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But it’s not just not ‘A Good Day To Die Hard’ because of this being such a poor film.
And that reason is that, two days before the film was released in cinemas, the BBFC revealed it would be rated ’12A’. Yes, this is a version of John McClane that will be available for all children to see, of any age, as long as they’re accompanied by an adult. This is NOT what was expected from a Die Hard film. (Mark Kermode also had a lot to say on this subject, on this video. )
Back in 1990, Die Hard 2: Die Harder had cuts aplenty to get it down from an 18 to a 15, simply to put more bums on seats, a practice that has spread throughout the industry ever since. It eventually came out as an 18-certificate widescreen video, and subsequently on DVD and Blu-ray, but the cuts involved ‘smudging’ some sounds of f-words as if the microphones had distorted at the time of filming.
1995’s Die Hard With A Vengeance saw so many cuts to the violence that the infamous edits to the lift scene meant that what was left didn’t actually make sense. One minute, Bruce is standing amongst some cops and talking about the lottery, while the next minute he’s standing over a pile of dead bodies. Huh?
Only relatively recently did this version get an uncut version released on Blu-ray and DVD, but in the meantime, Fox accidentally (on purpose?) released what was basically a PG-cert version on DVD which was even more censored than the original cinema release.
In 2007, Die Hard 4.0 (aka ‘Life Free or Die Hard’, in the U.S.) appeared in a badly-censored 15-cert which not only cut out many of the f-words as well as the violence (this is the version which frequently appears on Channel 4), but also ripped apart McClane’s famous catch-phrase, so the f-word part of it was muted as he shot a gun through his own shoulder to dispatch with Timothy Olyphant as the baddie.
On DVD, you can buy the ‘Harder’ version of this film, which is how it should’ve been originally, yet the Blu-ray still remains censored, which is just stupid.*
(*Unless Fox have changed their minds with the 5-film compilation released at the same time as this title)
Surely, the barrage of complaints 20th Century Fox received about that would stop them doing it again? No.
Three days before the theatrical release, they announced that the fifth film in the franchise, A Good Day To Die Hard, would be a 12A certificate. This is pathetic, and it is the work of Fox, not the BBFC, who offered a 15-rated version to them, but as confirmed by the following…
The BBFC’s site states in the pre-cuts information:
- “During post-production, the distributor sought and was given advice on how to secure the desired classification. Following this advice, certain changes were made prior to submission.”
It goes on to say (and there are possible spoilers here):
- “A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD is the fifth film in the DIE HARD action franchise starring Bruce Willis as New York City cop John McClane. In this film McClane travels to Russia and joins forces with his son to foil a nuclear weapons heist. It is rated 12A for strong language and violence.
The film contains four uses of strong language (‘f**k’) and a partial use of ‘motherf***er’, the end of which has been cut short so the implied strong language is not heard in full.
Against a backdrop of explosions, car chases and the destruction of property, there are a number of scenes featuring shootings which occasionally show brief bullet impacts, but there is no focus on blood or injury. In scenes of hand-to-hand combat we see brief punches and kicks, impressionistic rifle butt blows and an implied, but unseen, neck break. Although there are some crunchy sound effects and incidental shots of the heroes with blood on their faces and clothes, no detail of injury is shown.
A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD also includes scenes of gun threat to the head and several brief shots of knife-blades as the heroes prepare to defend themselves. There are also passing references to ‘doing drugs’ and some mild innuendo.”
Check out my look at the extras on page 3.
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.