Is Diehard A Christmas Movie? High-Performance Powerboat Fans Speak Out – Speed on the Water
Just before Thanksgiving, my family begins its holiday move-watching ritual. The sequence, though my brother has been known to go rogue and create his own, begins with “Trains, Planes And Automobiles” and concludes with “A Christmas Story.” Between those two holiday classics, “It’s A Wonderful Life” (my personal weeper), “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” and “Scrooged” can be watched in any order. On this we are united.
An offshore racer and movie buff, Loren Peters does not put “Diehard” in the Christmas movie category. Photo by Jeff Helmkamp copyright Helmkamp Photos.
And then there is “Diehard,” the perennial subject of holiday-movie controversy in our family and families across this great nation since it was released in 1988. (Just looked that up and it scared me—35 years ago?) It’s a fine action film—the villain dies badly, the hero reunites with the love of his life, things blow up and the Nakatomi Plaza gets trashed. Action pictures get no better. On that my clan agrees.
But is it a Christmas movie? On that we disagree.
And that—plus some wine—got me musing last night. What does a random sample of my friends in the high-performance powerboating community think?
So all in good fun, I reached out to a bunch of them and posed the question: Is “Diehard” a Christmas movie?
Here’s what they had to say:
• Always a thinker, Fred Kiekhaefer, the former president of Mercury Racing, went analytical with, “It depends on the context” but did not elaborate further.
• A self-described “movie junkie,” offshore racer Loren Peters took a decisive stand: “It’s not a Christmas movie. Even though it happens around Christmas that as no impact on the story itself.”
• Nolan Ferris, the auctioneer-of-choice in the go-fast boating world, saw it differently: “It is 200 percent a Christmas movie. First off, it starts with a party at Nakatomi Plaza. Bruce Willis wears a Santa Hat. Sargent Powell asks John McClain how his Christmas is going so far. McClain was in town to visit his daughter and wife for Christmas and was joining his wife on Christmas Eve at the holiday company party.”
• One of the original gentlemen behind the Lake of the Ozarks Shootout, Jeff Dorhauer agreed: “It absolutely is. Bruce Willis saves the world—OK, Los Angeles—while trying to get home to his family.”
• As did former Powerboat magazine editor Brett Becker, but with a cinematic qualification: “Diehard I and II are Christmas movies.” (Who knew there were Diehard movies after the first two? What have I been doing with my life?)
• The owner of a new Outerlimits SC 37 catamaran, Donnie MacLeod went patriotic: “It’s a Christmas movie for the gun-toting, s-kicking U.S.A.”
• But his friend, boat-painter Stephen Miles, offered more-philosophical take: “I don’t know if it is or not, but I know for some reason there seems to be such a big fuss over December 25, as well as what happened 2,023 years ago.”
• High-performance catamaran man Kelly O’Hara personalized his response: “It’s definitely a Christmas classic. And it motivated my friend Jack to go into law enforcement. He mutters ‘Yippee Ki-Yay’ in his sleep.”
His friend Jack, a mostly retired sheriff, confirmed O’Hara’s take: “Both true statements.”
My favorite Justins kept their answers short and sweet:
• Thunder Run organizer Justin Lucas: “Bang-bang boom, there’s your answer.” (Really, dude?)
• Waves And Wheels owner Justin Wagner: “We are going with ‘Negative, Ghost Rider.’”
• Fountain 47 Lightning owner Justin Snook: “Melissa and I say yes.”
• Skater 368 owner Justin Beischel: “Meh. I’m Switzerland on this one.”
My answer is simple.
Merry Christmas.
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