It's Christmas Eve, and there's an employee party in progress on the 30th floor of the Nakatomi Corporation building. New York City Detective John McClane becomes the only hope for a small group of hostages, one of whom is his estranged wife, trapped in a Los Angeles high-rise office building when it is seized by a group of terrorists headed by Hans Gruber, who plan to steal the 600 million dollars locked in Nakatomi's high-tech safe.
As a grand flourish of cinematic technique, it is awesome; as a human drama, it is disgusting and silly, a mindless depiction of carnage on an epic scale.
McTiernan, who directed last summer's Predator, composes the action cleanly and logically, making good use of Jackson DeGovia's elaborate post-modernist set-the building becomes something of a character in itself.
In the first half of Director John McTiernan's movie, Willis wears an undershirt. In the second half he gets rid of it. And that's pretty much it for his performance.
Die Hard is probably the most manipulative movie I've seen this year, but since it makes no bones about being manipulative and does it so well, this not only isn't a problem -- it's fun.