Sunday, February 24, 2013

A Good Day to Die Hard in Hungary


Sometimes, a preview really wins you over.  That was the case for us with “A Good Day to Die Hard.”  We saw the preview, and decided that the movie looked fun.  Thereafter, it didn’t matter what the critics might say, or how audiences might compare it to the previous films.  The preview won us over on the character of John McClane, and the idea of him teaming up with his son against the baddies of Russia.  So we picked up the third and fourth movies in the franchise, and watched them to catch up on what we had missed after the first two films.

Although they’re primarily action movies, the Die Hard movies are also about family.  The first two highlight how a demanding job can detract from your relationship with your spouse.  As John McClane is an exceptional police officer, by the third film, his marriage is on the rocks.  He repeatedly tries to call his wife, but his pursuit of the villains always force him to abort those attempts.  In the fourth movie, he works to win back his daughter, who blames him for her parents' divorce.  Now, in the fifth movie, John's son has been arrested in Russia during an assassination attempt.  He’s been estranged from his son for several years now, and doesn't understand why his son has taken to a life of crime.  So he travels there to attend his son’s trial, and hopes he can do something to aid him.  Only he travels to Hungary, not Russia.

I didn’t realize until the credits that the movie was actually filmed in the Budapest area.  (At one point, Moscow’s colorful cathedral seems to rise in the background).  Some of the chase scenes were filmed at the Hungaroring, one of my favorite Formula One racetracks.  Filmmakers can do so much with special effects these days, and they used these tools not only to transform locations, but also to heighten action sequences.  The automobile chases, the people falling out of buildings and crashing through barriers, and all the explosions, are portrayed so colorfully and artfully, that they better resemble a professional ballet than the ugly gritty reality of so many action films.  Given my recent research, the story also tempts me to view the movie as a contemporary Hungarian Fairytale, with John McClane as a Taltos, a folk hero with special knowledge that allows him to survive the most extreme situations, and can fly through the air and land without sustaining major injury.

But that might be going just a little too far.

Reviewers may have panned the movie.  Audiences may feel it’s the smallest Die Hard ever.  But for an hour and a half, the movie transported me to Russia (even if it was Hungary), and I followed John McClane as he sought to reconnect with a son who had long ago written him off as a father.  Because John's aims were simple, and born of love and concern, I felt for him, smiled and laughed with him, and cheered him on in his (and his son’s) fight with the villains.  Likewise, the plot may have been simple, but what there was of it was good, and always kept me wondering what would happen next.

If you enjoy a movie with lots of action, built around a protagonist who realizes that his most precious treasure is his family, perhaps you’ll find that it’s "A Good Day (for you) to Die Hard."  Or at least, that it’s a good day to go out and watch a fun, light-hearted action movie.

Now, if only it had a few dragons in it.

Dragon Dave 

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