Bonnie Bedelia

On a snowy Christmas Eve in the nation's capital, off-duty cop John McClane battles a team of terrorists who have taken over a major international airport, while he copes with an inept airport police chief, the stubborn head of the army's anti-terrorist squad, and the knowledge that his wife is trapped in a plane circling overhead.

New York City detective John McClane is in Los Angeles to spend the holidays with his estranged wife Holly. While McClane waits for Holly's office party to end, terrorists take control of the building. As their sinister leader, Hans Gruber, and his savage henchman round up hostages, McClane gets ready to blast a few rounds of his own and launch a one-man war.