Seminar: Die Hard

Name: Seminar: Die Hard
Released: 2026-12-02
Duration: 3 h 27 min

<a href="https://amblertheater.org/faculty" style="text-decoration: none; color: rgb(142, 142, 142); transition: color 0.2s; font-family: arboria, sans-serif; font-size: 19px; cursor: pointer !important;">Taught by Paul McEwan, Ph.D. Professor of Media & Communication and Film Studies, Muhlenberg College</a> <div> </div><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">A Christmas movie can be a movie that: (a) has Christmas-y themes, (b) takes place around Christmas, or (c) becomes something that people traditionally watch during the holiday season. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:italic;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">Die Hard<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;"> (1988) now qualifies by at least two of these criteria, settling the debate about its status definitively, for all time. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">Of course, none of this was obvious when the film was released in the distinctly non-Christmas month of July, 1988, catapulting Bruce Willis from TV actor to Hollywood A-list action star, launching a major new franchise and fistfuls of quotable lines. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">The 1980s were good years for action cinema, and <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:italic;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">Die Hard<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;"> mastered all the tropes while blending enough elements of classic cinema to enrich the material. John McClane constantly quotes the golden-era Western heroes his character evokes, but this modernized protagonist is also not sure what it means to be a man in the 1980s, now that his wife has a fancy corporate job and no longer uses his last name. He has something to prove to her, to himself, and to the well-dressed terrorists several floors below. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">It is screenwriting gospel to make sure that your villain is a complete and compelling human being, and the great work of Jeb Stuart (<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:italic;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">The Fugitive<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">) and Steven E. de Souza (<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:italic;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">48 Hrs.<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">) is elevated even further by Alan Rickman (in his big-screen debut, no less), who takes the complexity of lead terrorist Hans Gruber and elevates him into the bad-guy pantheon. He’s a worthy foil to our hero, and that is a large part of what makes the film appealing nearly 40 years later. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">Adding to the fun we have an arrogant reporter, a slimy executive, a trusty cop sidekick, and enough explosions to light up the California sky at any time of year. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:italic;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;">Die Hard<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre;white-space:pre-wrap;"> is a rare film: a surprisingly complicated portrait of a changing country at a particular moment, and still a fabulously good time. PT3H27M2026-12-02Seminar: Die Hard"Seminar: Die Hard"

Showtimes

December 2, 6:30 pm