Die Hard

‘Passenger 57’ – Wesley Snipes is Great, The Movie is Not

Posted on by The Ultimate Rabbit

There was a time long ago, before he decided against paying taxes, when Wesley Snipes was one of the biggest action stars working in movies. When you see an actor like that suddenly sink into the almost inescapable realm of direct-to-video films, you cannot help but feel a little sad. Seriously, Snipes is a better actor than many give him credit for these days. He wowed us in “New Jack City” and the “Blade” movies among others. But in between all that, he starred in crappy movies he usually proved to be the most watchable thing in. “Passenger 57” is one of those crappy movies but, for what it is worth, it is never boring for a second.

Snipes stars as John Cutter, a security specialist for an airline corporation who is taking a flight to Los Angeles to take a new job. He is the kind of character you might see in Sylvester Stallone movies like “Cliffhanger;” a man who has suffered a terrible tragedy and is now heading on to the road to redemption. Cutter watched his wife get shot to death in front of him during a convenience store robbery, so you can understand why he doesn’t smile a lot. Along with him on the plane is flight attendant, don’t dare call her a stewardess, Marti Slayton, played by Alex Datcher. Cutter just got through a training session with her where he chewed Slayton out for improvising a move where she succeeded in disarming a terrorist. Now he is trying to make it up to her, but she is not making it easy for him. Ironically, the thing Cutter chewed Slayton out about becomes their only option for survival.

Unbeknownst to Cutter, aboard the plane is terrorist Charles Rane (Bruce Payne) who is being shipped under the guard of FBI agents to await trial where he will most certainly be found guilty. Payne plays the villain of the piece with a seething glare you can find in any Stanley Kubrick film. It is a one-note performance, even if his character has the excuse of feeling no pain. At the same time, Payne does create a threatening presence as a villain to where he has us desperately wanting him to experience the most intense pain humanly possible. Seriously, karma has got to visit this asshole at some point.

Now this brings me to one of the key idiotic moves in this film. Charles Rane is responsible for all of these terrorist acts of destruction, many of them involving airplane explosions. So of course, the FBI has the bright idea of transporting him to trial via airplane. Not by car, train, or even in a cage or some contraption that they would use for Hannibal Lecter. Of course, if they didn’t take him on a plane, there would be no movie. I doubt it would have been anywhere as exciting to see Mr. Rane hijack a 1970’s Pinto. Then again, that might have made for some interesting fight scenes between him and Cutter.

Some movies have gaping holes in plot logic which don’t bother me because I don’t always realize they are happening while I am watching a movie. But when you have plot holes as big as the ones those dinosaurs could have walked through, it’s kind of hard to not notice them. “Passenger 57” is full of plot holes, and they left me scratching my head constantly. We have already gone over transporting an airline hijacker by airplane, but how does this terrorist manage to get on board after being taken off by the police? He has some guy shooting the officers taking him back on board, but how did he get all the way out there? Did the FBI even bother checking the backgrounds of the flight crew and passengers? Really, you can see it in the eyes of Rane’s henchmen. Then again, looks can be deceiving. And is it really possible for Cutter to get inside an airplane by sneaking up through the landing gear while the plane is taking off and not get crushed or blown away in the process?

To a certain extent, it almost shouldn’t matter as “Passenger 57” is entertaining enough. But if these logic loopholes give you a big enough headache, like being in the front row and staring right up at a movie like “JFK,” then it does. You can only be allowed to insult the intelligence of the audience so much before they get right back up in your face.

The other really big problem is that the majority of the acting here is God awful. Granted, Snipes is always fun to watch, and I even have good things to say about Elizabeth Hurley as well. The other actors, however, all speak as if their feet are nailed to the floor, and they emote more than anything else. This is especially evident on the ground when Snipes is confronted by a bunch of hillbilly cops that are clichéd and racist in inescapable ways. How rare it is that you see this much bad acting in a motion picture which was released theatrically.

Then again, you do have Tom Sizemore on board as Cutter’s friend of sorts, Sly Delvecchio. Even if he was on drugs while acting in this movie, he is never ever boring and raises the acting level ever so slightly for the rest of the cast. Then again, that helped only so much.

The movie was directed by Kevin Hooks who has done a lot more work these days in television than he has in feature films. But considering that he has worked on such shows as “24,” “Alias,” and “Homicide – Life on The Street” among others, it is clear he has a good hand for action and character than this particular motion picture would quickly suggest. Maybe the movie was so low budget that they didn’t have time to work on things more. If they did have more time, it would have ended up being far more entertaining and enthralling than what ended up onscreen here.

As I write this, Snipes has since gone through a career renaissance thanks to the combined efforts of Craig Brewer and Eddie Murphy who allowed him to let loose and go crazy in “Coming 2 America” and “Dolemite is My Name.” Seeing him in “Passenger 57” serves as a reminder of the kind of action movie star he was once upon a time, and he does make this one more watchable than it might be otherwise. Thanks to Snipes, he keeps me from giving this particular movie a more brutal review.

In the end, I can’t say I hated “Passenger 57,” but I never got bored by it either. This was made back when we had dozens of “Die Hard” knock-offs, and this one can safely be described as “Die Hard on A Plane.” If you want a better version of this movie, check out “Executive Decision” with Kurt Russell and Steven Segal which has better acting and characters. Better yet, check out “Air Force One” which stars Harrison Ford and was directed by Wolfgang Peterson.

After all this time, I can’t believe Roger Ebert liked this movie more than “Air Force One.”

* * out of * * * *

Attending The ‘Die Hard’ Mural Unveilling at Fox Studios

Posted on by The Ultimate Rabbit

Bruce Willis attends as 20th Century Fox presents a dedication of a permanent sound stage mural celebrating 25 years of “DIE HARD” and “A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD” in Los Angeles, CA on Thursday, January 31, 2013. (Alex J. Berliner/ABImages)

WRITER’S NOTE: As the first paragraph will indicate, this event took place back in 2013.

I was one of the lucky attendees at the Fox Studios lot on January 31, 2013 where the unveiling of a brand-new mural done in honor of “Die Hard” took place at Stage 8. The action classic which stars Bruce Willis as New York Detective John McClane has now reached its 25th anniversary, and the fifth movie in the long running series, “A Good Day to Die Hard,” is about to be released. Joining Willis in this celebration were Fox Film Entertainment chair Jim Gianopulos and the cast and director of “A Good Day to Die Hard.”

I cannot begin to tell you what a thrill it was to be a part of this historic event. Like so many, I was raised on the original “Die Hard” and its sequels, and the fact this franchise has held up so well is really a testament to the character of McClane and Willis’ portrayal of him. Before McClane, all movie action heroes were indestructible superhuman armies of one who obliterated every single bad guy while barely getting hurt in the process. McClane, however, was a different kind of action hero because he was like the rest of us; vulnerable, easily wounded, scared, and far from ever being indestructible. Gianopulos made this clear when talking about the character and his enduring status.

“While John McClane describes himself as the ‘fly in the ointment, the monkey in the wrench, the pain in the ass,’ I’d like to think his appeal is just that he’s the everyman who just has this uncanny way of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and who never, ever says die,” Gianopulos said. “So, however you try and categorize him, John McClane will live on for audiences in our hearts and the studio’s legacy and so will his ‘yippee-ki-yay…’ Well, it’s a family thing so I can’t really say it.”

Gianopulos also rightly pointed out how, unlike Batman or James Bond, John McClane has been played by the same actor in all five “Die Hard” movies. The crowd was thrilled to see Willis show up for this mural unveiling, and he looked genuinely happy to be there and to see us so excited.

“This is really very nice, really nice,” Willis said of this occasion. “I worked on this lot. I started on Stage 20 here and I moved on to bigger things here at Fox, and I just couldn’t be more pleased that you all came out here. It has been a big, great, fun time doing ‘Die Hard’ for the last twenty-five years and living to talk about it.”

Afterwards, Gianopulos gave Willis a device which looked like a detonator to a bomb and, after the 20th Century Fox Fanfare was played, he pushed the button on it. What followed were some loud pyrotechnics and the dropping of the curtain to reveal the 35- foot “Die Hard” mural which was designed by muralist Van Hecht-Nielsen and painter Fernando Cepeda. It depicts the scene where McClane makes his way through an air vent and pulls out his cigarette lighter to see what’s ahead. This of course led to one of Willis’ famous quotes from the movie:

“Come out to the coast, we’ll get together, have a few laughs…”

I personally got a huge kick out of the whole presentation as did everyone else, and it was greeted with thunderous applause from the onlookers as well as many car alarms which were inadvertently set off by the pyrotechnics (I guess they had to have their say as well). Then again, “Die Hard” did get its name from a car battery, so the irony is hard to ignore.

Following the mural presentation, we were invited to a screening of “A Good Day to Die Hard” held at the Zanuck Theatre on the Fox Lot. Introducing the movie was its director, John Moore, who added he hopes his funeral looks like this and with so many excited people in attendance. He also pointed out while this was a special screening of the new “Die Hard” movie, he also called it a “nerd screening” because of a new sound system being utilized for it.

“This is an Atmos screening of ‘A Good Day to Die Hard,'” Moore said. “To explain what that is, Atmos is a new three-dimensional sound system that Dolby is rolling out over the next few years, and this is only the eighth film to be mixed in Atmos. If I could director direction to the ceiling for a moment, you can see there is an array of nearly 40 speakers, and this creates a three-dimensional sound that’s gonna role of you like nothing you’ve ever experienced… Or since the last time something’s rolled over you.”

But for many of us, the biggest treat of the evening was when we were invited to the 21st floor of the Nakatomi Plaza where the original “Die Hard” was filmed… Okay, it’s really called Fox Plaza, but to us “Die Hard” fans it will always be known as the Nakatomi. The lobby in the building has changed only so much since 1988, and while the lighting inside was different, it still looks the same as it did back then. You should have seen us when we got into the elevators though because they looked exactly the same as they did in the movie. My friend Phillip was practically hyperventilating from all the excitement of being there, and he later claimed how he almost died of “sheer awesomeness.” We all definitely shared in that feeling, and I had a great grin on my face for the rest of the night.

The 21st floor was decked out with a DJ and food that ran from cheese and apple blintzes to bigger dishes like beef stroganoff and egg noodles, perhaps to reflect how “A Good Day to Die Hard” takes place in Russia. I loved how the floor resembled the one McClane hid out on when he set off the fire alarm and was waiting for the fire trucks to show up. This had a lot of us going up to the windows and looking out while repeating our favorite lines from “Die Hard” such as “c’mon baby, come ta’ papa, I’ll kiss ya’ fucking dalmatian” or “you macho a-holes! No! No!” We didn’t bang our hands on the windows though as that likely would have gotten us into trouble.

Actually, some of us got a really nice security guard to take us up to the 30th floor where the Christmas party in “Die Hard” took place, but it looks nothing like it did in the movie. In fact, much of what we saw in “Die Hard” was done on a soundstage, and the real 30th floor was full of empty office spaces still waiting to be occupied. We were hoping to go up to the roof where the helipad is so we could imitate the scene where McClane shot his machine gun into the air to get the hostages to run downstairs, but unfortunately the guy couldn’t do that for us (he was very nice about it though).

Still, we got to see the front parking area where Sgt. Al Powell (Reginald VelJohnson) drove around in circles before going inside, and we also got to see the place where a terrorist stole a Nestle Crunch candy bar while waiting for SWAT to break into the building. It’s all those little details which got us so excited.

Seriously, this was one of the best evenings I have had in a long time. To be a part of it was an honor, and it was an amazing thrill to go inside the Nakatomi/Fox Plaza and see where “Die Hard” was filmed. I came out to Los Angeles to be a part of the movies and to be close to those involved in their making, and this was an occasion which allowed me to do just that. I’ll never forget this evening, and I look forward to having many more of them.

Soundtrack Review: ‘Die Hard with a Vengeance’

Posted on by The Ultimate Rabbit

Die Hard 3 soundtrack

Anyone remember the RCA Victor release of the “Die Hard with a Vengeance” soundtrack back in 1995? That release was a joke and an unforgivable one as well. It did have some of Michael Kamen’s music score on it as well as a couple of rap songs which I’m not sure were in the movie, and some symphony pieces by Beethoven and Brahms which are not in this movie at all. It was as if RCA just wanted to throw any kind of soundtrack together so they could cash in on this sequel’s expected success, and what resulted was a travesty which any true soundtrack fan would be right to despise.

Well, it took over a decade, but La La Land Records has finally given “Die Hard with a Vengeance” not only the proper soundtrack release it deserves but an expanded one which contains two discs of music. In addition, it also comes with an informative booklet written by Jeff Bond who discusses how this “Die Hard” movie differs from the two which came before it, and it looks at how Kamen came to develop this particular score. But the great thing about this soundtrack release is it forces you to listen to Kamen’s music more closely in a way we didn’t previously.

When I first saw this sequel, I wondered if Kamen had actually bothered to create a new score for this “Die Hard” adventure. Many of the music cues sounded like they came from “Die Hard” and “Die Hard 2,” and it was hard to spot any new musical themes throughout. Listening to the La La Land Records release, however, makes you realize Kamen did not just simply throw something together. Much thought went into this particular score as it presents a somewhat darker John McClane (played by Bruce Willis) than what we have seen previously, and it also captures the joyful qualities of the heist movie that “Die Hard with a Vengeance” is meant to be.

Among the pieces of music I was thrilled to hear on this soundtrack is “Taxi Chase” which has McClane and Zeus Carver (played by Samuel L. Jackson) driving through a populated park in New York in an effort to catch a train before it explodes. “Taxi Chase” sounds unlike any music Kamen has previously composed for a movie with all its urban percussion. In the booklet, Bond quotes Kamen on this cue as it is one of the composer’s favorites which found its inspiration from his living in Manhattan.

“A lot of it (the movie) takes place on the streets I inhabited,” Kamen said. “I was trying to figure out what music to put there and I remembered that Needle Park is just up the street, and all you ever hear is bongo players and people driving past, and that’s why that cue is all native percussion. We’re using drums and drum loops and the normal accouterment of a modern recording studio – even a live drummer from time to time.”

This soundtrack not only contains music which was not on the original release, but also the music which was written for the movie but not included in it. Bond writes how director John McTiernan removed a number of Kamen’s cues from the movie, but Kamen wasn’t bothered by this too much because he was very collaborative and agreed with many of the changes McTiernan wanted to make.

And yes, The Lovin’ Spoonful’s “Summer in the City” which opens the movie is on this soundtrack as well, and it has never sounded better.

When it comes to these expanded soundtracks, I usually say how they have never looked or sounded better. With La La Land Records’ release of “Die Hard with a Vengeance” though, that’s a given as the original release was put together before Michael Kamen even had a chance to finish his score. While it may not have the same exhilarating or emotional sweep as his score for “Die Hard 2,” what Kamen has put together here is great and highly enjoyable to listen to. This release also forces you to realize Kamen was never out to just recycle his own work in the way the late James Horner was often accused of doing.

Sadly, this proved to be the last “Die Hard” movie Kamen scored before his death. Marco Beltrami later took over composing duties for “Live Free or Die Hard” and “A Good Day to Die Hard,” but the music Kamen created for these films will live on forever.

CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT HOW YOU CAN PURCHASE THE “DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE” EXPANDED SOUNDTRACK.

‘Incredibles 2’ Was Well Worth the Wait

Posted on by The Ultimate Rabbit

Incredibles 2 movie poster

I was beginning to think Pixar had made one too many sequels to their biggest hits, but now we have “Incredibles 2” which brings writer and director Brad Bird back into the Pixar fold as he continues the fantastic adventures of Bob and Helen Parr who try to balance out their crime-fighting ways with raising three kids, each who has their own unique super powers they are ever so eager to use. It is no surprise how this sequel is not as fresh or as inventive as its predecessor, but I am thrilled to say “Incredibles 2” proves to be just as much fun as the original, and it is a blast from start to finish.

It has been 14 years since “The Incredibles” was unleashed on us, but “Incredibles 2” begins just mere seconds after it ended with the Parr family doing battle with the Underminer who lays waste to their town while robbing the Metroville bank. They manage to thwart the Underminer’s dastardly plans, but in the process they leave a tremendous amount of damage in their path. Despite their goodwill in preventing many citizens from getting hurt, the police do not even try to contain their fury at these supers to where they flat out tell them it would have been better to let the bad guy get away as the bank are insured. Hmm, it kind of makes you think how the story might just reflect the state of our society today…

While attempting to do the right thing, the Parrs forgot that, in spite of their victories, supers are still illegal and have long since been forced to adhere to their secret identities. With this latest incident, the family has been forced to say at a motel as their home was destroyed, and they are informed by government agent and friend Rick Dicker (Jonathan Banks) that the “Super Relocation” program is being shut down permanently. Bob and Helen now have two weeks to figure out what they can do to support their family before they find themselves homeless and out on the street.

Their savior comes in the form of Winston Deavor (Bob Odenkirk), a telecommunications tycoon who has been a big fan of superheroes since he was a child. Winston is intent on changing the public’s perception of supers with the help of his tech savvy sister Evelyn Deavor (Catherine Keener), and he chooses Helen to revive her superhero alter-ego of Elastigirl to make this happen. However, this leaves Bob, better known as Mr. Incredible, at a loss as he feels he should be the one to start things off, but Winston feels Elastigirl is a better choice as she does not leave the same path of destruction Mr. Incredible does on a regular basis. This ended up reminding me of what Al Powell told John McClane in “Die Hard 2” after McClane said he had a feeling about something:

“Ouch! When you get those feelings insurance companies start to go bankrupt!”

Seeing Helen/Elastigirl take center stage as the main superhero in “Incredibles 2” is a wonderful twist on the original when Bob/Mr. Incredible did his superhero thing while Helen stayed at home to look after the kids. With “Wonder Woman” having been a critical and commercial smash hit, lord knows we have been long overdue for female superheroes to take charge as this genre can no longer be considered a male dominated club. Holly Hunter returns to her role with great relish as she makes Helen/Elastigirl into a wonderfully realized human being who runs the gamut of emotions throughout, and the action sequences she is featured in puts those in so many live action movies rendered in this past year to utter shame.

It’s also great to have Craig T. Nelson back voicing Bob/Mr. Incredible, and hearing him here reminded me of the welcome presence he gave us in movies like “Poltergeist,” “All the Right Moves” and on the television series “Parenthood.” He does great work in making Bob’s heroic efforts in caring for his children by himself all the more palpable as he experiences sleep exhaustion any parent can relate to. Whether its desperately trying to understand how Dash’s teachers want him to do math in a completely different way from what he as taught or dealing with Violet’s descent into adolescence, Bob has more to deal with than any parent could ever expect, and having to handle so many real-life obstacles on your own has to be admired more than criticized.

This is Brad Bird’s first movie since “Tomorrowland” which proved to be a critical and commercial disappointment. After his phenomenal success with “The Incredibles,” “Ratatouille” and “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol,” “Tomorrowland” was greeted with a lot of criticism to where it seemed like Bird lost his mojo, but every director has their failures, and we are always eager to see them make a comeback. With “Incredibles 2,” Bird shows us how quickly a filmmaker can recover from a cinematic failure as he raises the bar for the other movies to be released in the summer of 2018. When “The Incredibles” was released, the superhero genre was not at the same level of popularity it is at now, and this created challenges for any sequel destined to follow it. But Bird more than rose to the occasion as he has given us a sequel which is gloriously entertaining and full of heart.

I also have to say Jack Jack steals every scene he’s in here. Whereas we saw some of what Jack Jack was capable of in the first movie, his parents are only now discovering he has many superpowers. This makes Bob’s role as a parent more challenging as Jack Jack won’t stay still, refuses to fall asleep, and turns himself into an angry beast at the most inconvenient of moments. Even Lucius Best/Frozone (Samuel L. Jackson) cannot maintain his cool self once he sees how this baby boy can make himself invisible and not easily detectable.

And yes, Bird reprises his brilliant character of Edna Mode, fashion designer to the supers who, in her first appearance, reveals herself to be infinitely perturbed to learn Elastigirl is wearing a suit not designed by her. Still, she becomes Bob’s savior when upon agreeing to babysit Jack Jack so he can for once get a decent night’s sleep. The bond she forms with this baby boy is a hilarious sight to take in as he is quick to mimic Edna’s every move, and it makes her appearance all the more delightful to take in.

I got to see “Incredibles 2” with a nearly sold out audience, and it reminded me of how much fun it is to watch a movie with so many enthusiastic people. You could complain at length about how this sequel doesn’t have the freshness of the original, but it would just take away from the fun it contains. I had a great deal of fun watching this long-awaited motion picture, and the rest of the audience clearly felt the same all the way through the end credits. Pixar still succeeds in making movies for audiences young and old, and I eagerly await an “Incredibles 3.” Of course, it would be nice to see it come out in less than 14 years.

* * * ½ out of * * * *

All-Time Favorite Trailers: ‘Die Hard 2’

Posted on by The Ultimate Rabbit

I so wish I saw this particular movie trailer in a theater when it first came out. Instead, I first watched it on the Movietime Channel which would later become E, Entertainment Television. One of my dad’s friends, however, told me of when he saw the “Die Hard 2” teaser trailer on the silver screen and of the reaction it generated. At first, it looked to him and the rest of the audience like just another action movie as the narrator went about describing Dulles International Airport even as there were title cards showing us exactly what he was saying. In my mind, I could see the audience repeating what they saw onscreen in a lifeless way as they waited impatiently for this trailer to end and for the movie they came to see begin.

But then Bruce Willis appeared as John McClane, and the audience burst into spontaneous applause as “Die Hard” quickly became an all-time action movie classic upon its release, and to see the former “Moonlighting” actor bringing this character back to the big screen made them super excited. With John McClane, Willis gave us a new kind of action hero which was so different from the superhuman ones Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone among others gave us time and time again. As a result, McClane proved to be more human than any other action hero many of us had seen previously.

When it comes to this particular teaser trailer, what I love is how it has all these sound effects going on even as the narrator narrates away, and it forces you to imagine what is going on at this airport during one of the busiest travel seasons ever. We have all been to the airport during the holidays and have experienced the craziness and insanity of getting checked in and of the flight delays which are usually inevitable, and this teaser pokes at those fears and anxieties we have while waiting to travel home to see our families.

Once we see the title card which says “but tonight on Christmas Eve,” I began to realize this might be the “Die Hard” sequel we had been waiting for. Then Bruce Willis enters and says, “How can the same thing happen to the same guy twice?” It makes perfect sense that McClane would say this as, like I said previously, this is an action hero more human than the average one we had been exposed to for many years. Furthermore, I was happy to see Willis say this as many sequels strand characters like McClane in the same situation, and yet the filmmakers would treat it as though the previous movie never happened. But with this simple exchange which spells out how he spent Christmas this way last year, I became even more enthusiastic about this sequel as the filmmakers knew in advance that they had to deal with this inescapable fact.

Even after all these years, I still love watching this “Die Hard 2” trailer as it raises my excitement level to a very pleasurable degree, and it takes a lot for a movie trailer to do this for me these days.

WRITER’S NOTE: In addition to the teaser trailer above, I am also including the two trailers which came after it. Back then, this proved to be the first time when I realized movie studios were never content to release just one trailer for a summer blockbuster. Each of them was thrilling to watch, and this sequel was released back in a time when my expectations for a motion picture were much higher than they are now. These days, I am very guarded in my expectations as I usually expect them to not be met.

Renny Harlin and Steven E. de Souza Look Back at ‘Die Hard’ & ‘Die Hard 2’

Posted on by The Ultimate Rabbit

Die Hard poster

Steven E. de Souza and Renny Harlin dropped by the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood back in 2009 to talk about the making of “Die Hard” and “Die Hard 2.” Both films introduced us to modern action hero John McClane, a man more real and human than the muscular superheroes played by Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone. They also inspired a most popular concept in movies; the lone warrior fighting overwhelmingly bad odds. The audience at the Egyptian clearly had seen both these movies hundreds of times, but seeing them on the big screen made them seem more exciting than ever.

In talking about the genesis of “Die Hard,” de Souza said it was based on Roderick Thorp’s novel “Nothing Lasts Forever.” The filmmakers followed the book closely, but there were differences: John McClane was older and visiting his daughter, not his wife. Also, Al Powell (played by Reginald VelJohnson) was originally a cab driver, but the character was turned into a cop as the CB radio craze had long since ended. The writers also dropped the ticking time bomb as well. De Souza also explained in writing the screenplay how he made Hans Gruber the protagonist and John McClane the antagonist. Basically, while Gruber is dragging out time, McClane is busy trying to foil his plans.

In casting “Die Hard,” de Souza admitted Bruce Willis, best known back then for starring on the television series “Moonlighting,” was not the first choice. Frank Sinatra had first dibs as “Nothing Lasts Forever” was a sequel to his movie “The Detective,” but he felt he was too old to play the part. Offers were made to Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, James Caan and even Richard Gere, all of whom turned the role down as they found McClane to be too passive.

Die Hard 2 poster

The conversation moved on to “Die Hard 2” which de Souza said 20th Century Fox decided to move forward with a week after the original opened. Harlin said he had just finished making “A Nightmare On Elm Street 4,” one of that franchise’s biggest hits. This led to him getting many offers as the thinking is studios proclaim you a genius when you have a hit movie. Harlin said he still doesn’t understand the thinking behind this. 20th Century Fox had offered him “The Adventures of Ford Fairlane” and gave Harlin total freedom in filming a movie which featured, as he put it, “girls in bikinis.” The studio bosses liked what they saw and gave him “Die Hard 2” to direct, and Harlin began shooting it two weeks after “Ford Fairlane” wrapped.

Harlin remembered “Die Hard 2” as being so hard to make and that even Joel Silver came to admit he put too much on his plate. As nervous and excited as he was about doing it, Harlin bemoaned his misfortune at shooting during what he called “least snowy winter ever.” He and the production team looked everywhere for snow and couldn’t even find any in Colorado or Montana. In Spokane, Washington, they finally lucked out with lots of snow and were set to start filming, but a sudden heat wave melted it all on the very next day.

Both Harlin and de Souza said they saw “Die Hard 2” as a comedy which makes sense when McClane says, “How can the same thing happen to the same guy twice?” Bruce Willis, however, didn’t see it as a comedy and initially refused to say the “yippee kay yay” line again since he already did in the first film. Harlin said Silver eventually convinced Willis to do a take his way and then another take Harlin’s way. Indeed, it works well as a comedy as McClane’s bad luck is impossible to ignore. Harlin did however credit Willis for the “just the fax ma’am” line.

Thanks to de Souza and Harlin for dropping by. Seeing “Die Hard” and “Die Hard 2” on the silver screen was a great treat. After all these years, they remain exhilarating action movies to watch.