Review: Die Hard 4.0

All you need to know about this sequel is whether or not it follows the template of its predecessors.
So...

• Yes; it features Bruce Willis as wisecracking Det. John McClane.
• Yes; it's stupidly, cartoonishly violent.
• Yes; it features thrilling stunts.
• Yes; there's a pantomime villain.
• Yes; there are incompetent senior officers getting in the way.
• Yes; a member of McClane's estranged family ends up involved in the action.
• Yes; it's full of plot-holes and absurdities.

In short, yes; fans will love it, the rest of us will be entertained.

In truth, the wisecrack quotient is down and those which are there aren't nearly as funny, the characters are weak cyphers to the point where you don't care what happens to any of them and - since the plot revolves around the American secret service getting its comeuppance for ignoring warnings - it's hard to not want the bad guys to win. Indeed, the Live Free or Die Hard title used in the States is dropped here, wisely, because of the jingoistic tone so sadly common over the Atlantic post 9/11.

Maggie Q is criminally underused, the bad guys are - as is becoming depressingly common in Hollywood flicks concerning terrorism - mostly French and Justin Long plays the same character he always does. If you can believe Warren P. Cheswick from Ed as a hacker extraordinaire he won't irritate the arse off you as he did me. The same goes for the depiction of all computer users as sci-fi obsessed geeks.

Check your brain at the door and enjoy the big bangs.

Clangers: Watch out for the abysmal lip-synch'ing in several scenes.