10 Greatest "Die Hard On A...." Movies
2. The Rock: Die Hard On Alcatraz
An absolute stonewall action classic here which transposes the Die Hard trope to Alcatraz prison in San Francisco. This time, the bad guys are rogue US Marines led by Brigadier General Frank Hummel (Ed Harris) who take the island and its visitors hostage and threaten to launch gas rockets at the nearby city unless money is paid into a slush fund set up to help the families of men lost on clandestine missions.
Our unlikely hero is FBI chemical weapons specialist Stanley Goodspeed played by Nic Cage who is forced to become an action hero as he sets about disarming the chemical weapons. Along for the ride is federal prisoner John Mason (Sean Connery), a 60 year old man facing life behind bars but who is the only person to have successfully escaped from Alcatraz.
The famous prison is an ingenious location for a Die Hard movie, complete with small confined spaces, a collection of terrified hostages and a dangerously pissed off bad guy. Harris is extremely menacing as the General on the edge and Cage is in fine form as the unexpected and underestimated lead. It's loud, over the top and completely ridiculous, but it's one of the finest variations on the DIe Hard formula to date.