With Thanksgiving out of the way and the calendar soon to read December, the discussion of listing the best Christmas movies is back in the minds of many. On top of that, the annual Die Hard debate is in full swing, with swaths of social media claiming it is while others say it has nothing to do with Christmas whatsoever.
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Bruce Willis, the actor behind action heartthrob John McClane, says those who think Die Hard is a Christmas movie couldn’t be more wrong. “Die Hard is not a Christmas movie,” Willis exclaimed at his Comedy Central roast in 2018. “It’s a Bruce Willis movie so yippee-ki-yay to all you motherf–kers and good night!”
So, is Die Hard a Christmas movie?
Even though Willis says the action classic isn’t a Christmas movie, the director of the film says it absolutely is.
“Joel Silver sent me the script three, four times,” John McTiernan said in a 2020 interview. “And it was about these horrible leftist terrorists that come into the sort of Valhalla of capitalism, Los Angeles, and they bring their guns and their evil ways and they shoot up people just celebrating Christmas, terrible people, awful. And it was really about the stern face of authority stepping into put things right again, you know? And I kept saying to Joel, I don’t want to make that.”
He added, “In fact, everybody, as they came to work on the movie began to get, as I said, this idea of this movie as an escapee. And there was a joy in it. Because we were, we’ve had changed the content. And that is how Die Hard became, we hadn’t intended it to be a Christmas movie, but the joy that came from it is what turned it in to a Christmas movie. And that’s really the best I can tell you about it.”
Die Hard is now streaming for free on Tubi.
