Hard to Fight

Clementine (2004)

This is easily the worst movie I have watched so far in Seagal's filmography, obviously a quick payday for him. He brings nothing to this except his name. He had not even appeared in it before I turned it off an hour in.

Quick synopsis the main star of the movie is a karate champion who lost a rigged fight (possibly against Seagal) I'm not 100% sure. As he is fighting this fight his wife dies during childbirth and his daughter put into an orphanage. He gets her back, stops fighting and becomes a cop. He loses that job for being too aggressive and turns to cage fighting to pay the bills!! Then in a move only a soap opera writer from Days Of Our Lives could come up with, the mother did not die and she wants her little girl back.

Forgettable.

As a fan of Asian (especially Korean) movies I just had to look this up. Korean martial arts movie with Steven Seagal! How cool is that, huh? Well, not much. The film itself seemed do not know what it wanted to be.

It starts like some gangster/cop action drama. The protagonist, as an ex-fighter and martial artist, takes out punch of criminals in illegal casino. He retires from police and we see heartwarming relationship between him and his adorable daughter. Then the gangsters force the protagonist to fight again. Then we see one poorly directed and edited cage fight scene. The daughter cries. Then comes some woman who appears to be the biological mother of the girl. More drama follows and the girl cries again. The daughter gets kidnapped just to force the father to fight one more time but this time his opponent is unbeatable cage fight master (Steven Seagal). Another fight scene. The girl cries again (it becomes annoying). Then comes Steven Seagal and says something meaningful. The girl stops crying (finally). Happy end!

Steven Seagal's part is quite brief and we can't see him much in the final fight either. The drama parts between the Korean actors were played out pretty well and the story around the girl was rather interesting and quite enjoyable.

It would have been much better movie as a simple drama without those poor action sequences. And maybe if the father would have been played by Steven Seagal. The premise: An American Taekwondo champion living in Korea with his seven year old daughter and then the supposedly dead mother comes up. That would have been cool!

I am a huge Seagal fan, and you will find my reviews on most of his films on this site. I ordered Clementine via Amazon more to complete my collection as I had read that Seagal has "little more than a cameo" in this film. My biggest compliment to Seagal is, this film had to have been filmed on a small budget...and I highly doubt Seagal is hurting for cash...so he must have done this film in gratitude to somebody involved with either the production or direction. The fight scenes are decent-however one can clearly see that it is not Seagal in the cage when the camera is shooting from a farther distance. It reminded me of the fight scenes in "Half Past Dead" thugh they lasted a little longer. Decent movie, hard to get into because of the subtitles, definitely a film only for hardcore Seagal fans.

I felt really tense during this film, but not in a positive way. You see, I love Steven Seagal's earlier films from the late 80s and early 90s. You know, when he was thin, handsome and charismatic. His "characters" were kind of more tolerable. But, from the end of 90s and beginning of 2000s... What can I say? Extremely boring C films, straight to DVD features. Now, this is one of those rare Seagal films, very different, very rare, legendary, if you will. You don't see Steven Seagal every day in some martial arts drama, just like this one. Yep, you read that well - it's a martial arts drama. But, that doesn't mean that the movie is good, it was pretty irritating and cringing.

Our leading man is not Seagal, but a man named Kim (played by Dong-jun Lee). He is a former Taekwondo champion who retires from professional fighting to take care of his daughter. However, in order to survive, he decided to fight in illegal matches and he proves once more that he is the best. And, bunch of mobsters wants him to fight a cage champion Jack Miller (Seagal), who is, of course, being a Seagal - indestructible.

The fight scenes were solid, and that is the only thing I like here. Drama was a bit forced and cringing as hell. Steven did his typical job of being in front of the camera and playing a non-emotional badass. But, when it comes to acting - no luck. Actually, when it comes to the martial arts scenes also, you can clearly see that in most fighting scenes, Seagal uses a stunt double. The dude needs to accept that it is over for him. This film was released in 2004 and he still looked like a large, funny walrus in his close up shots. Most of other actors were Korean (well, apparently), starting with Dong-jun Lee. The man is not the best actor around. He showed some good martial arts skills, but acting... well, not that much. His accent was too strong. They could at least hire an English speaking coach to teach him how to properly pronounce English words. And of course, to avoid stereotypes. When he spoke Korean, I understood all. And I don't speak Korean. His character has only one motive and that is fine, but not enough to save the film. Our leading "actress" who plays Kim's daughter SaRang was really forced into her performance. Most of scenes were so painful to watch. OK, I understand that she is a kid and still has a lot to learn about acting and it's not her fault. I think director forced her too much and her performance turned into this ear shredding tirade. Other actors and characters didn't do much. And to mention... one of the leading mobsters and fight organizers is played by Kevin Grevioux (Raze from the Underworld films), but he was uncredited for the role. I would recognize his deep voice anywhere. But, why not credit him? Maybe he didn't want to be credited in Steven Seagal film.

There's nothing much special to say about this film, it is a really boring and irritating ordeal. You definitely have something better to do...

Well, I guess you know it by now: Steven Seagal has little more than a cameo in this movie. The real lead is Dong-jun Lee. One point of interest that comes out of this arrangement is wondering if Seagal, playing the seemingly invincible reigning cage-fighting champion, will agree to lose (or, to use a pro-wrestling term, "job") cleanly to the hero, as it would happen in nearly every other story of this type. But the fighting is by no means the focal point of "Clementine": there are essentially 2 long fight scenes, a 5-person free-for-all inside the cage and the climactic match between Lee and Seagal. Both are pretty messy and lacking in flow, and in the last match there are plenty of long shots from outside the cage where you can clearly see Seagal's stunt double. No, "Clementine" is basically a family melodrama, and I have to admit I found it quite moving at times. The characters are essentially good people trying to do the best but not always knowing how or even what it is, and the acting is genuine and heartfelt. Lee is definitely an above-average actor for a martial arts lead, the little girl is irresistible, and her mother is very beautiful. The story does depend on a very big coincidence (the daughter literally crashing into her thought-dead mother in a supermarket!), but if you can accept that, the actors (and the music score) make it work. To sum up: this is a martial arts tearjerker more suitable for fans of the latter genre. (**1/2)