Live Free Or Die Hard

Really?! PG-13?!?! What the fuck?!?!

But first, some previews.

THE SIMPSONS MOVIE–Finally, a real preview for this thing…and it doesn’t tell us a damn thing about the movie at all. It just looks like it’s a BIG story. Hopefully, one that couldn’t necessarily take place in a 22 minute episode.

I’ll see it. We can only HOPE that it’s as good as the South Park Movie…but I doubt that it will be.

LIONS FOR LAMBS–Um….wow! Robert Redford is taking the Bush administration to task for their sins! I love it! I only wish that Tom Cruise wasn’t in it as a senator…but he does what he does best: he plays a jackass.

Meryl Streep and Redford play a journalist and a professor who come calling on the senator when they realize that the war on terror just isn’t working.

This one seems to have been kept under wraps. I hadn’t heard a damn thing about it until today and it comes out in early November. I can’t wait!

THE KINGDOM–Jamie Foxx tries again for the action lead in a movie about a group of special ops sent to the Middle East to figure out who bombed an American facility.

I dunno. It kinda looks like a bunch of suck. I like director Peter Berg, but I just don’t think this looks very good. And when was the last time Jennifer Garner was good at action? Chris Cooper, Jason Bateman (his career is really coming back, huh?) and Jeremy Piven also star…action stars all. Love ‘em all, but I think only Chris is good with the whole military thing.

THE BRAVE ONE–Jodie Foster stars as a woman whose husband was killed by racist assholes, and the cops (led by Terrence Howard) can’t seem to do anything. Anytime Jodie is in a movie, I perk up. I love her and I’ll watch her in anything. This doesn’t look like just another vigilante movie. If they wanted that, they could get Ashley Judd to do another one. This looks like a pretty emotional roller coaster about a woman who just doesn’t have any other choice. She’s lost herself and has to come up with a new one.

I’m there.

BALLS OF FURY–Uch. WHY, CHRIS!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! WWWWHHHHHYYYYY!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

Now, back to John McClane.

It’s been a long time since we left John (Bruce Willis) on the streets of New York City after dispatching the brother of his first nemesis. Now, 12 years later, the world needs him again. It seems that a new terrorist group led by Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant) is trying to bring America to its knees via cyberspace. They enlisted the help of some young hackers who didn’t know what was going on. McClane is sent to pick one of these hackers, Matt Farrell (Justin Long), up. Of course, the terrorists have other plans for Matt. They want him dead, just like the rest of those hackers are.

McClane and Matt end up roaming the entire East Coast trying to foil Gabriel and his crew. But McClane’s pissed off daughter, Lucy (the overly beautiful Mary Elizabether Winstead), might just become a pawn in the game.

I love the Die Hard movies. They’re gritty, over the top and fun, just like a good action movie should be. Hell, even the second one has its moments, although it is the weakest of them. (I fully blame director Renny Harlin for that.) Bruce is a great action hero and he’s usually surrounded by people who are great bad guys/helpers.

This time out, he has Justin Long following him around…which seemed like it might be a little annoying. I like Justin alright, but I wasn’t quite ready for him to be John McClane’s buddy. He holds his own as a pussy-boy who learns more about being a hero.

Olyphant has a knack for playing sleazeballs, so it wasn’t too surprising that he would be the bad guy here. He’s no Alan Rickman or Jeremy Irons, but he’s still fucking cold. His right hand girl, Mai (Maggie Q) is pretty damn hot, too. It was fun to watch her kick ass.

And then there’s Kevin Smith. Yes, THAT Kevin Smith. He plays Matt’s hacker buddy in Baltimore. Kevin’s never been a great actor, but he’s not terrible. And it helps that I like the guy a lot. He managed to not be too annoying and even got a few good lines in.

This one lost some of the grittiness (and realism), but it’s still a lot of fun and has some WAY over the top action. McClane would have died about 100 times. The human body just wasn’t meant to slide down half a mile of concrete and slam into six walls at 50 miles per hour.

Barring that, this is the first good movie that Len Wiseman has made. I swear that this was made by someone besides the director of the terrible Underworld movies. The only good thing about those movies was watching Wiseman’s wife (the oh-so-beautiful and, normally, classy Kate Beckinsale) run around in vinyl.

Wiseman seems to have figured out how to do action, so that’s good. Maybe he actually watched Die Hard and Die Hard With A Vengeance before making this one. I still would have loved it if John McTiernan had directed it, but you can’t have everything.

Yes, the story is pretty preposterous. My viewing partner, who is a big computer guy, said that a lot of that was completely off-base. Not to mention the fact that, as stupid as the government is, there’s no way that they would do some of the stuff that is in this movie.

But, other than that, it’s a really fun action movie.

There is one BIG problem, though. John McClane is a fucking foul-mouthed motherfucker. And for him to be in a PG-13 movie is just lame. The last three movies have been rated-R and they have raked in the cash. Was it worth it for them to neuter one of America’s favorite action heroes like this just to make a few more bucks from parents bringing their little kids to it?

Obviously, it was. I still went even after I found out (just today!) that it was PG-13.

Here’s the biggest problem, though: McClane’s most famous line is an R-rated line! They had to fucking edit it with a gunshot!

Fuck Hollywood. They’re all a bunch of sell-outs. I almost wish that I HADN’T liked the movie. Unfortunately, I did. Maybe there’ll be an R-rated version on DVD.

What’s funny is that it’s still pretty fucking violent. Yeah, there are no holes in people’s heads, but plenty of people get killed and there’s quite a bit of blood. Although…come to think of it…a lot of those deaths happen off screen.

Dammit. They TOTALLY neutered John. Maybe I should stop thinking about it. It’s only pissing me off.

I guess if it hadn’t been a Die Hard sequel it wouldn’t have mattered to me as much.

Shutting up.