A Good Day to Die Hard (aka DH5): Grade, Review, Discuss---SPOILERS!!!

[Captain Craig]

The 5th entry in the Die Hard saga drops today(2/14/13) stateside. I understand it opened in some international markets last weekend.

A Good Day to Die Hard official site with trailer



Rottentomatoes.com

John McClane (Bruce Willis) and his estranged son Jack (Jai Courtney) team up to protect a government informant in Moscow, and thwart a major crime in Chernobyl in this sequel from director John Moore (Max Payne, Behind Enemy Lines). Russian politics are in tatters when veteran detective McClane shows up in the nation's capital, and learns that his son is working undercover to protect Komarov - a notorious whistleblower who some powerful people would like to see silenced. Protecting Komarov won't be easy, even for the cop who's single-handedly defeated small armies of terrorists, and the sharp-shooting son he's never known. Meanwhile, when the fearless father and son catch wind of a deadly plot unfolding in Chernobyl, they face the fight of their lives in one of the most hostile landscapes known to man. Cole Hauser and Mary Elizabeth Winstead co-star.

[Captaindemotion]

Hopefully seeing next week but so far the reviews I've seen have been overwhelmingly negative. Shame, as I was really hoping for a return to form.

[davejames]

By all accounts, it's even MORE ridiculous and over the top than the last one was.

[Captain Craig]

Grade: B-

I went to the marathon, we had about 50 people at it.

It's not as bad as the reviews suggest AT ALL but at this point people have their own ideas and will pile on cause it seems the "cool thing" to do.

Still objectively I can agree that reviews calling the villain the worst of the series is fair. You just don't "love to hate" him. He's pretty generic and two dimensional. You love to hate the Grubers(1&3), same for Gabriel in pt.4. Taking it out of franchise you love to be able to connect with some villains like Magneto or Loki and a solid villain means it contends for an "A" grade. So imo, a B+ was the best it could attain with the villain choice and backstory.
I blame a lack of unified vision when I get moments in a trailer but not the film itself. Marketing and Editing need to be in synch.

I've not read but a few of the horrid reviews but this film has an actual twist in it the other series don't have.

the bad guy you first get isn't really the lead bad guy

The action is great and during the second act father and son start to form a bond where it was clear from the first act resentment was firmly entrenched. The Lucy moments were nice.

It's the first to break the "non-rule" that McClane is thrust into the role of being the hero. To what degree that's broken could be debatable.

Still, this is a fun action filled movie with plenty of cool sequences that are worth seeing on the big screen. Even as the "worst" DH film it's a low B score and better than so much else. Deeming it "unwatchable" is pure hyperbole(which I've seen other places).

Apparently it made about $900K for midnights.

20th Century Fox reports that A Good Day To Die Hard is off to a great start at the box office. The action flick raked in $840,000 from 2,838 locations at midnight for a $361 location average.

[Trekker4747]

Wish I had gone to the marathon but going to the movies at noon on a weekday and staying there for the next 10 hours isn't at all sane or practical. I'm going to see this movie Saturday night no matter what. I've not too hard of expectations for it I just want to be entertained.

[Captain Craig]

The early estimated report is that A Good Day to Die Hard will have an OD of around $9m. Although some speculation is it might be under reported. Be nice to get $10m for an OD in Feb on a Thursday.

As expected, romance author Nicholas Sparks took Valentine’s Day with between $9M-$11M. Close behind, because when you think of romance you think of the Die Hard franchise, is the Bruce Willis actioner with around $8.5M-$9M. But it should win the long 5-day Presidents Day weekend.
.......
Grosses abroad for A Good Day To Die Hard are currently at a strong $16.5M from the eight Asia Pacific markets released last weekend. It took advantage of the Chinese New Year holiday which began Sunday, a time audiences flock to cinemas.

Reported budget=$92m

[Agent Richard07]

I gave it a C. I thought it was pretty weak. It had a story that didn't quite come into focus and as Captain Craig said, the bad guys were pretty bland and poorly fleshed out. Its main highlight, aside from the action, is that it furthers the adventures of the iconic John McClane and gives us some decent father/son drama woven into the action. Die Hard has always been about family issues and they did okay in advancing that here, as much as 5th installment in a 25 year old action movie franchise could anyway. Jai Courtney was pretty good as Jr. and played well against Willis but I don't think I'd want to see him carry the franchise if that's what they were suggesting at the end. As for the action itself, some of it was pretty generic, but some of it was fun, elevated only by Willis' brand of badassery. A few scenes were as over the top as what we got in Die Hard 4 and those were pretty fun too. Watching Bruce Willis go through the ringer hasn't gotten old yet.

Another highlight I want to point out is Yuila Snigir. She wasn't Maggie Q's supermodel mercenary with graceful yet brutal fighting skills but she was pretty easy on the eyes and carried herself well enough as the hardened villainess with sex appeal. Here are her various looks from the movie…

Lonemagpie wrote:

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And after all defending of it, 97 minute runtime and all...

I was satisfied with the runtime. This wasn't the kind of movie I could have sat though for over 2 hours.

Deckerd wrote:

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You have to wonder how relevant rottentomatoes think they are, since the critics give it 14% and the nearly 27.5 thousand bum-on-seat reviews give it 82%.

Yeah, looks like the critics hated it because the plot was too thin even for an action movie and it was a weak installment in the franchise. And it looks like the public likes it because it's Die Hard and they probably enjoyed the ride at least a little, but mainly, it's Die Hard. I don't think it stands on its own as a good action film in its own right.

[JarodRussell]

How can this be a Die Hard when you can't even describe it that way.

Sudden Death is Die Hard in a stadium. Under Siege is Die Hard on a boat. Under Siege 2 is Die Hard on a train. You get the idea.

And Die Hard 4 was... Die Hard on the East Coast?
And Die Hard 5 is... Die Hard in Russia?

There's already one big mistake right there.



It's then it's simply no Die Hard when the guy Willis plays is a super hero who walks away from the action scenes like nothing happened. In the original three Die Hards, he always cried at some point, he panicked, shit his pants several times, and in the end he was a physical wreck.

The guy walked on fucking glass and spent the next time crying in the bathroom.


I also hate how he simply walks (or drives) over civilians in this film. What the hell, McClane?

[Dream]

JarodRussell wrote:

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How can this be a Die Hard when you can't even describe it that way.

Sudden Death is Die Hard in a stadium. Under Siege is Die Hard on a boat. Under Siege 2 is Die Hard on a train. You get the idea.

Don't forget, TNG's Starship Mine was Die Hard on the Enterprise!

[Trekker4747]

And Die Hard 3 was Die Hard... in a city?!

[StolenThunder]

Everything was a bit dull. The villain, his son, the humour, the bad guy. Just generally underwhelming.

[Saul]

Better than Live Free or Die Hard. Nice action. That's it. Not as bad as I thought it would. I heard 'fuck' and 'mother fucker' on a PG rating. How bout you guys?

[Eduardo]

Between a D and a C. Plot is barely there, the action pieces are nice but repetitive, and there is almost no character or plot development at all.

[doubleohfive]

Saw the film last night at the Arclight in Sherman Oaks.

Save your money. This movie is awful.

F.

[Captain Craig]

My ranking for the series would look like this now.

1. Die Hard
2. DH3
3. DH4
4. DH2
5. DH5

I think the biggest problem is the choice of how they chose to go about making the uranium the mcguffin of the film. The bad guys are essentially two guys who used to work at Chernobyl, skimmed some weapons grade U235 and stored it away secretly with one key to the vault. Both went different paths. Stealing money is one thing and the other villains were fun to hate for doing so. You don't really find any empathy or sympathy with a guy whose going to sell uranium to some terrorists who will kill millions.

The switcheroo for the audience and some characters was that there never was a FILE containing critical political intel. File was code for KEY. They finally spell it out of course with about 10min left in the film.

John McClane at first is fighting for his son. It's not till after the hotel ballroom sequence when Jack(with rebar in his side) explains what the "file" contains that John gets fired up to stop some bad guys and his character comes back to life and is enjoyable to watch for the next 2/3 of the film.

The action is great and yeah the plot has issues but then again so did Skyfall and people ate that shit up (I did, but it's a structurally flawed film) while still praising it. The plot in that film is just asinine but worth seeing as well cause you like the protagonist and the action is well done.
Last I looked it's Cinemascore was a B+ and had a low 80's audience score at RT so overall audiences are liking it, it's just not performing based on Fox's projections. Going to fall at least $10m short it looks like. So pure WOM isn't keeping people away.