Among the sea of knowledge, pseudoknowledge, cat videos, and chatrooms that call the internet home, there also exists a multitude of debates that countless individuals pretend to be very passionate about. These topics can range from pineapple on pizza, to the social acceptability of Crocs, to whether or not Die Hard is a Christmas movie.
Indeed, everybody has an opinion on whether Bruce Willis’ claim to fame can be slotted into the holiday feature pantheon, which is to say that nobody has an opinion on such a thing, and mostly picks one side or the other for the sake of causing friction or manufacturing commonality with their fellow man. As such, most folks probably side with the notion that Die Hard does count as a Christmas movie, and they’re using Prime Video to prove their loyalty.
Per FlixPatrol, the John McTiernan-directed pillar of the action genre has debuted as the sixth-most watched film on Prime Video in the United States, appropriately beating out the likes of a seventh-place Almost Christmas, but falling short of eclipsing the fourth-place Frosty the Snowman.
Die Hard stars Bruce Willis as John McClane, an NYPD detective who unwittingly finds himself trapped in a skyscraper that’s been overtaken by terrorists. Armed with nothing but an uncanny ability to make the most out of dumb luck, John must rough-and-tumble his way through the building to put a stop to the terrorists’ plans while also making sure that their hostages remain unharmed, after which he can think about returning to his estranged wife.
Released in the summer of 1988, Die Hard set itself apart from the actioners of the time by making John McClane a hero that actually got hurt, rather than another invincible powerhouse of the Schwarzenegger persuasion. This loaned itself well to an emotional and thematic meat that propelled it to the sparkling reputation it has now, and was perhaps also benefitted by the casting of a then-green Willis, who was known for the dramedy television series Moonlighting (where he played a private detective) and would therefore be able to believably take a situation like this on the chin.
Willis was paid $5 million to star in the film, which put a sour taste in the mouths of industry professionals, who weren’t convinced that the investment would pay off. Then it got nominated for four Academy Awards, became the highest-grossing action film at the time, ended 1988 as the tenth-highest-grossing movie of the year, and proceeded to spawn a multimedia franchise that included film sequels, comic books, and even video games.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why Die Hard is one of the greatest action movies of all time; not just because of its subversive take on the action genre, but because it went a step further and proved that there are no rules when it comes to great filmmaking. You can cast a television star as your hero, embark on an non-traditional marketing campaign, and refuse to accommodate the expectations surrounding such a tried-and-true genre, and you might just make history. One can only wonder how much more history we could have made by now if the suits kept their fingers out of the creative side of things.
Published: Dec 4, 2024 11:33 am