First Hit: More or less, it was aimless, thoughtless and died hard.
I’ve seen and enjoyed most all of the Die Hard films. There was a personality created in them through Bruce Willis as John McClane, the script, and the situation in which these two things came together.
In this fourth incarnation I found myself not caring, looking around the theater and waiting for the film to end. It was overstuffed with car chases, shoot-outs, and special effects (helicopter sequence at Chernobyl).
The basic storyline was that McClane didn’t know his son Jack (played by Jai Courtney) was a CIA operative in Russia (thought his son was a lost soul, dealing or using drugs in Russia). John goes to help his son and gets caught up in Jack’s job which is to find out and capture the guy who is going to smuggle nuclear weapons out of Russia.
The story complicates itself with the poorly written part of a wayward daughter double crossing her father, and John and Jack trying to reconcile their relationship.
Willis is the only occasional bright spot in this film with his usual McClane quips. Courtney is OK as Willis’ son but there is little chemistry to make it seem real. Sebastian Koch (as Komarov) is not very believable as a Russian scientist who is on the outs with the Russian Premier. There was nothing that made me believe that Yuliya Snigir as Irina was Komarov’s daughter. Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Willis’ daughter Lucy was OK and was aspect of the film, in her brief parts, that worked. Skip Woods and Roderick Thorp wrote a lazy script that focused on what sort of shooting and chase sequences can we put in. John Moore wasted my time (and probably yours) by trying to put this story on the screen.
Overall: The worst of this otherwise reasonably entertaining group of Die Hard films.