Time to curl up and Die

A Good Day To Die Hard
DIRECTED BY: John Moore
STARRING: Bruce Willis, Jai Courtney, Sebastian Koch, Yuliya Snigir
CERT: 15A

A Good Day To Die Hard will look great on a lot of CVs, mostly those of the stunt and technical crews, the lads who put together a wagonload of very impressive action scenes throughout the film.
Neither will it do any harm to the career of Jai Courtney, a decent young actor with the makings of a fine action star. If nobody paid him too much attention in TV’s Spartacus or the recent Tom Cruise turkey, Jack Reacher, they’ll be taking notice now.
These things aside, the movie is basically useless.
Getting word that his estranged, wayward son is in a spot of bother, veteran tough nut John McClane (Willis) goes all misty-eyed before catching a lift to the airport and departing for Russia with a lovingly stern warning from his daughter (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) not to go causing more trouble. An early reminder that the Die Hard movies have become a family-friendly experience.
In Moscow, Jack McClane (Courtney) is in the middle of a sensitive job and isn’t too happy when daddy-dearest shows up and destroys the operation. Turns out the boy is CIA and is trying to bust a political prisoner named Komarov (Koch) from the country, saving him from a bunch of government hatchet men who have a dangerous secret to protect. It involves Chernobyl and, well, in a movie that wasn’t otherwise so ridiculous, it might be an interesting notion.
All that matters here, though, is that father and son rekindle the family flame and these tough men work out their feelings and bond – talking out their issues in the midst of mayhem and mass murder. Because… well, just because.
It’s immensely foolish stuff, so foolish in fact, that at various points we are introduced to a dancing villain (Radivoje Bukvic) and a Mysterious Girl In Leather (Snigir) who rides a motorbike and who may or may not be one of the good guys.
That’s the level we’re at, the level to which Die Hard has fallen. By all accounts Mr Willis seems happy enough for that to continue, but anyone who remembers how good these movies used to be, will not be in a hurry to see the next one.

This Is 40
DIRECTED BY: Judd
Apatow
STARRING: Paul Rudd, Leslie Mann, Jason Segel, Melissa McCarthy
CERT: 15A

For a while here at this column, we’ve been pointing out the rapid decline in quality of the material coming from Judd Apatow’s production stable. Like a once-fine comedian, the more successful he (and his extended cast family) gets, the lazier his movies become. His latest is his worst yet.
This Is 40 is just one long whine, a whine that gets tiresome and grating after about five minutes of its long, long running time.
This whine is performed by Peter (Rudd) and Debbie (Mann), a handsome couple with a pair of fine young kids and a lovely house and a grand life – one which is now suddenly falling apart because they’re both turning 40. Well strike up the violins.
As a side note to being doomed simply by the calendar, their finances are also a bit messy. Her clothes shop is in trouble and his niche record label is barely hanging on. His rescue plan involves a new album by 70s rocker Graham Parker, whose return may be jeopardised by a dose of gout. It doesn’t look good for the family home.
Meanwhile they both have daddy issues. His (Albert Brooks) is too needy, hers (John Lithgow) has never been around. None of this adds anything to the film, except time and needless characters and someone else for the whining couple to blame for their woes. And indeed, someone to forgive. Because, well, as we learned in A Good Day To Die Hard, forgiving is healing.
Thankfully, in the midst of all this shallow nonsense, there are a few laughs to keep you from losing the will to go on. Melissa McCarthy provides the best of them in a too-brief appearance as a raging fellow parent.
The leading pair aren’t given anything to match that and neither are their many co-stars. Among those wasting their time are Jason Segel as a fitness trainer and Chris O’Dowd as Peter’s co-worker. This is a typical  Seth Rogen role, but O’Dowd doesn’t have the lines to make it memorable.
This Is 40 is billed as a sort of sequel to Knocked Up, which itself was a tad overrated back in the day. Compared with this, however, even that is starting to look like a classic.