It’s been twelve years since the last instalment, but Die Hard just doesn’t seem to die. And it shouldn’t. It’s got four times the action, four times the racy dialogues and a big huge complicated plot. And watching the battle-scarred Bruce Willis dodge bullets, falling cars and zooming cement blocks is worth every penny.
The story is a mish-mash of the article ‘A Farewell to Arms’ by John Carlin and the usual Die Hard-ish plotline, along with a few original characters by Roderick Thorp thrown in. John McClane (Willis) gets tangled up in an FBI investigation involving a madman (Olyphant) who’s systematically shutting down the United States through the Internet. With amateur hacker Matthew Farrell (Long) as a reluctant partner, McClane takes down the baddies one-by-one, while saving the US from doom.
Like all Die Hard movies, there’s action in every minute — blink and you’ll miss a building getting blown up, or a plane careening dangerously over a flyover.
 The best part is that the action is all real, with hardly any special effects. Watch out for the car-missile that takes down a helicopter — very slick.
Sweeping camerawork by Simon Duggan makes each gunshot and each hacking sequence spectacular, but the tight shots of the actors’ blood-stained faces are painful at times.
Acting-wise, there are no great talents to speak of. Willis and Long have a few taunts to throw at each other, Olyphant fails to look scary or mad — just confused. Maggie Q does nothing but kick people and pretend to be a telephone operator. Waste of an actor. Watch out for Mary Elizabeth Winstead as the next-generation McClane, she’s a delight.
All said, Die Hard 4.0 is only about the action and Bruce Willis, and for the loyalists it is paisa vasool.