Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, May 19, 1995                   TAG: 9505190064
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO  
SOURCE: MIKE MAYO CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

NEW 'DIE HARD' PACKS PLENTY OF ACTION

The film delivers most of the things that fans want to see, but that in itself is the problem. The fans have seen these things before.

It all begins with a bang, literally, when a New York department store explodes. In the ensuing confusion, the police receive a call from the bomber, calling himself Simon (Jeremy Irons). He demands that detective John McClane (Bruce Willis) be brought in to fill a bizarre demand involving a trip to Harlem. Unshaven, sweaty, hung-over McClane is pressed into service.

In Harlem, he meets (and is rescued by) Zeus Carver (Samuel L. Jackson), an electronics shop owner who's black and proud of it. Together, McClane and Carver sally forth - scrapping, fighting and bonding all the way - against another gang of Euro-villains who claim to have planted bombs all over Manhattan, including one in a school. Simon refuses to say what he wants; stating that it's personal between him and McClane.

It really wouldn't be fair to give away the details of the clockwork plot. Jonathan Hensleigh's script finds many of its twists in the first film, but Hensleigh and director John McTiernan elected not to use the one element of the original that held the screw-loose story together: its unity of place.

By staging virtually all of the action in one high-rise office building, the makers of the first film were able to turn it into a magic box where anything could happen and macho action fantasies could be played out. In "... Vengeance," the action takes place all over New York City and beyond, thereby allowing questions of "reality" and plausibility to intrude.

And because the action is so much more open - in the subway, on boats and helicopters, through Central Park - the film lacks the narrative momentum that the strict structure of the first created. The stunts are bigger, louder and more preposterous than ever before, but they don't have the same punch.

On the positive side, the pace seldom flags so the film is satisfying on a cinematic popcorn level. Willis and Jackson work well together playing characters with equally abrasive personalities. Then there's the matter of the music. Fans will remember that the first film used Beethoven to good advantage. This time out, when the story really starts moving, McTiernan uses the jaunty "When Johnny Comes Marching Home," immediately calling to mind the dark, satiric mood of "Dr. Strangelove."

As a musical cue, it's too blatant to be unintentional. McTiernan and company are letting the audience know that all this isn't to be taken with complete seriousness.

In the end, "Die Hard With a Vengeance" probably won't be the summer blockbuster that the original was, but it will keep theater seats warm until the next "Lethal Weapon" Roman numeral hits the big screen.

Die Hard With a Vengeance **1/2

A Twentieth Century Fox release playing at the Salem Valley 8 and Valley View Mall. 128 min. Rated R for graphic violence, strong language.