FAQ

When NYPD detective John McClaine (Bruce Willis) learns that his estranged son Jack (Jai Courtney) is being held in a Russian prison, he travels to Moscow to lend a hand, arriving just in time to see the Draganskiy Courthouse bombed and his son escaping with political prisoner Yuri Komarov (Sebastian Koch), who claims to have a file containing evidence against corrupt Russian official Viktor Chagarin (Sergey Kolesnikov). Certain that his wayward son is up to no good, John is surprised to find out that Jack is actually a CIA operative, and the two team up to find the hidden Chagarin file.

Although some of the characters were introduced in the novel Nothing Lasts Forever (1979) by American writer Roderick Thorp, the screenplay for A Good Day to Die Hard was written by American screenwriter Skip Woods. It is the fifth movie in the Die Hard series, preceded by Die Hard (1988) (1988), Die Hard 2 (1990) (1990), Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995) (1995), and Live Free or Die Hard (2007) (2007).

Astute viewers will notice that in the original Die Hard movie, when Holly calls her house and a young Lucy McClane answers, you see a young boy playing on the floor behind her. Then in the family portrait that Holly has on her desk, you see both children again. In each subsequent film, it is mentioned by John or Holly that there are at least two children. Finally, in Live Free or Die Hard, John's son is mentioned by name for the first time—Jack.

A Good Day to Die Hard was released with an R-rating, which meant that there was not the expectancy of an uncensored home cinema release as had been the case with its predecessor. However, probably due to the bad reviews the movie had gotten, shortly after the cinema release it was announced that John Moore was working on a Director's Cut including plot extensions and a 30 percent longer chase. This "Extended Harder Cut", however, is only available on the Blu-ray disc release. The extended cut mostly differs from the theatrical Version in two aspects: On the one hand, Mary Elizabeth Winstead as John's daughter Lucy is missing completely. The scene at the beginning in which she drives him to the airport was completely removed and during the car chase the shots of John using a phone and were removed as well as any audio bits of their talk. The ending also offers an alternative solution and does not feature a family reunion. Whoever is not interested in the whole family business might welcome these changes. However, when John talks to Komarov in the 40th minute, he still at least mentions that he has a daughter. Additionally, the chase through the streets of Moscow was extended significantly. In the end, 30 percent more was a bit exaggerated, but several small shots and one long one were added and lengthen the scene quite a lot. It has to be said though that these shots do not include anything really worth mentioning, nothing too spectacular is happening. Then there are also several insignificant extensions that mostly are restricted to something like "person X walks around a bit longer".