![]() ![]() Instead we got people firing guns a lot and not hitting a whole Hell of a lot. ![]() But all through the movie I kept hoping for that one great, defining fight scene. He's even witty in a way that Jean-Claude Van Damme will never be. Or how about the prison itself, which has an armoury that contains heavy machineguns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers? You also have a helicopter (bearing a striking resemblance to a Huey) with some kind of video game machinegun mounted in the nose. The plot holes are stupendously, glaringly large - for example, prisoners who, when the jail is invaded, fight the invaders rather than attempting to escape. An action movie so ridiculous that it at least made me smile right the way through. Finally, add in a main star who's getting saggy around the midriff and doesn't appear to be able to do his own stunts anymore. Throw in a bunch of people with really bad acting ability and who don't have real names. Then get a writer/director to pen a plot even Ed Wood would be ashamed of and who's too big a fan of The Matrix and John Woo movies for his own good. This film can be summed up as follows: Take an episode of the A-Team, remove the lovable and roguish characters such as Murdoch, Hannibal, Mr T and Face. We might even get to see him have a stick fight with somebody! Excellent! However, I was in for a rude awakening. I was thinking.A Steven Seagal movie! Cool! We'll get to see him kick people and flip people and break bones. Others viewers will be a bit harder to sell on this premise, but even in their case, you could definitely find worse if you're looking for a way to spend the evening in front of the television.Oh dear! What can I say about Half Past Dead? I was really disappointed in it. Essentially, it's the kind of movie that makes hotdogs and popcorn taste even better.ĭiehard Seagal fans will not want to be without this one. If that's not enough, then judge on the fact that HPD is built entirely upon fun: whereas flicks like The Foreigner would focus excruciatingly on stories that no one understood, HPD is a straightforward action vehicle that makes no secret of being silly but boasts some definite adrenaline. Though the latter have a knack for ending disappointingly, the encounters are fast-paced and range from an unexpected Nia Peebles/Ja Rule confrontation to an acrobatic Seagal/Chestnut tussle on 15-foot hanging chains. The gunfights are numerous and diverse - the final shootout in the cell block is pure action fantasy - and the hand-to-hand fights are similarly nice, with nifty choreography by Xin Xin Xiong ( Seven Swords ) proving that Seagal still had the moves at the time he went straight-to-video. However, once we consider that this is a Steven Seagal film, we begin to appreciate it for its good points, all of which come back the fact that it's a return to action for our hero. Add a few silly scenes - like Seagal "accidentally" hurling Ja Rule out of his car as a joke without reprimand - and it's easy to see why this film didn't do too well at the box office. In addition, whoever was in charge of the editing and camerawork deserves a swat on the nose: endless slow-motion is topped by hit-and-miss cinematography that develops a trend of showing guns being pointed and fired but not who was shot. Ja Rule's weasily performance in particular is best left forgotten. Seagal is probably the first man to play a Russian without an accent, and nobody in the film acts with any kind of memorable finesse. Style- and story-wise, "Half Past Dead" is a combination of Seagal's Exit Wounds and Sean Connery's The Rock, but there's really no comparison when it comes to dramatic strength. Sasha must now rally the prisoners to the side of justice and use his uncanny abilities to foil the plot. Before long, the in-prison execution of an infamous gold thief (Bruce Weitz, Hill Street Blues ) is interrupted by terrorists eager to find his hidden treasure (headed by Morris Chestnut and Nia Peebles ). The plot: car thief Sasha Petrosevich (Seagal) and his friend and partner Nick (Ja Rule, The Fast and the Furious ) are busted by the FBI and sent to the newly-opened Alcatraz. Less passionate or non-fans of Seagal will almost certainly catch onto the film's faults, but devotees shouldn't be disillusioned: our hero's last theatrical outing is worth watching. Indeed, this tends to make more casual viewers like a film less, but as someone raised on the man's poorer DTV outings, I found HPD a surprisingly exhilarating departure from the repetitive wrist-snapping, stale shootouts, and nonsensical storylines of the majority of the aikido master's lesser films. I'll say it right away: I like "Half Past Dead" mainly because it has Steven Seagal in it. ![]()
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