Die Hard(spoilers--a character analysis)

[Guest Copycatalyst]

This movie is full of the usual trope of unaccountable amounts of violence, the self-righteousness of the human spirit in its egofacades, and othersuch usual conventions seen in most of the movies that hit these states. However, it implicates a nice perspectivism that is comprehensive, and shows that all characters in the movie, from their ego-centric perspectives, are justified in their actions. In essence it creates a foil trinity of character archetypes, which play off of each other excellently: that of John MClane, Matthew Farrel, and Thomas Gabriel.

John MClane is justified in his actions by his eyes, because all he knows is violence and killing and all he knows is to be "the hero," which by necessity means nothing in the end, as he implicates; he lacks the intellect of the digital age (he is "a timeless watch in the digital age").

The Neo-facade character, Matthew Farrel, represents the perspective of many of this generation's youth, whom have realized the power of the internet and how much our country is beginning, and will be controlled, by computerized systems; Farrel is afraid of violence and wants merely a peacable solution to the various umatching perspectives of this era. Farrel realizes a comperehensive understanding of the world, understanding various perspectives, including MClane's, and their blatant fallibilities. This is exposed in the scene where Farrel discusses the fact that America is a culture of fear, and that the news is completely censored and governmentally controlled; Farrel is realizant of the fact that America, as it should be, is not what it is, and that it is cascading into a downward spiral due to its own ignorance.

Thomas Gabriel represents the Nietzschean [i]Ubermensch[/i], or overman, whom is rejected from its positions of power and its attempts to truly change the world. This character is the most complex of them all; it is easy to peg it as the evil man within the film. But if one listens closely to what Gabriel asserts, he was "crucified" in his federal position and the system he had designed was outcasted, and his entire reputation was ruined by the federals who run the entire show of America, so-to-speak. Due to this, this overman in essence committed its own suicide as genocidally as it could: to attempt to make the deepest mark possible. Thus Gabriel does what terrorists had only attempted so as to "do the world a favor" as he says, and speed up its change.

The comparison of Gabriel's cold nature and his thugs, whom do what he says regardless of their own positions, is of direct comparison to Hitler, whom built an entirety of "thugs" around him, called the nazis, and took Nietzsche's philosophy and distorted it beyond recognition.

In a more accepting world, Gabriel would not have had to assert the dichotomic role he puts himself in. But he does such completely on purpose, because he has nothing left to lose, and he cannot change the dichotomy of the world as it is then; so he figures he will attempt to change the state of America as much as is possible in his position of power. There is also a direct line of comparison to Gabriel's thugs to the federals running their government in a corrupt, [i]status quoic[/i] manner, and how their main net of power--that of military--merely does what it does with no consideration, as was seen when the jet-pilot merely, as a puppet, listened to the orders of his "superior" (whom was Gabriel acting the position of his superior), just as Gabriel's thugs do what he says without consideration.

Thus, Gabriel is not necessarily any more "evil" than anyone else in the film; it is merely the dichotomic fallacies within the perspectives adhered to by those in corruptible power, and the generation MCane himself represents--that of the baby boomers and of the brash conservatism which has swept current-day America. The Neo-facade character of Farrel represents the median, and cusp, between the [i]Ubermensch[/i] that is Gabriel, and the underman (as far as intellectuality, which is of course the main function of man, so thus is of more importance than physical barbarity) of MClane.

[Gavin]

[SIZE="1"]Just saw the film, good action flick, but to me it just didn't really feel like a Die Hard film, sort of the "red haired step-child" of the series, like Rocky Balboa. Visuals and explosions were top-notch, the story will keep you mildly interested, as will certain shots of Lucy McClane. Ending is predicable as with all Die Hards.[/SIZE]

[Andy]

[FONT="Garamond"][SIZE="2"]I haven't seen this movie yet, and I probably never will. I mean, don't get me wrong, I like the Die Hard movie's, but just not the new one. The only thing that really stopped me from seeing this movie was that Bruce Willis has just gotten too old. In my opinion, watching this movie would be like watching Andy Griffith doing a new episode of the Andy Griffith show in today's time. Seriously.[/SIZE][/FONT]