What is the greatest Christmas movie of all time? It’s a Wonderful Life? A Christmas Story? Jingle All the Way? Of course not. The greatest Christmas movie of all time is Die Hard.
Now, Die Hard is a typical, over-the-top, unrealistic action movie, but truly entertaining. Side note, gun handling in many modern movies has, indeed, become more realistic, as 80s movies like Die Hard are pathetically bad in this regard. Still, I presume most readers of this blog are fans of Die Hard. I recently watched this classic action flic again, probably the first time I have seen it in decades.
Did you know much can be gleaned from this movie as it relates to realistic self-defense? Yup. There is certainly nothing good to be learned from the gun handling in the movie, but there is much else that proves useful reflection concerning more psychological elements of personal protection and violence.
Body Language
I have written and discussed body language, and how it factors into victim selection or de-selection, numerous times in the past. This remains a pertinent topic that should be re-considered from time to time among those who are serious about personal protection. The way in which you carry yourself can be a draw, or deterrent, to criminal predation.
Die Hard has several characters that are played by actors who have also starred in numerous other, very different, roles. A good actor perfectly exemplifies an element of self-defense that is too often overlooked; The perceived demeanor of an individual has more to do with how one carries themselves than do actual physical attributes.
Consider the phenomenal, late, Alan Rickman, who starred in Die Hard as primary antagonist Hans Gruber. This is, undoubtedly, one of the most iconic villains in film history. Hans Gruber oozes intelligence, charisma, and brutal ruthlessness. As soon as he appears on set you know he is the bad guy, and you can tell he is very dangerous, just by the way he walks and carries himself. This mannerism is consistent throughout the film. He appears dangerous. Why?
Is the actor, Alan Rickman, particularly intimidating looking? You be the judge. Check him out in the epic chick-flic (is there such a thing?) Love Actually, where he plays a straight-forward office working yuppie who is on the verge of starting an affair. In this particular role, he looks like good victim material for a mugging, but if Hans Gruber walks down a dark alley, you think he would appear an ideal victim? It’s the same man. What, then, is the difference?
Also in Die Hard is the second-place antagonist, the not-so-lovable Karl. Dressed in black, tall, with long, blonde, hair and a perpetual scowl, Karl looks truly sociopathic, unpredictable, and imminently dangerous, right from the beginning. Yet, Alexander Godunov, the actor who plays Karl, is also capable of portraying a wide variety of personality types. In the movie Witness, starring Harrison Ford, Godunov plays the pacifist, Amish male who gets pushed around by bullies in one iconic scene of the movie. Hell, Godunov is actually a well-know ballet dancer! Can you picture Karl from Die Hard dancing Ballet? Well, here you go:
Good actors can portray timidity and weakness, or dangerous strength, and it rarely has much to do with their actual size or physical attributes. Consider, then, how you want to be perceived by those you interact with in the world. Now, obviously, you probably don’t want to walk around with a lunatic frown on your face and appear to be bursting with anger, as Karl does, but carrying one’s self with a cool confidence says a lot. This confidence comes from one’s own ability to be dangerous and use force, and this is derived through training. How you carry yourself is likely to keep you out of conflict more times than not.
They Are Not Like You
As the late, and tragically missed, William Aprill would say when referring to the criminal element, “they are not like you, they do not think like you.” Understanding that violent criminal actors place no value on human life is a hard pill for most people to swallow, and this denial keeps most from preparing to deal with such predators.
At the beginning of Die Hard, when the bad guys take over the Christmas party at Nakatomi Plaza, Hans Gruber says that they are about to “give the Nakatomi corporation a lesson in the real use of power.” Interestingly, throughout the movie we find the white-collar yuppies who are taken hostage unable to come to terms with the fact that Hans Gruber’s use of power is far different than their own. Being a well-respected attorney, investor, or some form of office life mogul means everything to these urbanites, but it means nothing to the dangerous criminal element. The real use of power, to the ruthless criminal actor, is violence to achieve one’s ends, with no regard for human life. Hans Gruber, despite his erudite charisma and superior intelligence, uses violence as his primary tool for obtaining his goals. They are not like you.
In this well-known scene, Mr. Nakatomi, the head of the development firm, does not realize that he is dealing with a very different kind of man from himself in Hans Gruber. Nakatomi thinks that power is being influential in business, and he makes the fatal mistake of thinking that he is dealing with a fellow rational actor who will endlessly negotiate business terms. When he states, “I guess you will just have to kill me,” he does not think that Gruber will, indeed, kill him right there on the spot because he still thinks that Gruber shares his values and perspective on life and transaction. Nakatomi should have, instead, stalled and strung Gruber along, buying time for a possible escape. They are not like you.
Further in the film, we find an even more stupid lapse in judgement coming from the entirely unlikable character Ellis, who decides to sell out the protagonist, John McClain, to Gruber. Ellis, once again, thinks that he is dealing with a soft-handed office space yuppie like himself. He says, “you use a gun, I use a fountain pen, what’s the difference?” this is typical of the exempt-from-reality world such people live in. Everything is morally relative. Ellis would, indeed, be fully behind the defund-the-police movement if Die Hard was filmed now, 36 years later.
Another trait that we find in Ellis is one that is consistent among left-leaning city dwellers; the idea that violence and protection is the job of the state, not of the individual. He whines, “the police are here now, John, let them handle it.” This mentality is the same as that which does not have a firearm in the home, thinking that when thugs kick down your own door the police will be riding to the rescue. Again, much to learn from here:
Opposite the pathetically naïve, individually weak, ideologically collectivist, Ellis, is the magnificent John McClain, who knows exactly how to deal with the Hans Grubers of the world, and he does so to devastating effect throughout the film with his Barretta 92, possibly the most popular pistol on the silver screen for that brief late 80s era. What is there not to love about this movie?
So, Die Hard is certainly the greatest Christmas movie of all time, but did you realize how full of insight the film is? You’re welcome.
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