---
title: "Die Hard 2"
year: 1990
kind: "film"
canonical: "https://film.one/film/die-hard-2"
fi1m_score: 70
critics_score: 76
critics_reviews: 11
published: "2026-09-19T16:06:55.300266+00:00"
updated: "2026-09-19T16:07:04.626206+00:00"
region: "US"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Die Hard 2 (1990)

Directed by Renny Harlin · 2h 04m · MPA R · Action, Thriller

**Fi1m score: 70** · Critics 76 from 11 reviews

*In a sentence:* McClane gets an airport, a blizzard and twice the explosions, and misses Alan Rickman as much as we do

> Renny Harlin swaps the tower block for an airport and the battle of wits for a blizzard of explosions. It is fast, well built and good fun, and it never finds a villain worth Bruce Willis’s trouble.

## Synopsis

Christmas Eve, Washington. Off-duty New York detective John McClane (Bruce Willis) waits at Dulles International Airport for his wife Holly (Bonnie Bedelia), whose plane from Los Angeles is circling in a snowstorm. Two men in the terminal look wrong to him; he follows them into the baggage tunnels and comes out with a corpse and no thanks from the airport police captain, Carmine Lorenzo (Dennis Franz). Meanwhile a team of former soldiers led by Stuart (William Sadler) seizes control of the airport’s runway lights and radios from a church nearby, leaving tower chief Trudeau (Fred Thompson) and engineer Leslie Barnes (Art Evans) blind. They want General Ramon Esperanza (Franco Nero), a Latin American strongman being flown in to stand trial, landed and set free. Overhead, Holly’s plane has fuel for only so long.

## Review

John McTiernan’s [*Die Hard*](https://film.one/film/die-hard) kept its hero in one building. Renny Harlin, taking over for the sequel, has been handed an airport, a blizzard and roughly twice the explosives, and he uses all of them. *Die Hard 2* puts John McClane back in trouble on Christmas Eve, at Dulles in Washington, while his wife’s plane circles overhead in the snow, and it knows exactly what it is: the same thing again, louder. It is fast, well built and good fun for 124 minutes, and about half as clever as the film it copies. If the first one is yours, this is worth an evening. Do not expect to remember much of it by Boxing Day.

Steven E. de Souza and Doug Richardson’s script, from a novel by Walter Wager, sets a team of former soldiers under a man called Stuart to seize the airport’s landing systems and free a general being flown in for trial. The writers know the first film as well as we do and let McClane say so; his complaint about the same thing happening to the same guy twice is the best joke in the picture and also a confession. Obstructive local cop, smug reporter, wife in danger, crawling through ducts: all present, all a size larger. The film mostly gets away with it because it moves too fast to be caught.

Oliver Wood shoots the whole thing at night in falling snow, and it is the film’s best decision. The runways are black, the lights amber and blue, and every explosion has a white backdrop to bloom against. John Vallone’s production design gives the villains a church annex full of monitors and the control tower the look of a room that has been worked in for years. Michael Kamen, who scored the original, brings back his sleigh bells and low brass and adds a carol. Stuart Baird and Robert A. Ferretti cut the fistfights hard and quick; when Harlin drops into slow motion for the bigger stunts, which he does more than once, the energy runs out of the frame until he stops.

Willis is why it works as well as it does. He plays McClane as a man who is cold, tired and faintly embarrassed to be doing this again, and he apologises to the people he inconveniences, which is funnier than most of the written jokes. We laughed more than we expected to in the baggage tunnels, and it was his face that did it, not the lines: a man hitting someone while plainly wishing he were somewhere warm with a drink. Bonnie Bedelia has less to do than last time, stuck in a seat beside William Atherton’s Richard Thornberg, the reporter from the first film, and plays it as a woman quietly reconsidering the marriage.

The trouble is who he is fighting. William Sadler’s Stuart is introduced exercising naked in a hotel room, a good joke and the last interesting thing about him. Sadler is cold, tidy and quick, but the script gives him orders to bark and nothing to want beyond the job, and the memory of Alan Rickman’s Hans Gruber hangs over every scene. Franco Nero’s General Ramon Esperanza is a cigar and an accent. Dennis Franz, as the airport police captain Carmine Lorenzo, shouts every line and is a pleasure for it, and John Amos arrives as Major Grant with a special forces unit and a jaw you could break rocks on. The most likeable person in the building is Tom Bower’s Marvin, a janitor who knows where everything is.

The plot does not bear looking at. The circling planes have exactly as much fuel as each scene needs. Sheila McCarthy’s television reporter Sam Coleman has a helicopter to hand at all times and the film treats it like a bus. And the last third leaves the terminal for snowmobiles and a chase along the runway, where the snow that has served the film so well becomes the thing that stops you telling who is shooting at whom.

Set against the first film it is plainly the lesser thing; it traded cleverness for volume and knew it. Set against the run of action sequels from the same years it sits high: it is made with real skill, it does not insult you, and it has a lead who understands the joke. Watch it in December with the curtains drawn, and forgive it the fuel.

*Fi1m score 70, published 19 September 2026.*

## What the critics say

Most critics like Die Hard 2, and few pretend it is anything more than a big, loud sequel. Nine of eleven reviews are positive, and the praise clusters in the same place: Renny Harlin’s set pieces, the speed at which they arrive, and Bruce Willis, whose one-liners and visible reluctance to get hurt again keep the film human. The 1990 notices are the warmest, with the plane sequences and the stunt work singled out, and several later writers credit the film with knowing exactly how absurd it is.

The reservations are just as consistent. Several critics find the villain a poor substitute for the first film’s, and more miss the original’s confined, claustrophobic tension, which Harlin trades for volume. Collider goes further, arguing the script misreads McClane’s motives and coasts on the first film’s goodwill. The spread is narrow, from 60 to 90, and the more recent the review, the cooler it tends to be.

### Reviews we read (11)

- **RogerEbert.com**, Roger Ebert (90/100, inferred): Ebert finds the sequel a skillfully constructed and well-directed thriller that carries momentum past credibility gaps, calling it terrific entertainment and as much fun as the Bond pictures. He singles out for praise the convincing plane crash sequence and an exhilarating shot of Willis being catapulted toward the camera. [Read](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/die-hard-2-die-harder-1990)
- **The New York Times**, Janet Maslin (90/100, inferred): Maslin praises the film as the fastest, scariest action film of the summer, highlighting lean, edgy direction, astonishing stunts, and Willis's magnetic, self-effacing hero who regrets violence even as he excels at it. She singles out the character's clever drawing and the way the story accommodates his wife's career. [Read](https://www.nytimes.com/1990/07/03/movies/attention-claims-adjusters-willis-is-back-in-die-hard-2.html)
- **Radio Times**, John Ferguson (4/5): The critic calls it a hugely entertaining slice of action hokum. Director Renny Harlin piles on grand explosions and set pieces rather than recreating the original's battle of wits. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/movie-guide/b-m2cqt1/die-hard-2-die-harder/)
- **Slant Magazine** (80/100, inferred): The piece frames Die Hard 2 as a self-aware sequel that embraces its derivative, repetitive nature in the spirit of Nietzsche's eternal return, highlighting McClane's media-savvy myth-making and the film's Christmas setting. It praises the way it revels in absurdity while delivering solid action and character moments. [Read](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/summer-of-90-die-hard-2/)
- **Time Out**, DW (80/100, inferred): The critic notes the self-referential irony saves the film and praises Willis's one-liners and vulnerability. Harlin fails to match the original's claustrophobic tension but compensates with timing, speed and volume, succeeding magnificently as action. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/die-hard-2)
- **Los Angeles Times**, Sheila Benson (70/100, inferred): Benson calls it the most cheerfully preposterous film of a jaw-dropping summer and a lively three-ring circus, noting Harlin's crunchingly effective direction and technical flair despite the lack of logic. She singles out for complaint the weak villain compared to the first film's Alan Rickman character. [Read](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-07-03-ca-468-story.html)
- **The AV Club**, Kyle Ryan (70/100, inferred): The critic notes that Die Hard 2 loses some of the original's clever efficiency and soul but succeeds as enjoyable dumb fun with bigger action setpieces and zingers. Strong supporting performances, especially from William Sadler and Dennis Franz, help elevate the sequel. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/die-hard-2-loses-the-soul-of-the-original-but-succeeds-1798238431)
- **Variety**, Variety Staff (70/100, inferred): The review notes that Die Hard 2 lacks the inventiveness of the original but compensates with relentless action, working as sheer entertainment with shootouts and fistfights. It credits Harlin with a creditable job on the large-scale assignment while noting he lacks McTiernan’s grip on action and sometimes uses slow-motion that saps energy. [Read](https://variety.com/1989/film/reviews/die-hard-2-1200428437/)
- **Empire**, William Thomas (65/100, inferred): Renny Harlin's sequel is an object lesson in sequel-making that delivers knowing nods and ramps up the explosions, though the villain falls short of Alan Rickman's standard. It is entertaining nonsense that does not quite recapture the original's magic but remains enjoyable thanks to Bruce Willis. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/die-hard-2-review/)
- **Collider**, Matt Goldberg (B-): The critic finds it mostly a retread of the original lacking ingenuity and originality, with the biggest issue being a misunderstanding of McClane's motives and ignoring the conflict of saving his wife. Willis and the supporting cast are strong, and some new action sequences work, but the script is lazy and the film coasts on the first movie's success. [Read](https://collider.com/die-hard-2-review/)
- **HeyUGuys**, Dave Roper (3/5): The critic finds it a fairly standard actioner struggling in the shadow of the original; praises Harlin's action direction and set pieces but notes absent emotional beats and a bland villain. [Read](https://www.heyuguys.com/die-hard-quadrilogy-blu-ray-review/)

## Details

- **Director:** Renny Harlin
- **Director:** Renny Harlin
- **Screenplay:** Steven E. de Souza, Doug Richardson
- **Novel:** Walter Wager
- **Cinematography:** Oliver Wood
- **Editor:** Stuart Baird, Robert A. Ferretti
- **Music:** Michael Kamen
- **Production design:** John Vallone
- **Producer:** Joel Silver, Lawrence Gordon, Charles Gordon
- **Cast:** Bruce Willis as John McClane; Bonnie Bedelia as Holly McClane; William Sadler as Stuart; John Amos as Major Grant; Franco Nero as General Ramon Esperanza; William Atherton as Richard Thornberg; Dennis Franz as Capt. Carmine Lorenzo; Art Evans as Leslie Barnes
- **Runtime:** 2h 04m
- **Certificate (MPA):** R
- **Release (the US):** 3 July 1990
- **Genres:** Action, Thriller
- **Budget:** $70 million
- **Box office:** $240 million

## Where to watch in the US

- Amazon Prime Video: rent $3.99, uhd
- Apple TV: rent $3.99, hd
- Apple TV: buy $19.99, hd
- Amazon Prime Video: buy $19.99, uhd

*Checked 2026-09-19.*

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## Awards

- Japan Academy Prize for Outstanding Foreign Language Film 1991: Japan Academy Prize for Outstanding Foreign Language Film (nominated)

## If you liked this

- *Die Hard* (1988), Fi1m 89: The original, one building, one night, and a villain who could quote Plutarch. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/die-hard.md)
- *Speed* (1994), Fi1m 86: A bus that cannot slow down, and a script that knows exactly how silly it is. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/speed.md)
- *Airport* (1970): The disaster-film grandfather: snowbound runways, stiff drinks and Burt Lancaster looking worried.
- *The Taking of Pelham One Two Three* (1974): Hijackers under New York, a weary Walter Matthau and a clock.
- *The Raid* (2011), Fi1m 83: One tower block, one squad, and fights that make Harlin’s look like a dinner dance. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-raid.md)

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/die-hard-2