Critics for movies tend to shit on everything I like. Critics for video games tend to overrate games highly way too much.
I don’t know about game critics, but movie critics have (usually) studied film on an academic level, and watched a whole fuck ton of movies for the purpose of breaking them down and analyzing them. They’re not watching and/or thinking about movies like most people. Of course they will judge them differently.
Yeah. I basically focusing on nitpicky professional details and missing the “is this movie entertaining/fun” part.
You can differentiate between if a film is “objectively” good and subjectively enjoyable to yourself.
The problem is critics are people who always value the new and interesting, and good acting. Because they watch a lot of movies, day in day out.
Sometimes normal viewers just want something dumb that’s exactly what they expect.
For me, it’s not Bruce that’s great in Die Hard. It’s Rickman. Die Hard 3 does better on the protagonist side because of the chemistry between Jackson and Willis, but again it’s the classically trained theatre actor doing a lot of the heavy lifting, single-handedly stopping it from turning into an episode of Blue’s Clues.
In his latest movie, Bruce Willis plays a cop trying to rekindle his ailing marriage. A classic romantic comedy setting which unfortunately gets bogged down by a bizarre terrorist sub plot which ends up taking way too much screen time.
Sadly we’re going to recommend giving this one a pass.
The issue was Bruce Willis at the time was more or less regarded as a comedy star as his last several movies were romantic comedy’s.
No one really expected this movie or knew how to approach it.
And the last thing you want is a confused movie critic with a masters in Spanish literature trying to figure out if the movie was good or not!
“This thing doesn’t have a single horse? What’s up with that?!”
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My belief is that at least half of the reviewers for anything are just really desperate to be distinguished and taken serious, so if a thing has too much mass appeal and/or it’s too low brow they can’t like it on principle.
In 1988, what was the general consensus on “fun” or “over the top” movies? Did 80s audiences not understand how fucking cool the action movies of their era were? Was it yet another critics vs average chad movie enjoyer scenario?
The audience loved those movies, thats why they became classics. But movie reviewers were much more pretentious back then. Nowadays it is more socially acceptable for a movie critic to say they had fun with a mainstream action movie.
I don’t recall the reviews of the first movie but I vividly recall LOTS of articles exclaiming about all the unnecessary violence in the second movie. One news piece had some “expert” show how many times MacLaine would have died, broken bones, etc if it were real. So much free advertising.
Sounds like an earlier version of this
Oh, it must be Christmas time
Unpopular opinion but I don’t think this movie is good lol. I get that it’s very nostalgic and it has its moments but otherwise it’s not too different from any other late 80’s/early 90’s action film. Which is frankly not a high bar to achieve.
I understand how, in retrospect, it may feel like it isn’t groundbreaking, but do consider that before Die Hard, there really wasn’t anything quite like it.
A quote straight from Wikipedia:
It is considered to have revitalized the action genre, largely due to its depiction of McClane as a vulnerable and fallible protagonist, in contrast to the muscle-bound and invincible heroes of other films of the period.
While it did sort of fall apart and away from what made it great in the later sequels, I think it’s important to put the film into the context of when it was released and what it did to the genre.
All that to say, Die Hard fucking rules.
Exactly, this is 100% Seinfeld is Unfunny material.
In the eighties, action films preferred invincible heroes who slaughtered mooks by the dozen with casual disdain. Die Hard popularized grittier and more realistic action, with heroes who are vulnerable and suffer from character faults. It also popularized the concept of action movies confined to limited space, a setup that this very wiki calls ““Die Hard” on an X”. (For example, Speed is “Die Hard on a bus.”) Also, at the time it came out, people were shocked at the idea of a comedic actor like Bruce Willis being an action star. Nowadays, what with Tom Hanks Syndrome, comedic actors doing serious roles aren’t nearly so amazing. Younger fans might not even know Willis got his start in comedy.
Same reason I like Dredd from 2012. They confined the story mostly to a location and one main enemy, and I think it helped a bit cause Dredd generally has no flaws and can’t be beat.
Dredd (2012) is just “Die Hard on LSD”
Jokes aside, Dredd rules.
Just learned about the Seinfeld is Unfunny trope from your comment. What a helpful expression in describing media/pop culture progenitors!
Yeah it’s a good way of realizing why certain things from your past felt so amazing at the time, but are seen as less impressive to people just experiencing it now. It’s hard to describe just how awe inspiring The Matrix was to see in the theaters, or how incredible Golden Eye felt to play on the Nintendo 64 for the first time. Looking back, those things feel like one of a million other movies and games. But that’s only because a million other movies and games were changed forever because of them.
Or to take it a step further back, try getting someone without context before the modrrn era to understand how groundbreaking Casablanca is. So many tropes were invented in that movie, but watched without that understanding many would say “what’s the big deal ?”
It’s a good movie even now. But it’s a great movie with context
He could be a fucking bartender for all we know!
I’m in my 40s and wasn’t aware of his comedy career.
I mean, I don’t think Moonlighting really targeted preteens and children, so that tracks.
I think that TV Tropes page was written like a decade ago, if that helps you feel better.
That’s the thing, it WAS different to other action movies at the time. Im not going to say you are wrong not to like it, but it can’t be denied that it blazed a trail for a new type of action movie and, as a result, is loved by millions.
I suppose you had to be there at the time. For people who only watched US/Hollywood films it was wild. There hadn’t been much, if anything, like it before. Everything that came after it… came after it.
It’s not outstanding but it is well crafted.
Iconic action scenes, memorable, quotable dialog and one liners. Great charismatic actors playing the hero and the main villian. Good actors playing supporting characters.
Decent coherent easy to follow story.Lots of action movies from that era don’t score highly on at least a few of those points and have been mostly forgotten.
That’s fair. It is a well rounded movie. I just didn’t find it exceptional.
I haven’t bothered to watch it again since the 90s.
I agree with you.
I’ll watch most of the Schwarzenegger movies from this era ahead of this.
And hair! Don’t forget hair. Lots and lots of hair…
My kids watched it for the first time ever last weekend. They had no nostalgia or frame of reference for it and yet they both loved it - “the dumbest fun movie I’ve seen in ages”. We’re watching #2 tonight.
I’ve always told people they’re thinking too much when they watch these movies. Just have fun. They’re ridiculous, that’s the point.
