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| Year: 2003 |
| Director: Siu-tung Ching |
| Cast: Steven Seagal, Byron Mann, Monica Lo |
| Genres: Action |
| Runtime: 91 min. |
| IMDB: This film on IMDB |
| Subtitles: OpenSubtitles.org |
Ten years ago, Jake Hopper was a CIA agent who was stationed in Thailand. Then one day, things went sour, and his partner, Sunti barely escaped with his life...after accidentally killing a woman. Jake called it quits and returned to the United States when his wife died, and Sunti became a Buddhist monk to atone for his sins. For the past 10 years, Jake has run a successful private security business, and has been raising his daughter Jessica, who is now an adult. While hiking in Thailand, Jessica and her friend Sarah Winthorpe are kidnapped. A group of Islamic fundamentalists known as the Abu Karaf claims responsibility. Sarah is the daughter of United States senator John Winthorpe. For ransom, the Abu Karaf demand the release of 20 prisoners from American custody. The US Secretary of State urges restraint -- he won't negotiate. Tom Collins, an ex-colleague of Jake's, recognizes Jessica on the ransom tape and tips Jake off. Jake knows that he must rescue the girls himself. An old CIA buddy puts Jake in contact with Leon Washington, an active CIA agent who is working in Thailand. Jake goes to Bangkok, and escapes an assassination attempt. Leon arranges a meeting for himself with with Soku -- the internal security chief for General Jantapan. Jantapan is a rebel military general who is making a play to be one of the most powerful men in Thailand. Secretly, Jantapan is messing with some dangerous spiritual forces. Soku provides Jake with a cover story, but the CIA wants Jake out of it -- they are planning to take out the Abu Karaf with the aid of the Thai army, and they don't want a civilian in the middle. Jake is a spiritual man, so he contacts his spiritual master Paijan Paitoon. As Jake is in trouble, Paitoon offers to arrange a divination from the oracle of the order. Jake enlists the help of Sunti. Jake gets Lulu, the girlfriend of arms dealer Fitch McQuoid, to steal information leading to the Abu Karaf. Jake and Sunti follow the leads to a warehouse where they discover evidence of highly sophisticated weaponry. With their enemies now after Lulu, Jake takes Lulu under his wing. Jake shares some of his info with Leon. Can he trust Leon? Another attempt is made on Jake's life -- and this time, Jake is sure that Leon was involved. Finally, the Abu Karaf contact Jake to arrange a meeting -- the pieces are coming together, and Jake figures out that it was not the Abu Karaf who kidnapped Jessica and Sarah. Jantapan tries to send the spirit of an ancient warrior demon to kill Jake, but the ceremony goes wrong and the spirit enters Jantapan himself, giving Jantapan amazing physical and spiritual powers. Jake and Sunti go to meet Mongkol, the leader of the Abu Karaf. Mongkol confirms that ever since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Jantapan has worked to corner the narcotics and arms markets. It was Jantapan who kidnapped the girls, blaming the Abu Karaf so the army would wipe out his competition. Mongkol knows where the girls are, and he gives Jake plans and intelligence. They both need the girls alive. Jake must engage in a battle that will put both his physical and spiritual powers to the ultimate test. |
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Comments |
| Date: 2007-10-04 12:53:27 |
User: Eugene Miliskievic |
I've heard of hackwork, but this is getting silly. Why does this guy still have a career? It's pretty obvious that he has nothing but contempt for his audience.
The scenery and photography is great, the supporting actors are fine (especially the exotic female love interest), the plot and the writing are OK (if a little hackneyed); in other words the overall content of the movie is good B movie stuff (with some inspired directorial touches in a lot of places).
And into this potentially pleasing and exciting melange comes Steven Seagal, who sleep walks through the entire thing as if he had pressing business elsewhere and spends the entire movie with his inner dial set to 'squinty eyed tough guy' and using one of two expressions -('squinty eyed scowl' and 'eyes slightly widened'). I've watched a lot of movies (even a lot of action and martial arts movies) and I've rarely seen a lazier "lead" performance than this.
You doubt me? Check out the fight scenes - Seagal used to do nice, snappy Aikido/Aikijutsu style fight choreography, and his gunfight choreography was fast, fluid and visceral. Now he uses a stunt double for any scene involving kicking, leaping, or leg fencing. Now he seems to be pretending to be some kind of Tai Chi master and Hung Gar stylist, with a lot of extraneous wire work to hid the fact that he isn't putting ANY 'oomph' or speed into his motions (no matter how hard the director tries to frame him, he's obviously loafing); in fact, Seagal can hardly be bothered to raise his hands above his head or pick his feet off the floor anymore. And he's gotten really fat - the generous fit of the loose kung-fu GI and the numerous flattering camera angles can't disguise his girth or the way his neck balloons out of the shirt collar to give him wattles and a double chin.
Almost anyone other actor with a martial arts background and a 'tough guy' persona could have taken the lead role in this move (Jet Li, Gordon Liu, Donnie Yen, or even Don Wilson or Oliver Grunier) and done a better job. Heck, David Carradine could have pulled this off with aplomb. In fact, this could have been a killer movie with a relative unknown in the part. one that could take some acting direction and was eager to prove himself. But someone somewhere still thinks that Seagal's name can sell a movie, and so he gets to grunt out another performance.
There are also some weaknesses to the plot that aren't especially Seagal's fault, but I'll blame him anyway: Of course, he gets the exotic Thai call girl in the end for no apparent reason other than the plot requires it. Seriously, there is literally almost NO transition between the point where they are allies and when they are lovers- it's a couple of lines of dialog and that's it. And Seagal's friend the Buddhist Monk comes out of seclusion to help him rescue his daughter, and is immediately able to leap into demanding physical action after 10 years of asceticism, living on 1200 starch based calories and an average of 4 hours of sleep each day. And Southeast Asia apparently has its own brand of voodoo mind control, because a weird shaman type appears for 10 seconds nears the beginning of the movie, and never shows up again until Seagal's final showdown with the bad guy, and then the shaman starts sticking pins into a voodoo doll to slow Seagal down only to be fought off somehow by the chanting and good vibes of the remaining monks. The whole thing is so badly and transparently handled that it will leave you scratching your head in confusion. The plot element is completely out of place in this kind of movie and makes no sense. (It might work in a 'sword play' style movie). The film makers just threw it in there to make Hopper/Seagal even more of a knee-jerk hero than before - the monks are on his side and fight for him, so he MUST be a HERO, right?
I sound as if I hate this movie. I don't. I like almost everything about the movie except Seagal, and even he doesn't suck all that much here. It's just that I can't imagine any actor in a leading role of an action movie who has even a shred of self respect doing this little actual work and expecting his fans to accept it.
I have no idea what has happened to Seagal in his private life (and it's none of my business) to turn him into such a total hack with such a threadbare schtick. I can hope that he either shapes up and turns his life around, or that he just finally has enough money saved up that he can retire. |
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