Die Hard isn’t just one of the greatest action movies ever made, it also happens to be one of the best Christmas films of all time. But while John McClane set out the blueprint for many movies to follow, that doesn’t mean his cinematic antics are the be-all and end-all of action flicks.
In fact, there’s an argument to be made that many of the films that have followed in Die Hard’s footsteps over the three decades since have actually improved on the winning formula devised by writers Jeb Stuart and Steven e. de Souza and brilliantly realized by director John McTiernan.
Die Hard may have proven a difficult act for any movie to follow, but these efforts are all well worth seeking out. Each film offers a unique riff on the tried-and-tested formula, played out in Nakatomi Plaza all those years ago. Just take a look at these examples...
Air Force One
Harrison Ford took the Die Hard formula airborne for this brilliantly executed action thriller. Ford stars as President James Marshall, a decorated Vietnam Veteran and Leader of the Free World, who is forced into action after a group of Communist Soviet Radicals hijack Air Force One with him and his family on-board.
Director Wolfgang Petersen was the go-to filmmaker for intelligent, well-paced thrillers in the 1990s, having already made In The Line of Fire and Outbreak earlier in the decade and excelled again here. Credit also goes to Gary Oldman as the movie’s brilliantly malevolent Russian terrorist cell leader.
Sudden Death
Jean-Claude Van Damme re-teamed with Timecop director Peter Hymans for this sports-focused riff on Die Hard. Van Damme plays the McClane-esque Darren McCord, a former fireman tasked with foiling a group of terrorists holding not only the Vice President hostage, but everyone in attendance for the seventh game of the NHL Stanley Cup finals.
What Powers Boothe’s brilliant main villain Joshua Foss didn’t count on, however, was a high-kicking fireman spoiling his plans for revenge against his old bosses at the CIA. It may lack some of the wit of Die Hard but Sudden Death makes up for it with superior action set pieces.
Becky
2020 may not have been a great year for much in the world of movies and beyond but it did deliver this unique take on the Die Hard format. Emerging star Lulu Wilson wows as the titular Becky, a difficult teenager who finds her weekend away with her emotionally distant father disrupted by the arrival of a group of Neo-Nazi convicts lead by Kevin James in blistering form.
What they didn’t count on, however, was the Home Alone-esque traps and cunning of our heroine. A gruesome game of cat and mouse ensues.
The Rock
Michael Bay has never been better than with this Alcatraz-set take on the familiar one-man-army action flick. Except for this time, it’s a two-man army. Nicolas Cage plays Stanley Goodspeed, a geeky chemical weapons expert, who is forced to team up with Sean Connery’s John Patrick Mason, a former SAS operative and the only man to ever escape from the prison island.
Together they must foil a group of rogue marines, led by Ed Harris’s General Frank Hummel, who are holding a tour group hostage and threatening to launch missiles on San Francisco. Frantic, full-throttle action ensues.
Under Siege
Long before his descent into direct-to-dvd movies, Steven Seagal was busy giving John McClane a run for his money at the box office as Casey Ryback, the hard-as-nails ex-Navy Seal turned cook, who ends up taking on a group of terrorists hijacking a US battleship.
What makes Under Siege superior to Die Hard in one sense is the impressive double act of villains. Ryback goes up against the demented duoe of Tommy Lee Jones and Gary Busey, who both lead the bad guys to fine effect in this fun martial arts-based effort. It’s just a shame that Under Siege 2: Dark Territory ended up torpedoing the franchise.
Toy Soldiers
Die Hard meets Dead Poets Society in this fun action drama about an all-male boarding school that ends up being taken over by Colombian mercenaries.
Coming hot on the tail of The Goonies and quite a few years before The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Toy Soldiers sees a young Sean Astin star as Billy Tepper, a master prankster and schoolyard bad boy who ends up as the leader of the resistance against the South American terrorists. Featuring a fine supporting turn from Wil Wheaton as Billy’s best friend, Joey Trotta, this is a lighter but no less fun take on the magic formula.
Cliffhanger
Renny Harlin followed up directing Die Hard 2 with this John McClane on a mountain epic starring Sylvester Stallone. Stallone plays Gabe Walker, a mentally-scarred former mountain climber, who returns to the Colorado Rockies after a group of international thieves crash land on the snowy mountain tops.
They waste little time in taking Gabe’s old colleagues captive as they go looking for the $100 million buried somewhere nearby. Gloriously over the top and highly inventive in equal measure, Cliffhanger boasts a great array of bad guys, led by Jon Lithgow, who plays the psychotic ex-British military intelligence officer, Eric Qualen.
Passenger 57
Wesley Snipes was at the peak of his powers on Passenger 57, another Die Hard on a plane riff that remains entirely watchable today. Much of that has to do with Snipes’s magnetic performance as John Cutter, a former anti-terrorism expert who is forced to take matters into his own hands after the plane he boards bound for Los Angeles is taken over by terrorists.
Originally intended as a vehicle for Clint Eastwood, Passenger 57 benefits from Snipes’s energy, charisma, and impressive physicality as well as Bruce Payne’s tongue-in-cheek turn as the main villain, Charles Rane.
The Raid
More than 20 years on from Die Hard’s release, filmmakers were still finding fresh takes on the tried and tested path laid out by John McClane all those years ago. This Indonesian-set action effort might just be the pick of the bunch.
Written and directed by Welsh filmmaker Gareth Evans, events center on a doomed SWAT team, forced to do battle with a mobster and his merciless army of thugs across a dilapidated tenement building.
Featuring star-making turns from Joe Taslim and, in particular, Iko Uwais, this is pure, unadulterated action, with little let-up in the bullets or bloodletting once it gets going.
Con Air
Made during a dizzying two-year spell in which Nicolas Cage also starred in The Rock and Face/Off, Con Air is arguably the craziest and most fun of the bunch. Cage plays the majestically mulleted Cameron Poe, a soon-to-be-released convict who winds up sharing a flight home with some very bad criminals.
Criminals like John Malkovich’s scheming psychopath, Cyrus ‘the virus’ Grissom, the sadistic ringleader of a gang of not so much characters but rather a series of stereotypes that haven’t aged all that well. In any case, Cyrus soon takes over the flight, prompting Poe into glorious action. It all makes for quite the adventure.