"Die Hard" is a Christmas movie (unfortunately)

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Welcome to the party, pals …

It’s a part of life. Every once in a while, if you want to be honest, you have to give credit to someone you absolutely loathe.

The good news is they’ll let you get back to hating them soon enough. Ron DeSantis bowled over Florida’s progressives early in his gubernatorial tenure with moves to protect the state’s natural beauty. He lost a bit of that shine when he floated a plan to sell parkland to hotel developers. His early eco-efforts became a distant memory when he opened a concentration camp in the Florida Everglades.

Donald Trump’s laudable qualities frequently come neatly packaged with his failings. He deserves credit for the development of the COVID-19 vaccine, and he did send Americans more money during an uncertain period, but he also allowed the pandemic to spiral out of control in the first place. He’s a born entertainer with a knack for melodic and funny phrases, but he uses that gift to promote locking up his enemies and attacking minority groups.

In that same spirit of grace, knowing full well that they’ll quickly provide a new reason to despise them, I’d like to admit something here: the people who claim “Die Hard” is a Christmas movie are right.

It brings me no joy to admit it. These are the same type of guys (and they’re almost always guys) who get a little thrill out of telling people that John Lennon was an abuser. They’ll tie you up in interminable and unyielding debates about the definitions of a sandwich. Their contributions are a flex, meant to show their off-the-rack outsider way of thinking. Once their contribution has been weighed, the conversation always collapses under the weight of self-satisfaction. They are the worst, and they’ve taken on the mantle of the bloody blockbuster in recent decades as a way to derail conversations that are ultimately about warmth, family, memory and home.

Their argument boils down to one simple fact: “Die Hard” is set at Yuletide. And you can’t fault director John McTiernan for this. The imagery of Christmas is universally serene. The all-encompassing quiet of a snow-blanketed early morning. Chestnuts roasting on an open fire (digital or otherwise). Interrupting those silent nights with the sound of explosions and cool catchphrases is a winning formula and the action cinema canon is better for him having discovered it. Just ask Shane Black.

But setting a movie at Christmas doesn’t make it a “Christmas movie.” The two words together mean something greater than the sum of their parts. A Christmas movie has to grapple with common themes: a celebration of winter, returning to or being apart from family and being able to make merry out of the sheer fact of being together.

As NYPD cop John McClane flies out to Los Angeles on Christmas Eve, it certainly doesn’t feel like “Die Hard” is going to hit the mark. That side of the San Gabriel Mountains is light on winter wonderlands. The fractured Gennaro-McClane household doesn’t bring to mind pairings like Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed. Bruce Willis plays McClane as a schlubby screw-up, the universal standard for nearly all Hollywood cops before 9/11.

Then something wonderful happens. Over the film’s two hours, we get a massive celebration of the season. McClane walks barefoot across broken glass to be reunited with his family. The people using the tie-loosening of the holidays to schmooze and score (Harry Ellis and Hans Gruber) get forcibly ejected from the movie and this mortal coil. The movie ends with a reunited familylooking forward to a New Year that is notably lighter on pseudo-terrorists while walking through a heavy snow of bearer bonds.

Those “Die Hard” boosters are correct for the wrong reasons. But this deep into the season of giving, I’ll go ahead and give them one full-throated “you’re right.” It’s all they ever really wanted.

PROGRAMMING NOTE: I’ll be making a trek back home to celebrate with my family next week. I’m hoping my Christmas will be lighter on automatic weapons and explosives than McClane’s. (It is Florida, so we’ll see.) You’ll still get your daily round-up of the best of Salon, just without any essays from yours truly. 

Happy holidays, y’all.

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