Die Hard

"Nine million terrorists in the world and I gotta kill one with feet smaller than my sister." The first movie in the successful series, Die Hard is based on the novel Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Thorp, which itself is a sequel to his novel The Detective (which was made into a movie of the same name with Frank Sinatra in the title role). In Die Hard, Willis plays Detective John McClane of the New York Police Department. He has just arrived in Los Angeles on Christmas Eve to reconcile with his wife Holly Gennaro (Bonnie Bedelia), an employee at the giant Nakatomi Plaza building. While both husband and wife are in the building, a group of terrorists, led by Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman), take over the building and take everybody inside (save for a shoeless McClane, who is hidden) hostage while they attempt to steal money from the building's vault, and demanding the release of international terrorists held by authorities in various countries. McClane, of course, fights back, killing the terrorists who come up to the top floor of the building (where he is biding his time, awaiting police aid). His aid comes in the form Sergeant Al Powell (Reginald VelJohnson, a.k.a. "Carl Winslow"), a now-desk bound officer with the LAPD.
I'll shut up now so as not to spoil the rest of the plot, but, suffice it to say, Die Hard is truly one of the best action movies ever made (not to mention the most awesome Christmas movie ever). On an ironic note, Bruce Willis had an early film role as an extra in the film The First Deadly Sin, which starred Frank Sinatra (just look back at the beginning of this review to learn why this is ironic).

Rating: 4/4