W’s blag

Well, pretty much what I expected. It’s a Die Hard movie of course, a John McClane movie. Yipee-ki-yay motherfucker and all that. The plot this time revolves around computers, which of course gives room for much hillarity, Movie OS style.

What’s interesting is how close to realism the movie gets. Yes, most computer systems, even vital infrastructure, will have security flaws that can be exploited. But no, you can’t hire eight crackers to break into eight systems synchronized. Yes, some systems are closed, not hooked up to the internet. But why would an anthrax detection system in a federal building be hooked up so it could be cracked? And what struck me most; yes, there ARE people who would take it all down to prove the point, but NO, they’re not secretly just in it for the money. I sympatised with the badguy until that part. You only have to be a little more insane than me to take it to the level that character would; I’ve exploited security flaws to prove they exist, and to teach the ones that allowed them to exist a lesson. I would of course draw the line when actual people are hurt. But I can see how someone could cross that line, how they could, as the character in the movie states, do it “for the good of the nation”, “better I do it than some foreigner with bad intentions” etc. But then at the end they do a 180, and it’s revealed that it was all a plot to get at the money. I guess it follows the tradition of the previous Die Hard villains, but I think it cheapens this movie somewhat. A villain that would hurt you to prove a point is much more scary than one who’d do it for personal gain, and none of the information on the character indicates he was about anything other than proving a point.

As with most of Quentin Tarantino’s movies, this is a movie you’ll either hate, or love. It has nostalgia effects like jumps and repeats in segments of the movie, or abrupt cuts (as if part of the reel was missing), which is jarring at first. But it’s not random, but rather used for effect, as when the movie turns to poorly lit black and white in a bridge between two parts of the story that just emphasises the menace of the “Death Proof” car. The movie has some odd contrasts at times; practically every car is vintage, the music in the bar much of the first part of the movie is set it is from an old jukebox, and the mentioned nostalgia effects, give the impression that the movie is a couple of decades old, but then one of the characters drag up a modern mobile phone and starts SMS’ing, or the characters make a reference to some recent cultural phenomenon, and it sticks out. I liked the effect, but if you’re for consistency of atmosphere, you’ll probably hate it. As for the plot itself, there’s not much to it. Psychopath killer, and the trill of whether he’ll kill again, or be foiled in his plans. It doesn’t matter much, as with the hot women, silly culture references and jokes, car chases, and harsh-but-funny violence in classic Tarantino style, it’s very entertaining.