10 Movies That Totally Ripped Off Die Hard

Because you might as well steal from the best.

Olympus Has Fallen
FilmDistrict

No list of cinema's greatest action movies would be complete without John McTiernan's 1988 Bruce Willis-starring classic Die Hard. While the series has hit the skids in recent years - along with Willis' fast-waning enthusiasm for it - the original remains a high-point of the genre that's aged shockingly well.

Little surprise it is, then, that over the last three decades it's been imitated ceaselessly, with Dwayne Johnson's upcoming thriller Skyscraper delivering the latest big-budget attempt to recapture McTiernan and Willis' immaculate glory.

From shamelessly blatant ripoffs to slightly more considered attempts to shift the Die Hard formula into different settings, these are 10 movies that tried to ape the action classic with hugely varying results.

Whether a legitimately successful copy or a beguiling failure, pretty much each of these movies is worth a watch at least once - with perhaps one glaring exception - because no matter their craven cribbing, they at least had charm, intrigue or enough unintentional hilarity to be worthwhile.

Fingers are firmly crossed that Skyscraper will imminently join the canon of entertainingly trashy Die Hard knock-offs...

Advertisement
Contributor
Contributor

Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.