Zooey Deschanel gives surprising take on whether 'Die Hard' is a holiday movie

Zooey Deschanel recently got candid and shared whether she considers Die Hard a Christmas movie or not.

While conversing with PEOPLE magazine, the 45-year-old American actress and musician indulged in a debate which was about the 1988 action film and if it can be considered a holiday classic.

Taking into account the fact that Die Hard came to cinemas over the summer and it does not depict a “traditional” storyline of a Christmas movie, Deschanel stated that “it is,” as “it takes place on Christmas.”

“And maybe it's not like Elf or something, where there's a magical creature or a magical person or whatever at the center of the film — so it doesn't have that, like, super Christmas forward element — but it has Christmas in the background,” she added, referring to her 2003 holiday film.

The Almost Famous star went on to set it against her new film Merv, which revolves around a recently separated couple who go on a trip with their dog to “raise his saddened spirits amid the holidays.”

While Die Hard chronicles the story of a New York City police detective, John McClane, played by Bruce Willis, who visits his estranged wife in Los Angeles during a Christmas Eve party, where he ends up saving a Los Angeles skyscraper from a terrorist attack.

Before concluding, it is pertinent to mention that Zooey Deschanel’s movie Merv was released on December 10, 2025, on Amazon's Prime Video.