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Review Open Fire (1994): Die Hard in a chemical plant!

genre: action, die hard clone

Clearly the makers of the poster have not seen the actual movie. 
Or they have and thought they needed to add some spice and lie. 
Open Fire doesn't take place in a city. Nor is it aware of the fear.

Die Hard in a chemical plant? That sounds really explosive and dangerous. Sadly it's not. Nothing extraordinary is done with this location. And it really begs the question why they neglected to.

For me Jeff Wincott is a very dependable action star. He actually can act besides kicking ass (black belt taekwondo and skilled in other styles and fields of sports). It is therefore puzzling to me why he is not given that much to do. Most of the focus seem to be on the bad guy Patrick Kilpatrick and while he usually also is dependable as a villain I thought he was not as menacing or threatening as he could have been. Which brings me to the biggest flaw of this production. It lacks tension and thrills. Never mind events being predictable as hell. That is to be expected. However I do want to get excited about the action and events. Not once did I get impressed. Fighting scenes are over very quickly and there is not much style to it. Actually everything that could have increased the viewing pleasure here is lacking. On top of all this it's obvious that Open Fire misses heart and soul. The fact that the film takes itself too seriously shows how the director failed to grasp why Die Hard and the better clones are so much loved. You have to be able to relate to characters in some way. John McClane is a reluctant hero. He never wants to be there and therefore he lets people know this whenever he can. It makes most of his predicaments funny. You can't help but root for the guy. Alec McNeil is definitely no John McClane. From the minute you see him you simply know he won't hesitate to get into action. or ever be taken by surprise. He handles himself just fine throughout without very little to no opposition. It makes the character rather dull. Now this could have been simply remedied had the action scenes been more interesting. Would it really have hurt to have an explosion or two. Was the budget so low that they could not afford that? 

Open Fire is not super bad but it is so average that it does feel like a waste of time. As a die hard clone this fails miserably since it does not even have one percent of the tension and thrills of the original. 

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