Die Hard 2

"Die harder."

1990 2h 4m EN

👍

7.0

SOLID

🍅

68%

FRESH

👌

METACRITIC

⭐

7.2

IMDB

★7.0TMDB · 6,632🍅68%Rotten Tomatoes●67Metacritic★7.2IMDB · 405,542

ActionThriller

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

One year after his heroics in Los Angeles, John McClane is an off-duty cop who is the wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time. On a snowy Christmas Eve, as he waits for his wife's plane to land at Washington Dulles International Airport, terrorists take over the air traffic control system in a plot to free a South American army general and drug smuggler being flown into the US to face drug charges. It's now up to McClane to take on the terrorists, while coping with an inept airport police chief, an uncooperative anti-terrorist squad, and the life of his wife and everyone else trapped in planes circling overhead.

“Die harder.”

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Where to watch · US

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Cast

Bruce Willis
John McClane
Bonnie Bedelia
Holly McClane
William Sadler
Stuart
John Amos
Major Grant
Franco Nero
General Ramon Esperanza
William Atherton
Richard Thornberg
Dennis Franz
Capt. Carmine Lorenzo
Art Evans
Leslie Barnes

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Renny Harlin
Writers: Steven E. de Souza, Doug Richardson
Languages: English, Spanish
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Mid-budget at $70M — the now-extinct middle tier of Hollywood.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Made its money back 3.4× over at the box office.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

ERA

Did you know

36 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

Dialogue crosses 2 languages: English, Spanish.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

CINEMA

Did you know

Part of the "Die Hard Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

CAST

Did you know

390+ people credited in cast and crew — a small city's worth of labour.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Renny Harlin, shot by Oliver Wood. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Michael Kamen. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Renny Harlin directs. Oliver Wood behind the camera. Michael Kamen scores. Stuart Baird cuts. Made its budget back several times over at the box office. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English, Spanish.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Mid-budget at $70M — the now-extinct middle tier of Hollywood.
2Made its money back 3.4× over at the box office.
336 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
4Dialogue crosses 2 languages: English, Spanish.
5Part of the "Die Hard Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.
6390+ people credited in cast and crew — a small city's worth of labour.
7Directed by Renny Harlin, shot by Oliver Wood. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
8Original score by Michael Kamen. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
9Editor Stuart Baird shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
10Bruce Willis and Bonnie Bedelia and William Sadler carry the top of the cast.
11Marketing tagline: "Die harder.".
12IMDB entry: tt0099423 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
13Classified under 26 themes, including "helicopter", "airport", "based on novel or book", "ambush".
14Released under 12 different titles around the world.

The technical file

Cinematography: Oliver Wood
Original score: Michael Kamen
Editing: Stuart Baird
Production design: John Vallone
Makeup / hair: Jim Kail
VFX supervisor: Michael J. McAlister
Sound: Michael Jiron
Stunt coordinator: Charlie Picerni
Runtime: 124 min · 2h 4m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Budget: $70,000,000
Box office: $240,031,094
Return: 343% of budget
Original language: EN
Certification (US): R
IMDB: Die Hard 2 (1990)
Rotten Tomatoes: 68% 🍅 Fresh
Metacritic: 67/100
IMDB rating: 7.2/10 · 405,542 votes
MPAA: R

Awards

1 win & 1 nomination total

Part of

Die Hard Collection

An action film series centered around the character of John McClane, a New York City police detective who finds himself fighting a group of terrorists in each film.

Also by

Renny Harlin

Stills · wallpapers

Selected frames

Full-resolution frames — open one to save it as a wallpaper.

Wallpaper

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

talisencrw2016-08-13
★ 9/10
Great fun re-watching this after checking out the original for the first time. One of the very best filmic franchises out there, to be sure.
GenerationofSwine2023-01-12
★ 10/10
I was 10 in 1990, I loved Die Hard, and I hated Die Hard 2. Now I'm 40 and I am rewatching this and.... compared to movies today it is pretty good. If this was made in 2020 it would be a 10 out of 10 star smash blockbusting hit that all of America raves about except the "everything is political all the time crowd." But it didn't, it came out in 1990 and because of that it was a subpar sort of BS action movie that in no way lived up to the first one. The thing is... I'm writing the review in 2020. Today it's a good movie if you compare it to most everything in the theaters today and especially to the new Die Hard movies.
CinemaSerf2023-08-26
★ 7/10
If anyone were ever to need to write a training manual for terrorists that demonstrated how to maximise the chaos and destruction at a facility; then they could do a great deal worse than engage the services of Bruce Willis. In this cracking action adventure film, he is "Lt. John McClane" who finds himself amidst a hijacking - but this time it's not the plane that's being hijacked, it's the whole airport - and all so a drug-dealing general can escape justice with the help of some rogue highly trained military types. Willis has bags of charisma, and he needs it as he has to persuade sceptical authorities and other cops of the critical risk - and all before an incoming flight carrying his wife (with quite a fun little sub-plot of it's own) runs out of fuel. The dialogue is sometimes quite pithy, and Tom Bower is fine as "Marvin" (the janitor who gets roped in too). It does lack menace, maybe Willis' style of characterisation is just a bit too laid back; the smile and the glint - but it's still an end to end action thriller with plenty of pyrotechnics and near misses to fill a couple of hours in a world of mindless cinema. It's not quite as good at the first one, but there's not that much to it.