A West Coast-hating 'good guy with a gun' trying to get his nuclear family back - it's a conservative fantasy that liberals can't get enough of every holiday season
I think it’s easy to comprehend its popularity across the aisle if you simply leave politics at the door and just enjoy the movie for what it is: one of the greatest action movies of all time! If everything is viewed through the lens of politics I don’t see how anyone would enjoy anything!
All art is politics, whether people notice it or not. One of the jobs of art criticism is to reveal those politics to audiences who might have otherwise missed it. If I looked at my top 50 favorite films, I don't think more than one or two isn't politically motivated in some way. I mean, even STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE is. There are some exceptions, but even then they tend to still present some sort of social or spiritual conflict rather than a straight-ahead story with no meaning other than entertainment. DIE HARD has many, many opinions. Everything I described is on the screen. In a film as tightly plotted as it is, where every single minute leads to some sort of story development, it's hard to believe they were just the meaningless details that slipped through and I assigned erroneous value to.
I don’t disagree that there is (or can be) politics or messaging in all art, subtle or unsubtle. (Ghostbusters was described in an article as the most conservative movie of the 80s once and after reading the article i could see exactly the point the author of the article was making) But at the same time nothing about those movies to me was anything more than likable 3-dimensional interesting characters put into fantastical and entertaining situations. My internal reaction to Die hard was “wow what would I do if I were in that situation” not “who does John McClane vote for”
But I think you just identified the discrepancy here between what we're saying: "My internal reaction." Art is subjective. If you take only one dimension from it, that doesn't make it wrong. It just makes it yours. You can watch any of Shakespeare's plays and have a great time. But there's a whole other side of them that you can learn more about. Nobody would ever say, "Hamlet is just a play." A movie is not just a movie. At least not anything I watch.
Here’s how DH came into my life. Bruce Willis was a tv star on a weird adult show on ABC. Word was he was gonna be in some kinda Arnold like action flick. Then the film debuts. Unexpectedly it was a huge hit. I was 12. It was 88. It was summer.
We had to see this.
By this point in the decade we -all of my under 17 year old friends had saw all the rated R action flicks (and raunchy comedies).
Without our parents knowledge. Being the 80’s this was routine.
So we knew the drill. Go to a busy movie theater buy whatever kid appropriate ticket for some PG13 film.
Make sure it starts a half hour before DH (this was done well into the film’s run as to not be in a sold out theater) boom 15 minutes into the fake film we copped tickets, exit that theater and then just walk into Die Hards theater.
So here we are a bunch of kids from Brooklyn sneaking into theaters in the city in the summer.
That’s why the film has never been a Christmas movie.
None of my friends have ever made that point. We saw the film with shorts on and hoping to get home to see Doc and Darryl get busy for the Mets.
I’ve said for years it’s millennials who see it as a Christmas movie.
Those of us alive to be conscious of it saw it when it dropped.
Wasn’t any need to make it into something it wasn’t.
It was a classic summer blockbuster film.
Side note my junior high (IS 211) played the film the next year during graduation rehearsals. In New York school ends last week of June.
I associate DH with Christmas as much as I would the moon for my home.
It’s not to say you can’t or shouldn’t point political messaging out (as you see it) it just feels counter productive to follow-up with “how can liberals enjoy this movie too?” It almost comes across as a judgement on someone for enjoying something (which I know isn’t your intention but did have that wet blanket feel to it) either way - I enjoy your content and your viewpoint even if I don’t align 100% with it in this case
I'm Left of most progressives and I enjoy the hell out of the film and many others that also offend my ideals, which is the point that I made at the end. I'm not asking how Liberals can enjoy the film, because I'm one of them. It's why the film is such a Christmas miracle. Unlike most Christmas movies which are about socialist/communist ideas of wealth redistribution and caring for your fellow man that conservatives enjoy despite their messages, this one is a film with a very conservative message that liberals eat up. I think that's a very valid point to make. I also don't really give any mind to whether I convince anyone of anything here. I just want them to think about art in different ways, that's the end of my agenda. I'd be fine if 99% of readers disagreed with me about DIE HARD as long as it got them thinking about DIE HARD in some way they hadn't before.
I think it’s easy to comprehend its popularity across the aisle if you simply leave politics at the door and just enjoy the movie for what it is: one of the greatest action movies of all time! If everything is viewed through the lens of politics I don’t see how anyone would enjoy anything!
All art is politics, whether people notice it or not. One of the jobs of art criticism is to reveal those politics to audiences who might have otherwise missed it. If I looked at my top 50 favorite films, I don't think more than one or two isn't politically motivated in some way. I mean, even STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE is. There are some exceptions, but even then they tend to still present some sort of social or spiritual conflict rather than a straight-ahead story with no meaning other than entertainment. DIE HARD has many, many opinions. Everything I described is on the screen. In a film as tightly plotted as it is, where every single minute leads to some sort of story development, it's hard to believe they were just the meaningless details that slipped through and I assigned erroneous value to.
I don’t disagree that there is (or can be) politics or messaging in all art, subtle or unsubtle. (Ghostbusters was described in an article as the most conservative movie of the 80s once and after reading the article i could see exactly the point the author of the article was making) But at the same time nothing about those movies to me was anything more than likable 3-dimensional interesting characters put into fantastical and entertaining situations. My internal reaction to Die hard was “wow what would I do if I were in that situation” not “who does John McClane vote for”
But I think you just identified the discrepancy here between what we're saying: "My internal reaction." Art is subjective. If you take only one dimension from it, that doesn't make it wrong. It just makes it yours. You can watch any of Shakespeare's plays and have a great time. But there's a whole other side of them that you can learn more about. Nobody would ever say, "Hamlet is just a play." A movie is not just a movie. At least not anything I watch.
Here’s how DH came into my life. Bruce Willis was a tv star on a weird adult show on ABC. Word was he was gonna be in some kinda Arnold like action flick. Then the film debuts. Unexpectedly it was a huge hit. I was 12. It was 88. It was summer.
We had to see this.
By this point in the decade we -all of my under 17 year old friends had saw all the rated R action flicks (and raunchy comedies).
Without our parents knowledge. Being the 80’s this was routine.
So we knew the drill. Go to a busy movie theater buy whatever kid appropriate ticket for some PG13 film.
Make sure it starts a half hour before DH (this was done well into the film’s run as to not be in a sold out theater) boom 15 minutes into the fake film we copped tickets, exit that theater and then just walk into Die Hards theater.
So here we are a bunch of kids from Brooklyn sneaking into theaters in the city in the summer.
That’s why the film has never been a Christmas movie.
None of my friends have ever made that point. We saw the film with shorts on and hoping to get home to see Doc and Darryl get busy for the Mets.
I’ve said for years it’s millennials who see it as a Christmas movie.
Those of us alive to be conscious of it saw it when it dropped.
Wasn’t any need to make it into something it wasn’t.
It was a classic summer blockbuster film.
Side note my junior high (IS 211) played the film the next year during graduation rehearsals. In New York school ends last week of June.
I associate DH with Christmas as much as I would the moon for my home.
It’s not to say you can’t or shouldn’t point political messaging out (as you see it) it just feels counter productive to follow-up with “how can liberals enjoy this movie too?” It almost comes across as a judgement on someone for enjoying something (which I know isn’t your intention but did have that wet blanket feel to it) either way - I enjoy your content and your viewpoint even if I don’t align 100% with it in this case
I'm Left of most progressives and I enjoy the hell out of the film and many others that also offend my ideals, which is the point that I made at the end. I'm not asking how Liberals can enjoy the film, because I'm one of them. It's why the film is such a Christmas miracle. Unlike most Christmas movies which are about socialist/communist ideas of wealth redistribution and caring for your fellow man that conservatives enjoy despite their messages, this one is a film with a very conservative message that liberals eat up. I think that's a very valid point to make. I also don't really give any mind to whether I convince anyone of anything here. I just want them to think about art in different ways, that's the end of my agenda. I'd be fine if 99% of readers disagreed with me about DIE HARD as long as it got them thinking about DIE HARD in some way they hadn't before.