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Review
Archives
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Today's
Date is:
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Die
Hard – Five Star Collection
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Reviewed
by: |
Brad
Tobin |
| Genre: |
Action/Thriller |
| Video: |
Widescreen
anamorphic - 2.35:1 |
| Audio: |
English
(DTS) |
| Language: |
English.
French |
| Subtitle: |
English.
Spanish |
| Length: |
2
hr 12 minutes |
| Rating: |
R |
| Release
Date: |
July
10, 2001 |
| Studio: |
20th
Century Fox |
| Commentary:
|
Yes.
Scene-specific audio commentary with director John McTiernan
and production designer Jackson DeGovia. Screen-specific audio
commentary with visual effects producer Richard Edlund. Subtitle
commentary with cast and crew. |
| Documentaries:
|
None |
| Featurettes:
|
Promotional
featurette |
| Filmography/Biography:
|
None |
|
Interviews: |
On
the promotional featurette |
| Trailers/TV
Spots: |
3
Theatrical trailers and 7 TV spots |
| Alternate/Deleted
Scenes: |
Yes.
Extended branching version with additional "power shutdown"
scene edited seamlessly back into the film. Deleted and extended
scenes. |
| Music
Video: |
None
|
| Other:
|
2
Disk set. THX Certified. Interactive Menus. Full-length screenplay.
Interactive slide show. Interactive magazine articles. "The
Cutting Room" workshop: gives you the ability to re-edit and
re-mix scenes. "From The Vault" deleted scenes, outtakes and
newscast footage. DVD-ROM Features: Complete screenplay with
scene access. Game demos. |
| Cast
and Crew: |
Bruce Willis.
Alan Rickman |
| Screenplay
by: |
Written by:
Jeb Stuart and Steven E. De Souza |
| Produced
by: |
Lawrence Gordon and Joel
Silver |
| Directed
By: |
John McTiernan |
| Music: |
Michael Kamen |
| The
Review: |
John McClane
is a New York cop on a trip to California in an attempt to patch
up his marriage. He arrives at the Californian high rise where
his wife works, but unfortunately a group of terrorists also
arrive and they take control of the building. They have everyone
locked up on the 30th floor, that is, everyone but McClane,
who makes it his duty to be the fly in the ointment. John single-handedly
takes on this small army of terrorists, will he come out victorious,
that’s for you to answer. (Keep in mind, there are two sequels
and rumors of another on the way) “Die Hard” is the mother of
modern action and, in my opinion, the greatest film of all time.
I have watched the film literally hundreds of times and it never
bores me. It is the one perfect film that has ever been made,
the only film that I cannot find fault with. It was the first
film to ever have the power to make me sit for two hours without
blinking, and to this date, no other film has that power. Bruce
Willis makes the character a thoroughly real person, he gives
the penultimate “one man army” performance, making John a fully
developed, 3D character, not just your average “against the
odds” hero. Alan Rickman shows what being a classy villain is
all about, he brings Shakespearian depth to his role and he
gives the performance of his career. The production, the directing,
the script… All spot on. Everything in the film paved the way
for the action genre. The storyline, the good guy, the bad guy,
all of it has been redone over and over again (Die Hard on a
Plane “Passenger 57” and “Air Force One”, On a Boat “Under Siege”
and “Speed 2”, even In a Hockey Rink “Sudden Death”), but none
have bested the original. McTiernan really seems to have wanted
to make the Ultimate action movie, as far as I’m concerned…
He most certainly has. |
| Image
and Sound |
This is
the 5th version of “Die Hard” That I have purchased in my lifetime,
it is also the ultimate version. Unless some long lost alternate
ending turns up somewhere, it ain’t going to get much better.
Released along with “Die Hard 2: Die Harder” and “Die Hard With
A Vengeance” in 1999, the first DVD version of “Die Hard” looked
as good as DVD could look at that time. All previous video versions
of the film always exhibited a slightly worn out look that 20th
Century Fox seemed to have corrected with the DVD. The only
problem was that the transfer wasn't anamorphic. But now, two
years later, Fox has improved upon that original DVD ten fold,
with a brand new anamorphic transfer that blows all the other
Die Hard disks out of the water. Colors are vibrant with natural
looking flesh tones and no over saturation, while blacks are
deep and solid. Jan DeBont's top-notch photography shows the
visual flare he exhibited much later in his directorial efforts
“Speed” (Or Die Hard on a Bus), “Twister” and “The Haunting”.
Also, being a DVD, you get picture perfect pause, so I challenge
you to spot faults in the gunfire and squib use (Hollywood talk
for the blood bags that substitute for bullet wounds). Like
he did with “Predator”, McTiernan reached unparalleled levels
of realistic violence that looks flawless even under the scrutiny
of perfect pause (There was only one point where I caught the
squib cap flying off, see if you can spot it). Presenting the
soundtrack on this DVD in both Dolby Digital (at 448kbps) and
DTS (at 754kbps), the DVD does a great job improving the soundtrack.
Michael Kamen's grandiose score pours from every speaker with
a lush presence that still brought chills. In addition to the
Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 tracks, 2.0 surround tracks are included
in English and French, with subtitles in English and Spanish
and Closed Captioning in English. It is also important to note
that all of the added features in widescreen are anamorphic.
|
| The
Extras |
“Die Hard”
fans rejoice as all our Christmases have come at once. 20th
Century Fox have been very kind to us in the extra features
department. Last year, Fox created a new line of special edition
DVD’s to honor films they felt worthy of lavish treatment that
would be second to none. "The Five-Star Collection" has, after
only a few titles, already established itself as a true benchmark
of the format. Die Hard is the newest title to receive the Five-Star
treatment and it's hard to deny that it is absolutely worth
the wait. First off, we get an extended branching version of
the film that restores the "Power Shutdown" scene deleted from
the original film. In a great idea and something I'd like to
see Fox do more often, as the scene is actually seamlessly edited
back in (unlike “X Men” when there is severe loading time).
The footage is presented in anamorphic widescreen, yet you will
notice a single shot that appears in black and white because
the effects were never finished. The other features on disk
one are the commentaries and a script to screen feature accessible
by those with DVD-ROM drives, we are also treated to awesome
menus on both disks which allow you to navigate your way around
the Nakatomi Plaza rooftop. On disk two, the first stop is "From
the Vault," where you'll find a few interesting items. The Outtakes
are actually broken into two, the first is the deleted scene
that is included on disc one via the seamless branching feature.
The second section is for The Vault, a collection of deleted
footage, bloopers and alternate takes. You can watch this montage
of clips either with production audio and music or with production
audio only. Running time of The Vault is just over six minutes.
Another eight minutes of alternate takes and bloopers are found
with the collection of Newscasts. These are the full-frame VHS
recordings of some of the news footage shot for the film to
be played back on different TVs within the film. Also in the
same section are the reprintings of two 1988 magazine articles.
Richard Edlund is the primary focus of both the American Cinematographer
and Cinefex articles contained here, and both include pictures
that can be highlighted to get closer looks at his work and
additional information. Next we go into "The Cutting Room,"
where you'll find items of a more technical nature to stimulate
your senses. The first is a scene-editing workshop that allows
you to cut your own short scene based on shots you choose. When
you go in, there are three short scenes to choose from. After
viewing three different takes for each shot (sometimes containing
different dialog) you choose the take that you want. After all
of the shots have been decided, the player will cut them together
for you seamlessly and allow you the opportunity to cut your
own short scene from Die Hard. This is an awesome feature, pulled
off better here than it was in the “Men in Black – Limited Edition”
DVD. Next up in the cutting room is Multi-Camera Shooting. A
short paragraph explains that sometimes scenes are filmed from
more than one angle for a variety of purposes ranging from cost
to safety or just to capture the spontaneity of the actors.
With this feature, you can select one of several angles to see
three different shots from the film. Using the angle button
on the remote will change cameras and also offer information
on the lenses used for the shot on screen. This is a feature
I hadn't seen before and is certainly unique. The Cutting Room
also includes Audio Mixing, which gives you the opportunity
to mix the dialog, music and effects levels for a scene from
the film to your taste. Each of the three options can be set
to off, low or high and after you've made your selection, the
scene plays out based on the levels you've chosen. The “Why
Letterbox?” segment attempts to answer that same question with
probably the best visual explanation I've ever seen, they actually
pan and scan a scene from the film to show why the practice
should never be considered an acceptable form of transferring
films to video. Show this one to the friends and parents who
don't like widescreen and they'll have little to argue about
without sounding unintelligent! The final area of the cutting
room is a thorough glossary of technical film terms. One of
the best features of the set is the Interactive Slide Show.
This is a moving montage of stills set to score that gives an
insider's look at the making of Die Hard. The best part is,
when the Nakatomi logo appears in the lower right hand corner,
hit enter and you will be taken to addition material on that
still. This ranges from blueprints of sets and vehicles to test
footage and additional deleted scenes. Just how much is in there?
Let's just say it took me thirty minutes to get through a nine-minute
still montage. This is definitely one of the best parts of the
disc. The entire script is also included in DVD-Video form for
people without DVD-ROM drives. Interestingly, there are quite
a few different lines and situations presented in the original
script that either didn't make it to the final cut or were changed
before shooting. Within the Ad Campaign section you'll find
three theatrical trailers, seven TV spots and the original seven-minute
promotional featurette that was included on the previously released
DVD. The final feature of the set is DVD-ROM features including
game demos and weblinks. Now, if you are still not satisfied…
Give me your name and address and I will personally come to
your house and beat some sense into you. |
| Commentary |
Director
John McTiernan and production designer Jackson DeGovia give
a screen-specific audio commentary. The two men have not been
recorded together, but a fair amount of effort has gone into
editing the two into a cohesive whole. McTiernan focuses on
the overall production and the cast and crew while DeGovia explains
in detail the look of the film from a design standpoint. The
track can be a bit dry at times as McTiernan isn’t the most
excitable guy on earth, but I've been waiting the best part
of two decades to hear a commentary for this film and I wasn’t
about to let a little thing like that spoil my time. A second
scene-specific audio commentary features special effects supervisor
Richard Edlund. This one is labeled "scene-specific" because
Edlund doesn't speak throughout the entire movie, only during
sections where his opinions are warranted. The disc includes
chapter listings detailing where to find his comments. Edlund
is quite informative and I'm glad that Fox didn't try to milk
a feature length commentary out of him. A third "commentary"
also included is the subtitle commentary by various cast and
crew. This track appears as a written subtitle throughout the
film with transcribed comments from participants including screenwriter
Steven E. DeSouza, supervising sound editor Stephen Hunter Flick,
composer Michael Kamen, producer Lawrence Gordon, actor Alan
Rickman, analysis by film journalist and historian Eric Lichtenfeld
and several others. The comments move fairly quickly, yet not
to fast that you miss anything, and are quite informative. All
in all, these three commentaries alone add up to hours of fun
for Die Hard connoisseurs and hours of boredom for the Uninitiated.
|
| Final
Words: |
A perfect
film gets a perfect DVD release. “Die Hard – Five Star Edition”
is to Die Hard fans what the Holy Grail is to Indiana Jones
father. Action fans rejoice, McClain is back, in the DVD he
so richly deserves. |
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