Hey folks, Harry here with a fun little bit of talkback baiting... Two Black Box heroes - Kevin Smith and Bruce Willis talking about the film they're both in and about sailing into AICN's Talkbacks.

You can see the interview below in the original story... or click it here if you don't want to scroll all the way down: CLICK HERE

Now I've been asked why the Q&A with Bruce Willis ceased. Well, the second set of questions hit Bruce the day that the first set appeared. However, Bruce was smack dab in the midst of the Global marketing blitz that Fox set him out on. About 3 weeks ago, I got 5 of the 10 questions back answered, but didn't post them, as it wasn't the complete 10. Then 3 days ago, Bruce wrote me to ask for the last 5 questions - and he hasn't yet responded to those. Now - is there some conspiracy against answering your questions laid down by Fox... or did Bruce decide to relax in what little time he finds to himself whilst on a global marketing campaign?

Whatever the case - we should cherish the time we had with him.

As for the film? I know in the UK it was rated the same as DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE - so does that mean the MPAA has been jaded by films like HOSTEL and GRINDHOUSE that a film like DIE HARD 4 feels PG-13 by their changing standards? Or did the foreign cuts have the good stuff intact. I've been hearing good things about this latest DIE HARD - here's yet another review - I just hope JackNance - is right...

LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD REVIEW

Hey Harry, Moriarty, et al.,

I’ve been reading AICN for years but the only thing I’ve ever contributed prior to this was a talkback entry eulogizing the great Samuel Z. Arkoff when his final credits rolled a few years back. It was a touching recollection of how I won an Arkoff Award as a film student at Loyola, went to a screening at Sam’s hilltop home, guzzled brandy and smoked Cubans with the man in his library, then graciously stumbled to his backyard and PUKED MY FUCKING GUTS OUT all over his wife’s prize rose bushes.

Anyway, it was a fitting tribute to an American film giant. Unfortunately, when I tried to post it, I screwed up and repeated it five times in a row and other talk backers gave me shit and I was mortified and vowed through bitter tears of shame to become a lifelong lurker and never contribute again...

...UNTIL NOW. And all it took to drag me from my self-imposed exile was a screening of LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD. (Don’t ask me how. Can’t even go into it. People close to me could get hurt).

I’m no fan of Fox and what they’ve done to some properties, comic and otherwise, I’ve held dear. So I would be more than happy to report that they screwed the pooch with the latest installment of their 20 year old Die Hard series. But such is not the case. Maybe I’ve just grown old and soft and nostalgic. Or maybe I just can’t get me enough Bonnie Bedelia. But here’s the bottom line...

Bruce Willis has been running around telling anyone who’ll listen that this is the best DIE HARD since the first one. AND….he’s right. And I’ll tell you why, but tread lightly… there’s a nest of fuckin’ SPOILERS ahead.

An action hero is only as good as the villain, so I’ll start there. Timothy Olyphant is cool as tits as sarcastic cyber genius, Thomas Gabriel, a sour ex D.O.D. chief programmer turned super villain. After being fired and suffering public humiliation for criticizing the United States’ data defense system, Gabriel recruits 8 computer whiz kids to design and test the ultimate infiltration software. Once successful, Gabriel covers his tracks by having the web designers systematically executed.

The last survivor, Camden resident Matt Farrell, gets identified by the FBI. So NYPD detective John McClane, who happens to be at nearby Rutgers University, is enlisted by the agency to apprehend Farrell and transport him to Washington DC. McClane shows up at Farrell’s bachelor pad in time to wipe out Gabriel’s 5 man hit squad. After a balls out firefight and a smash em’ up Joe car chase, the two narrowly make it out of Jersey. (Thank God for that.)

Gabriel’s master plan of attack is a three pronged “fire sale” designed to cripple the East coast’s public transportation, telecommunications, and utility systems. Phase one goes off without hitch – gridlocking all the DC roads and subways just as McClane and Farrell arrive. In the most intense of the many action sequences, the two unlikely partners speed into a tunnel trying to avoid the lethal spray from one of Gabriel’s sharp shooting helicopters. Once inside, Gabriel redirects the flow of traffic directly towards them from both directions, and then cuts the tunnels power and lights for good measure.

Meanwhile, the Capitol building is subjected to a mass evacuation after Gabriel programs government computers to erroneously detect an Anthrax threat. Gabriel sends in a pseudo HazMat team, led by his unbelievably hot girlfriend, Mai Lihn, (played by Maggie Q - who should have a red chili pepper next to her name in the credits ‘cause she’s one sizzling Szechuan dish) into the “Woodlawn” building. Deep in the bowels of this place lie 3 super sized NSA computer servers where, in case of emergency, the entire nation’s financial data is temporarily stored. Gabriel creates utter civil panic by grounding all flights and disabling the cell phone and television satellites. With the authorities knee deep in shit, he’s free to siphon billions from the servers.

After Farrell predicts Gabriel’s next move, our heroes race to Middleton, Virginia’s utility power station to try and stop sexy Mai Lihn from cutting off the eastern sea board’s power supply. McClane and the kung fu cutie duke it out in the most brutal and bone crunching fight scene in the entire flick. But after the China doll’s gruesome death (I was sad to see her go and kept secretly wishing they would bring her back to life). Gabriel kidnaps his daughter Lucy and threatens to kill her if John doesn’t back the fuck off.

In the most hilarious scene in LFODH, Farrell and McClane burst into the basement sanctuary of uber cyber dude, “the warlock,” to get a fix on Gabriel’s location. Kevin Smith is in his element as the paranoid hermit geek laying low in a make shift command center under his mom’s house. Funny stuff. As is much of the witty banter throughout between Willis and Justin Long which rips mercilessly on the gap between the Walkman and the iPod generations.

Back to the story, a pissed off McClane hijacks an 18 wheeler and puts the petal to the metal after after Gabriel’s government van. Gabriel uses the “go code” protocols for an F-35 fighter jet patrolling the Washington skies to instruct the pilot to blow the shit out of McClane’s truck. And it does, laying waste to a freeway overpass and shredding the John’s big rig beyond recognition. The spectacular action finale is littered with top notch stunts and effects until Gabriel’s van screeches to a stop inside a runway hanger. He’s about to fly the coop when McClane crashes the party for a final good ol’ fashioned Wild West showdown.

Craggy faced man's man McTiernan isn't as sorely missed as director as I thought he would be and I have to begrudgingly pay respects to Len Wiseman for his solid direction. Yeah I liked the UNDERWORLD flicks but I'm easy pickings. Throw vamps and werewolves into anything and chances are I'm going to find a way to dig it (this excludes you, Stephen “Preppy Hack” Sommers.) With Wiseman it's just...I don't know...all this and Kate Beckinsale, too?! It's just not fucking fair.

What can I say about Bruce Willis? I'll start at the beginning. 20 years ago, I was convinced that Willis was THE COOLEST MAN ON THE PLANET! I mimicked his speech patterns. I wore wife beaters. I started carrying a fucking Zippo, for Christ’s sake! In the 2 decades that have passed, Willis and I have had our ups and downs. I have, at times, no...many times, taken him for granted. Other times, I've been extremely pissed that he wasted my time and money (STRIKING DISTANCE, HUDSON FUCKING HAWK, TEARS OF THE SUN ) but no matter how rocky things between us may be, we always make up and get back together when a new DIE HARD comes out. I LOVE THIS GUY IN THIS ROLE! John McClane is the backbone of the Willis oeuvre. It's the bedrock of the Willis appeal. And he seems to know it. Sure, you can bitch that DH or any long running franchise skews way heavy toward commerce over art but Willis doesn't skate. Just the opposite. Willis seems sharp and on his fucking game in LFODH.

On the downside, I could have done with less computer techno babble and as much as I enjoyed his partnership with Justin ‘I’m a Mac’ Long, I did sort of miss the Lone Wolf McClane mentality from the original. Oh, and much to my chagrin, no Bonnie Bedelia.

If you see this movie, it won’t change your life. But you’ll have a great YIPPEE-KAYEE MOTHERFUCKING TIME!

And now I fade back into the shadows…until I am needed again.

JackNanceRevenge

Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. Just got the heads up that there's a video interview of Bruce Willis by the one and only Kevin Smith up on Apple's quicktime site. They talk about DIE HARD 4 and name check AICN. What kind of backwards assed fucked up world is this where the manliest of action heroes ('80s and beyond) talks about interneting with a bunch of geeks like us?

Anyway, the interview is at the link below. Willis doesn't seem to want to talk much... but that could just be the result of the reality television-inspired editing of the interview. Smith is hilarious and it's pretty interesting that these two are some of the only celebrities that have come into the talkbacks directly to chat with the talkbackers and here they are talking about it as a piece of publicity for a huge summer tentpole movie... again, backwards assed world...

CLICK IT HERE YOU BLEEPIN' BLEEPERS!!!