The McClane Experience

A friend from NE came to visit and her list of things to do included seeing shows, shopping and going to Coney Island.

In an effort to try and get her cheap tickets a group of us stood in line and put our names in for the Wicked lottery. Sadly, none of our names were called out so we headed over to The Drowsy Chaperone lottery - again, we struck out.

So what to do on a visitor's first night in NYC? Why go to a movie theatre in Times Square and watch Live Free or Die Hard!

Although I know about the other Die Hard movies, I have not seen any of them in their entirety. After seeing this one though - I at least want to watch the first one.

Live Free... lives up to what is expected of an action movie and of Die Hard w/ some humor tossed in. (Yes, you read the credits right - Kevin Smith IS in this movie...rumor has it that Bruce Willis asked him to rewrite some of the scenes to add more humor to them...)

Timothy Olyphant manages to humanize his stock villian character as the movie goes on and Justin Long is okay as a computer geek but his dialogue was a bit contrived when his complaints about lack of food and low blood sugar were obviously just being said so the audience "got" that he was nerd - highlighted by the fact that he opened a glove compartment with a product placement Snickers inside and didn't bother to eat it in his supposed weakened state.

Of course, those that were with me found the fighter jet pilot sequence a little more bothersome and unreal - but it's an action movie so I accepted that one.

Another thing that I found surprising though was some bad audio syncing - for a big budget/high profile movie like that you'd think they would have done a better job.

The final showdown between Willis (McClane) and Olyphant (Thomas Gabriel) I didn't see coming though and that was great! The cleverness of the scene reminded me of the "shooting thru the milk" scene towards the end of Kiss the Girls.

As a whole though, I'd recommend it to watch in the theatre rather than wait for video. But maybe try and catch it at a cheap theatre (if you are lucky to have one in your area) or for a cheaper rate at an AMC before noon on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.