Improbable Scenes in Die Hard and James Fenimore Cooper’s Novels
Recently, I was watching the first Die Hard movie (1988) on television. Die Hard is based on the novel Nothing Lasts Forever (1979) by Roderick Thorp. In the action film, East German terrorists led by smooth-talking Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) hold hostages in the fictional Nakatomi Plaza in Los Angeles. Their goal is to steal $640 million in bonds from the building’s vault. The criminals have at least fifteen opportunities to capture or kill the hero John McClane (Bruce Willis), a New York and Los Angeles police detective whose wife Holly (Bonnie Bedelia) is among the hostages. The scenes include hide-and-seek, races, fist fights, gun fights, wrestling, bombs, etc. However, McClane escapes every time with only a few wounds and minor injuries. After a while, I found this movie boring because the results of every action sequence became predictable: one by one, the villains would fail and eventually get killed. (more…)