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Seagalogy (Updated and Expanded Edition): A Study of the Ass-Kicking Films of Steven Seagal?
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The terms of my court order require me to recommend this book to anyone who likes Steven Seagal films.
oh make no mistake, i’m obsessed with the insanity that is Steven Seagal (did you know that he suggested to the producers of Executive Decision that his character could have survived being sucked out of the plane and should return for a sequel?). I will watch everything he is in, and be baffled to the point of ecstatic revelation.
if you haven’t already, you should read Vern’s Seagalogy, an exhaustive piece of Seagal scholarship up through Steven Seagal: Lawman. A masterwork
He's a fascinating guy though. He came out of nowhere, yet his first ever film (Above the Law) was written and produced specifically as a star vehicle for him. Furthermore, his first four films (Above the Law, Hard to Kill, Marked for Death and Out for Justice) were all stone-cold classics. He's sullied his reputation with the low quality of his later films and his ridiculous manner, but there's no doubt he's a phenomenon.
Further to /u/TheChocolateMelted's comment elsewhere, I'd recommend Seagalogy by Vern to any bad movie fan.
The portrayal of the Jamaicans is very over-the-top, and they use the word “blood clot” many times. Screwface is a memorable villain because of his spooky contacts and his crazy dialogue like “Everybody want go heaven. Nobody want dead. Fraid?” and “Stop thee blood clot cryin’. Everybody must dead. It’s yer turn.” In the traditional show-how-evil-the-villain-is scene (think Senator Trent in the hot tub in Hard to Kill) Screwface interrupts a domino game by knocking over the table, tearing off one of its legs and beating a guy with it. They don’t show how he was doing in the game but I betchya ten bucks he was losing, is why he did it. Fuckin Screwface, man. What a fuckin cheapskate. And it’s not like he can’t afford to pay up, either.
https://www.amazon.com/Seagalogy-Updated-Expanded-Ass-Kicking-Steven/dp/0857687220
Seagalogy (Updated and Expanded Edition): A Study of the Ass-Kicking Films of Steven Seagal
Wasn't expecting a 2+ sentence submission top level comment. Blud-klaat.
First of all, as a bonafide Seagalogist, this video is pretty accurate, while it doesn't go into some more finer details, they get the gist of 21st century Seagal. I'd recommend this book as your entry point into the scholarly world of Steven Seagal.
Do yourself a favour and get a copy of:
The author describes the phases of Seagal's career in great (and very funny) detail.
Under Siege 2: Dark Territory - Original Theatrical Trailer
Gonna also do my second most rewatched Seagal movie, Under Siege 2: Dark Territory, after Marked for Death, which I unironically have rated number 18 on my rewatchability variable weighted ranking list.
https://www.amazon.com/Seagalogy-Updated-Expanded-Ass-Kicking-Steven/dp/0857687220
Seagalogy (Updated and Expanded Edition): A Study of the Ass-Kicking Films of Steven Seagal
Under Siege 2: Dark Territory has some amazing side characters.
>If this was a James Bond movie (or any movie, really) they would probably hold Washington for ransom. If you don’t pay us a hundred million dollars or whatever, there will be an earthquake at the nuclear power plant. But instead of getting paid to not do it, they want to get paid to do it. … The use of secret, weaponized satellites is interesting too. The militarization of space is already in the works and seems destined for some kind of horrible consequences, with or without the help of Travis Dane. I’m afraid this might be another issue that Seagal is ahead of the curve on.
>Anyway it turns out that the aforementioned weapons genius Travis Dane (acclaimed playwright and monologuist Eric Bogosian) has decided to steal the targeting codes, take the passengers hostage and use the train as a moving headquarters while he uses the satellite to cause an earthquake in China (stock footage of Aegis Oil blowing up from On Deadly Ground) and then call up various world leaders to see how much they’re willing to pay for some more strategically placed earthquakes.
...
>Asshole head of the CIA Tom Breaker (Nick Mancuso) … niece Sarah (Katherine Heigl of Grey’s Anatomy and Bride of Chucky fame) … led by the scary looking Penn (Everett McGill of Twin Peaks and The People Under the Stairs … a porter named Bobby (Morris Chestnut, the kid that dies at the end of Boyz N the Hood, but you’ll soon wish he’d die in the beginning of this one). Bobby is the most unfortunate aspect of the movie, a painfully unfunny comic relief sidekick whose jokes consist of 1) overconfidence while hitting on Sarah 2) overconfidence in his non-existential martial arts skills and 3) various mugging. I guess Cuba Gooding Jr. wasn’t available. … The beloved characters of Admiral Bates (Andy Romano) and Captain Garza (Dale A. Dye) reprise their Under Siege roles of arguing and freaking out in a control room. … Mercenary #1 is played by Peter Greene,who you may recognize as Zed from Pulp Fiction or Redfoot from The Usual Suspects.
...
>One thing that makes Under Siege 2 stand out is the high-quality villainy of Eric Bogosian. This is just not a guy you would expect to play a villain in a Steven Segal picture. … Whoever thought to cast Bogosian deserves some kind of Seagology top secret medal that they can’t show anybody. … Bogosian delivers arrogant, sarcastic lines in a completely different way than your typical Hollywood heavies. You really believe that he’s smarter than everybody else and pissed off about it. … You got to hand it to Everett McGill, he’s one scary looking mercenary. I already declared Tommy Lee Jones and Gary Busey the best villain team of any Seagal picture, but Bogosian and McGill run a respectable second. … In the grand tradition of Hans Grueber they are not true terrorists, but just some greedy pricks with a get-rich-quick scheme. …He makes this deadly satellite so what do they do, they cancel the program and fire him. All they had to do was keep him on the payroll building evil robots or something, or give him a good severance package and invite him to company picnics. Hell, they could finance his next one man show. Instead they dump his ass unceremoniously, so he has no choice but to fake his death and then take over the deadly satellite and what not.
...
>“This is a Navy Cross. It’s awarded for bravery. This one’s my father’s. Uncle Casey’s got 2 of ‘em. And he’s got medals at home that are so secret he can never show them to anybody.” What the hell kind of medal is so secret you can’t show it to anybody? The medal for alien autopsy?
Gonna also do my second most rewatched Seagal movie, Under Siege 2: Dark Territory, after Marked for Death, which I unironically have rated number 18 on my rewatchability variable weighted ranking list.
https://www.amazon.com/Seagalogy-Updated-Expanded-Ass-Kicking-Steven/dp/0857687220
Seagalogy (Updated and Expanded Edition): A Study of the Ass-Kicking Films of Steven Seagal
Under Siege 2: Dark Territory, after Marked for Death has some amazing side characters.
>If this was a James Bond movie (or any movie, really) they would probably hold Washington for ransom. If you don’t pay us a hundred million dollars or whatever, there will be an earthquake at the nuclear power plant. But instead of getting paid to not do it, they want to get paid to do it. … The use of secret, weaponized satellites is interesting too. The militarization of space is already in the works and seems destined for some kind of horrible consequences, with or without the help of Travis Dane. I’m afraid this might be another issue that Seagal is ahead of the curve on.
>Anyway it turns out that the aforementioned weapons genius Travis Dane (acclaimed playwright and monologuist Eric Bogosian) has decided to steal the targeting codes, take the passengers hostage and use the train as a moving headquarters while he uses the satellite to cause an earthquake in China (stock footage of Aegis Oil blowing up from On Deadly Ground) and then call up various world leaders to see how much they’re willing to pay for some more strategically placed earthquakes.
...
>Asshole head of the CIA Tom Breaker (Nick Mancuso) … niece Sarah (Katherine Heigl of Grey’s Anatomy and Bride of Chucky fame) … led by the scary looking Penn (Everett McGill of Twin Peaks and The People Under the Stairs … a porter named Bobby (Morris Chestnut, the kid that dies at the end of Boyz N the Hood, but you’ll soon wish he’d die in the beginning of this one). Bobby is the most unfortunate aspect of the movie, a painfully unfunny comic relief sidekick whose jokes consist of 1) overconfidence while hitting on Sarah 2) overconfidence in his non-existential martial arts skills and 3) various mugging. I guess Cuba Gooding Jr. wasn’t available. … The beloved characters of Admiral Bates (Andy Romano) and Captain Garza (Dale A. Dye) reprise their Under Siege roles of arguing and freaking out in a control room. … Mercenary #1 is played by Peter Greene,who you may recognize as Zed from Pulp Fiction or Redfoot from The Usual Suspects.
...
>One thing that makes Under Siege 2 stand out is the high-quality villainy of Eric Bogosian. This is just not a guy you would expect to play a villain in a Steven Segal picture. … Whoever thought to cast Bogosian deserves some kind of Seagology top secret medal that they can’t show anybody. … Bogosian delivers arrogant, sarcastic lines in a completely different way than your typical Hollywood heavies. You really believe that he’s smarter than everybody else and pissed off about it. … You got to hand it to Everett McGill, he’s one scary looking mercenary. I already declared Tommy Lee Jones and Gary Busey the best villain team of any Seagal picture, but Bogosian and McGill run a respectable second. … In the grand tradition of Hans Grueber they are not true terrorists, but just some greedy pricks with a get-rich-quick scheme. …He makes this deadly satellite so what do they do, they cancel the program and fire him. All they had to do was keep him on the payroll building evil robots or something, or give him a good severance package and invite him to company picnics. Hell, they could finance his next one man show. Instead they dump his ass unceremoniously, so he has no choice but to fake his death and then take over the deadly satellite and what not.
...
>“This is a Navy Cross. It’s awarded for bravery. This one’s my father’s. Uncle Casey’s got 2 of ‘em. And he’s got medals at home that are so secret he can never show them to anybody.” What the hell kind of medal is so secret you can’t show it to anybody? The medal for alien autopsy?
https://www.amazon.com/Seagalogy-Updated-Expanded-Ass-Kicking-Steven/dp/0857687220
Seagalogy (Updated and Expanded Edition): A Study of the Ass-Kicking Films of Steven Seagal
>One thing Hatch and Max don’t know is that right there in the suburbs a Jamaican crack kingpin named Screwface (Basil Wallace, Rapid Fire) is fighting over territory (the high school?) with a Colombian Noriega lookalike named Tito Barco (Al Israel, who is legit because he has parts in both Scarface and Carlito’s Way). They’re pretty serious about it so they’re using voodoo curses on each other. A chicken gets beheaded and everything. The magic battle is actually started by Tito when he goes to the sorceress with “the most frightening power” for help. She tells him that Screwface is “abakua, the leopard people,” which is a reference to Afro-Cuban secret societies that have been around since the early 19th century. She says that he is muy malo because he is also “majadero.” Since Tito speaks Spanish, he ought to know that she is calling Screwface a silly person or a fool, but instead he acts scared. She takes a sexy bath, spits out some Bacardi and cuts a chicken’s head off in front of a photo of Screwface. It seems to have at least some effect, because it causes him to wake up scared in the middle of the night. Way to curse, sorceress.
>The portrayal of the Jamaicans is very over-the-top, and they use the word “blood clot” many times. Screwface is a memorable villain because of his spooky contacts and his crazy dialogue like “Everybody want go heaven. Nobody want dead. Fraid?” and “Stop thee blood clot cryin’. Everybody must dead. It’s yer turn.” In the traditional show-how-evil-the-villain-is scene (think Senator Trent in the hot tub in Hard to Kill) Screwface interrupts a domino game by knocking over the table, tearing off one of its legs and beating a guy with it. They don’t show how he was doing in the game but I betchya ten bucks he was losing, is why he did it. Fuckin Screwface, man. What a fuckin cheapskate. And it’s not like he can’t afford to pay up, either.
>Seagal is of course a fan of reggae, so he used the Jamaican theme as an excuse to get Jimmy Cliff in the movie. Cliff is seen in a club performing and even does a song that, according to the credits, was co-written by Seagal. (Seagal also gets a co-performing credit, so I assume he’s on guitar.) Cliff acts as sort of a Greek chorus I guess because he sings a song called “John Crow” that talks about the characters in the movie, saying Screwface’s time has come, adding: “So now I go take you down the road to doom / And John Crow, we’re going yum your supper soon.”
>Seagal sports several different excellent fashions, including the standard Nico Toscani black sport jacket/blue jeans combo, a trenchcoat, and most notably a puffy black jacket with dragons on the front and a tiger on the back.
...
>Director Little isn’t exactly a master, but he really hits the mark in a scene where the Jamaicans crash a car through a Tiffany’s. Hatcher and Max come in and destroy a lot of jewelry cases in a big fight, completely oblivious to all the rich people running around screaming in terror.
...
>Most of Seagal’s early movies were distributed by Warner Brothers, and later by Sony/Columbia/Tri-Star. This is the only one he ever did with 20th Century Fox, and it was the studio’s second most profitable film in 1990, following Home Alone. To this day many action fans remember it fondly as “the one where he fights the Jamaicans” or “the one with Screwface.”
Read Seagalogy by Vern. He gets into why the later DTV movies are so incoherent while talking to one of the directors. It’s also a freaking hilarious book: https://www.amazon.com/Seagalogy-Updated-Expanded-Ass-Kicking-Steven/dp/0857687220/ref=nodl_
I can recommend two books by Vern:
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