, but it was chock full of those unrealistic, implausible, and unbelievable scenes that usually keep me away from such fair as this.

Spoiler Tag: this time around John McClane's routine is disrupted by a disgruntled former government employee, who is taking advantage of a vulnerability in a computer network he had setup, to bring the country to its knees and make himself very wealthy in the process.

Bruce Willis is just average as are Timothy Olyphant, Justin Long, and the rest of the cast. No one really stands out. The writing is forgettable too ("I ran out of bullets" is Willis' justification for taking down a helicopter with a flying car) and even the visual effects are overblown to the point of risibility (the F18 vs. 18-wheeler at the end is just one such case in point).

To sum it up, this movie doesn't add anything new or exiting to the Die Hard lore that wasn't there already. It's a very commercial vehicle released to milk some last drops out of the die-hard (no pun intended) fans still out there, but you can safely skip this one and still feel confident that you didn't miss out on anything.

Grade: 4.5