OK so onto part 2 of the Die Hard entries, and this is funnily enough all about Die Hard 2 (who'da thought that????!). Die Hard 2 followed two years later after the huge success that was the original, so the idea was still much the same, so here's more about the plot and all that.
The film starts on Christmas Eve 1990, where John McClane (Bruce Willis) is waiting at Washington Dulles International airport for his wife's flight to come in. McClane while waiting in the airport bar notices two men, who appear to be wearing army fatigues and carry parcels. McClane follows the men to the baggage area, where he confronts them, and they pull a gun on him, in the enusing gunfight, McClane kills one of the men, while the other gets away. McClane after the incident speaks with the police captain Carmine Lorenzo (Dennis Franz) who dismisses his request to close off the baggage area and investigate further, as he thinks it was just a punk stealing luggage, McClane is then escorted out Lorenzo's office. After this McClane manages to borrow a fingerprint press and lifts prints off the dead man's hands, and calls up his fellow police officer Al Powell (Reggie VelJohnson again) and faxes a copy of the man's prints to check out who he is. Al soon calls McClane back and informs him that the man was a former army sergeant who apparently died two years ago. McClane then goes to the chief of the airport tower's operations, Trudeau, with his findings, but at that point the airport runway lights all start to go off. It is soon revealed the airport has been taken over by a terrorist group lead by an ex special forces Colonel, Colonel Stuart (William Sadler) who wish to use the airport for their own means, so that they can intercept a plane carrying the drug lord General Ramon Esperanza (Franco Nero), who has been brought to the US to stand trial for drug trafficking charges.
With the terrorists now in control of the airport tower systems, all communications to the planes have been cut off, which leaves the planes in the air, unable to land, which includes Holly's plane. And a botched attempt by Lorenzo's SWAT team and the airport tower's director of communications Barnes (Art Evans) to re-establish comms with the planes, ends with all the team killed by Stuart's men in an ambush, but McClane at the last moment steps in saves Barnes, and shoots Stuart's team. This enrages Colonel Stuart who then recalibrates the instrument landing system, and pretends to be the tower chief, and causes one of the planes to crash into the ground, killing 230 people onboard. McClane realises he must do something to stop the terrorists and try to ensure that his wife's plane will be able to land, and Trudeau tells him his wife's plane will soon run out of fuel. Meanwhile on Holly's plane, she suffers the misfortune of having to share the same aisle as Dick Thornburg (Richard Atherton), the sleazy news reporter from the first film, who protests that he is put near Holly, as he filed a restraining order against her for assaulting him (at the end of the first film again).
McClane with Barnes help soon locates the terrorists hideout, which is an old church, and by then a Special Forces platoon is brought in to help try and resolve the terrorist situation, lead by Major Grant (John Amos). Colonel Stuart and his men soon evacuate the church when the Special forces team arrive, a firefight ensues, and McClane chases after Stuart on snowmobiles, but Stuart gets away. McClane having taken one of Stuart's machine guns soon realises that the ammo they used was actually blanks, and it dawns on him that the Major Grant and his team are working together with Stuart. McClane goes back to Lorenzo and after failing to convince him that Grant is in cahoots with Stuart, he fires the machine gun loaded with blanks at him. Lorenzo then sends out all his police units to go after Stuart and Grant's men, and McClane catches up with the pesky news reporter Samantha Coleman (Sheila McCarthy) who has been bothering everyone throughout the movie, to get a ride in her news chopper, in order to stop Stuart and Grant's men from leaving on a plane. McClane soon with help of the ride, jumps on the plane before it takes off and a final fight ensues with the terrorists.
It has to be said for me anyway, that Die Hard 2 is the weakest of the films in the franchise, however that's not to say it isn't enjoyable, it is, but in comparison to the other films in the series, it falls short of the mark a little. The problem mainly stems with the script and characters, particularly the bad guys who are really get the worst dialogue, and are basically like something out of a comic book. Colonel Stuart's character in particular makes for a pretty bland villain, who lacks the charm, wit or humour that Hans Gruber had. And Stuart's suborindate baddies are all very much the same, and they get some bog standard dialogue such as "I'm gonna kick your fuckin ass!". There is also generally too much hackneyed dialogue between the police officers such as Lorenzo to Major Grant, as Grant says : "Make sure no one get's past us", Lorenzo says "You got it!". Lorenzo even gets one of the cheesiest lines of all time, when McClane confronts him toward the end and they realise what they must do, "Its time to kick ass!". Oh yeah sure. Again I think the writers of the Die Hard series have a thing for making the police look like idiots.
Performance wise things aren't too bad here, but the film suffers again from poorly realised characters, particularly Colonel Stuart, played William Sadler. Sadler himself is an excellent actor, as an example he stood out very well in The Shawshank Redemption, playing a colourful part of a prison inmate, but here he is just playing a cardboard cut-out villain, delivering loaded threats without any real sense of menace. Other supporting cast members however are better, such as Dennis Franz, who plays he Airport police chief, who is quite amusing in his part, playing the police chief, as very stubborn and has no interest in listening to McClane, and is more concerned about the traffic going through his airport than anything else. John Amos is also fine as Major Grant, the Special Forces unit leader, and he plays him with an expected sense of machismo, although he too does get some cringeworthy dialogue, especially the line where McClane says to him "I guess you're not such an asshole after all", to which Grant replies "No, you were right, I'm just your kind of asshole". God.
The regular cast however do very well in their respective roles, with Bruce Willis, once again playing John McClane to perfection, or as much to perfection as he can expect. In Die Hard 2 we get more wise cracking from McClane, but Bruce also throws in some deft little touches where he shows McClane's vulnerability. The scene in particular after the terrorists crash the plane, McClane sadly moves through the wreckage afterwards and picks up a singed doll, and later sits silently in the airport tower, lamenting how he failed to help the people on the plane. However now and then McClane's dialogue is a bit trite as well, especially then line near the end where he says "My God, John, what the fuck are you doing on the wing of this plane????". Bonnie Bedelia is certainly not forgotten about here, and she too provides some of the film's fun moments, especially where she has to sit and listen to the arrogant sleazy Dick Thornburg, and she says to him "if you wish to sit this close to me, could you consider changing aftershave, and a stronger mouth wash would be good". Another fun scene Bonnie has with Richard Atherton is where as Dick Thornburg, broadcasts his propoganda about the airport takeover by the terrorists from the airplane toilet and says "If this should be my final broadcast", Bonnie eventually comes into the toilet and tasers him and says "Amen to that! Dick!".
Action wise though Die Hard 2, has plenty of fine set-pieces and Renny Harlin does a good job with the action scenes, and overall he does a pretty good job at picking up the pace of the franchise where it left off. Michael Kamen also contributes another fine score to the film, building on the original score and adding some extra passages, as composers tend to do in sequels! Track wise, Let it Snow is used once more, but an additional fine choice is Sebilius's Finlandia, which is used really well at the end where planes come in to land, once the whole situation has been "dealt" with.
So there you go, that's the Die Hard 2 analysis over with, its not a bad action film by any means, but it has to be said with its bland baddies and hackneyed dialogue, its not the best in the series by a longshot, but its worth a watch once in a while.
So I'll soon be onto Part 3.....
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