5.5

A Dangerous Man

Mother Time has not been kind to Steven Seagal.  His leathery skin, wizened visage, barrel-sized paunch and stapled-on hair have, for the past 15 years, put him in stark contrast to his 80s action movie ilk such as Van Damme, Stallone and Swarzennegger, who despite their perceived shortcomings as thespians were never shy about keeping themselves in shape. 

Not so Seagal.  These days he lumbers around, still putting the hurtin’ on a series of bad guys who have wronged him in some usually terrible way, though with plenty of choppy camera work to his disguise his lack of fitness and a series of body doubles employed whenever one of his ham hock legs is required to move more than a few inches off the ground. 

These aren’t complaints by the way – I think his movies are fantastic.  Sometimes they’re pretty terrible, but even the instantly forgettable fare like Attack Force or Black Dawn is good in a I-can’t-believe-how-bad-this-is kind of way, and several of his later efforts such as the aptly named Belly of the Beast or 2009s Ruslan were highly enjoyable and fairly competent, at least by his standards.  A role in Robert Rodriguez’ excellent homage to B-movie exploitation Machete appears not to have provided too much of a shot in the arm to the aging Seagal’s career, however, and these days he’s back to doing what he does best: pumping out low budget straight-to-DVD action for his surprisingly sizable and ever-loyal fanbase.  

A Dangerous Man, filmed in 2009 and released last year, will keep said fans happy without finding Seagal any new ones.  The plot is predictably farfetched; imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit, upon release ex-Special Forces soldier Shane Daniels (Seagal) becomes embroiled in a bizarre series of events involving a car thief, a kidnapped girl, a murderous Chinese villain and a duffel bag full of cash.  Oh and he also has to beat up lots of people and win back the love of his wife (Aidan Dee, who is several decades Seagal’s junior and in a couple of bizarre and highly un-erotic flashback sequences gyrates naked against her fully-clothed, mountainous beau). 

The film boast all the Seagal hallmarks; the ludicrous dialogue delivered without so much as a hint of conviction, an largely obscure but mostly excellent supporting cast who continually act rings around their bloated cash cow and lots of bad guys being beaten bloody for foolishly choosing to live life afoul of the law.  This is one of his better STV outings, and with several highly attractive female leads and plenty of explosions and broken bones Segal fans will not be disappointed. 

Special Features

As usual special features are rather light on the ground.  For someone whose bread and butter are DVD-only releases, Seagal’s films sure are light on incentives.  Even Black Dawn had a self-aggrandizing interview and ‘making of’ featurette.  Here all that’s on offer is a trailer for the film.