Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995)

Directed by John McTiernan. Starring Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, Jeremy Irons, Graham Greene, Larry Bryggman, Colleen Camp, Anthony Peck, Kevin Chamberlin, Sam Phillips, Nick Wyman, Stephen Pearlman, Michael Alexander Jackson, Aldis Hodge. [R]

The “vengeance” of this third Die Hard pic’s title refers to a mad bomber called Simon who wants “to play a game with Lieutenant McClane”—a personal vendetta that sends the “Irish flatfoot” on wild goose chases to defuse several bombs stashed around New York City. Of course, it’s not as simple as that, complicated by the villain’s real goal/motivation, and a cohort McClane picks up along the way: a Harlem shopkeeper (Jackson) who doesn’t like people who are white (or going to get him killed). Best of the Die Hard sequels continues the trend of opening up the action—first a skyscraper, then an airport and surrounding area, now the entirety of Manhattan Island—and thumbs its nose at plausibility at nearly every turn, but the flick is so fast-paced and compulsively-watchable, it doesn’t matter. After hardly sharing a nanosecond of screentime in Pulp Fiction, Willis and Jackson make a good onscreen duo in this rollercoaster ride of riddles, fake-outs, close calls, thrilling action sequences, slick violence, and profane banter; the movie is almost an hour in before Irons shows up in the flesh, but he’s a worthy (if derivative) foe for McClane to tangle with. Only glaring flaw: a tacked-on second climax as abrupt as it is far-fetched (an alternate ending involving a game of “rocket-launcher roulette” isn’t an improvement, unfortunately). Followed a dozen years later by Live Free or Die Hard.

80/100