Submerged

I really had my hopes up for this one. After reading the original description of the film describing biological cargo...submarine...terrorists I thought we had the makings of an unrelated "Under Siege" sequel and since "Under Siege 2" was better than "Under Siege 1" and with the recent likable Seagal film "Into the Sun", I figured let me give it a look. And it wasn't even worth my viewing it for the full 90+ minutes. The storyline was way off the original description and it seems that we are now watching a poor man's "The Dirty Dozen". Though I rented this movie because I am a Seagal fan, I found that Vinnie Jones played a pretty good role and B+ movie action lead Gary Daniels is totally under-utilized. And the direction style used by Anthony Hickox does not lend itself to the movie in any way. It's a shame that this is what Seagal has come to with the movies he makes. Perhaps he should take a step back and look at "Into the Sun" which brought him back to his original form.

Submerged is yet another putrid straight to video release involving a bloated and aging Steven Seagal trying unsuccessfully to hide the fact he can barely do any martial arts any more and the fact that he is really quite overweight. He still can't hide the fact that he can't act either, despite the fact he appears to be dubbed for sections of the movie (Which is why some of his dialogue is actually semi-intelligible for a change). The film-makers attempts to hide Seagal's lack of mobility and increasing girth are largely what make these latter day Seagal flicks entertaining. Clever tricks such as close editing in the fight scenes so you can't actually see Seagal isn't doing anything very impressive, dark lighting to hide his jowls and breadth and loose clothing so as to not accentuate his less than athletic physique.

Anyway, the movie involves Seagal and a ragtag group of ex navy bad-arses being pulled out of prison (There is some lame political cover-up after an operation gone wrong angle to explain their presence there) to go after an evil scientist who has developed a mind control device and hiding out with some vaguely motivated militants in Uruguay. It is never made clear exactly why the hell the government is using a bunch of convicts for this mission- I thought perhaps they would have been selected as it was more likely they hadn't been got at by the mind control device when it had been established the US special forces had already been compromised this way but such explanation was not offered on screen- in other words if the script-writers for this movie actually put as much thought into the plot in writing the script as I did in watching it for a few minutes it was lost in the editing stage. At least Seagal isn't playing an archaeologist, a scientist or an arch bishop or some equally unbelievable profession in this one.

Although the movie is called Submerged very little of it actually set on a submarine. It was rumoured before this one came out that it was to involve Segal on a submarine battling a sea monster but unfortunately this was not the case. (No cheap jokes about Segal playing the sea monster I promise). The first section involves the group getting together and raiding the baddies base, the middle section is actually on the submarine and actually seems kind of shoehorned in, almost as though they wanted to make this mind control action picture and then found half the budget had been blown on a submarine set they were then obliged to use. The last section of this meandering and goofy storyline is set in some South American city (Yes I'm too lazy to look it up).

The plot is meandering, is full of holes and makes little sense (I was quite frankly shocked) but the film is full of action and is never dull, even if it is because of unintentional laughs, of which there are many. My two favourites- Seagal's ultra cheesy slow mo entrance- chained in shackles walking slowly toward the camera (Naturally) with loud heavy metal playing in the background in a lame attempt to make him look cool. The second and funniest is at the end when Segal kicks one of the main bad guys about forty metres through the air accompanied by some bizarre trumpet blast sound effect. Seagal doesn't actually do much in the way of martial arts (Wonder why?) but there are plenty of goofy action sequences such as a Commando like sequence where Segal and friends take on a small army, complete with tanks and barely get hurt. As I said, the movie is fast moving and all over the place shifting from location to location, from a dam/naval facility to a submarine, to the streets of a South American city, to an opera house, to a cartoonesque super-villain base/ laboratory. There is a large supporting cast to distract from Seagals non-acting, most of whom are dead by the end of the movie, including two Lock Stock and two Smoking Barrels alumni- Vinnie Jones, applying his usual cheerfully violent soccer hooligan type character that brings some much needed colour to the screen and Hatchet Harry. Most of Seagal's team is forgettable, the only other ones I remember a few days after watching it are stiff faced woman and skinny Latino dude.

In summation, if you want to watch a stupid, cheesy but on the whole entertaining(ly bad) action flick and laugh at the comedy institution that is Steven Seagal then Submerged is pure gold.

Sorry to say that I know know why this went directly to DVD. This film is not vintage Steven Seagal at his finest. He character in the film almost seemed like he was tired. If you like "shoot em' up" films just for the firepower then this is the film to see but if you enjoy an action film with a flowing story that makes sense then you're going to be horribly disappointed. Without giving anything away, right from the beginning you wonder how, under his current legal circumstance, he was picked for this mission. They don't explain why. If I directed this thing I would have at least had a line in the film saying "we can't trust anyone other then someone that has been locked away from the rest of humanity for quite sometime" which would have worked. The film went downhill from there. Even the film's title didn't make sense. It leads you to believe that the film takes place on or about a submarine which it does not. The submarine scene really had nothing to do with the plot. At one point one of his men say "we are submerged" hence the film topic. Point is that even the title wasn't suited for this film nor was the film suited for me. Mr. Seagal did one quick Martial arts scene in the entire film. Not what I expected from a marital arts action star. Many of his lines were vintage Seagal one liners but were very dorky. Sorry Steven but this is not your best work. I was very disappointed with this film and honestly I suggest keeping your money and renting one of his other films.

Steven Seagal, oh Steven Seagal, why must thou continue to make movies? IL' Stevie boy is at it again, as he lumbers around this occasionally diverting, yet heavily recycled piece of garbage. Seagal over the last few years has made a whole plethora of films. Ever since he experienced a brief comeback in hit film Exit Wounds, Seagal has reverted to doing DTV movies, with only the disastrous Half Past Dead as his last Cinema film. Since 2001 Exit Wound's we have been offered, HPD, Ticker, Foreigner, Out For A Kill, Out Of Reach, Belly Of The Beast, Into The Sun, as well as a small role in Korean Action flick, Clementine. That is a lot of movies from 2001-2005, andhe has a possible 3 more films to come this year or early 2006. My god! Exit Wounds came after Seagal had, had a 3 year break from filming and he is making up for lost time. Steve's cinema appeal has seemingly waned now but in the video market he continues to draw in punter, with some of his movies making upward of 20 million dollars in the rental market. He is certainly still the market leader, despite his laziness and complacency. His efforts, post Wounds, have been dire to say the least, with one common feature: Seagal looking bloated, old and extremely bored. It gets so bad at times he is being dubbed by some one else and in Submerged this is particularly evident, with large chunks of the trite dialogue being performed by a rather bad Seagal impersonator. So his movies stink, he stinks and can't be convincing as an action hero anymore, so why do people rent his movies? God knows. I do so in the vein hope that one day he'll make another kick ass action flick like Nico, and be about 3 stone lighter. Chance would be a fine thing!

So how does Submerged rate in the grand scheme of things. Well firstly for a DTV action flick it isn't too bad on some levels. It is also perhaps Seagal's most enjoyable since Exit Wounds as well. The film has an inane plot about brainwashing which they have stolen form classic films like The Manchurian Candidate and Ipcress File, and done without any of the cleverness of those films. It's a pretty conventional action film to say the least but has the advantage of having plenty of bang for the buck. There is a good amount of action and we have shootout's and car chases and all manner of explosive and bloody deaths. It's solid R-rated violence. Of course although the plot is stale, that matters not in a DTV Friday night easy going piece of entertainment. We want action and B-movie veteran Anthony Hickox handles that side reasonably well. The action is solid, with plenty of carnage and some neat stunts. This certainly marks a step up from the directors recent works, with far lower budgets. With a bit more money to play with he has done a lot better it seems. Of course his view on the action is to simply mimic John Woo, but if your going to mimic an action director it may as well be the Woo. The main problem with the flick though, is thus: Steven Seagal. The film starts off not half bad with some neat action and a good pace to open with. However no sooner does Seagal lumber towards the screen in slo-mo accompanied by a Heavy Metal soundtrack do the problems arise. Seagal stinks up the movie whenever he appears. From his atrocious accent, one expression, lameness, to his heaving, plodding physical performance in his action scenes, he just stinks. The movie has a good cast, with no fewer than 3 people who appeared in Guy Ritchie films, most notably Vinnie Jones, who is the best thing in the film. Action veteran Gary Daniels appears, acts as badly as we know he can, and gets killed like a little bitch and after co-starring with another action superstar Dolph Lundgren, he has been thoroughly wasted in what should have been his best two movies. Brit babe Alison King is sexy in full on Lara Croft mode as well. The action is well staged but it's the old problem that when Seagal is on screen fighting, the director has to make up for his lack of speed and agility by filming from the chest up and watch him wave his hands about. It's embarrassing. Of course Seagal doesn't actually participate in a great deal of the action anyway, only about half, so thankfully we don't have to put up with him too much in that respect. One can't help feeling though that with a more able leading man, this could have been a grade up and more enjoyable. Van Damme, Snipes, Lundgren, even Lorenzo Lamas, would have been better in the lead. Vinnie Jones could have led this movie, he steals the film to be honest, looks tough. Jones in fact revels as an action man and you can't help but feel that when he puts on his crazy face in his fights scenes, he is a bit too into it and probably landing a few punches on the poor old stunt guys or co-stars.

Overall this is fairly polished and although not as crisp looking as Seagal's Into The Sun, looks better than some of his other efforts, while the amount of action is ample for genre lovers. However thanks to Seagal this manages to become somewhat avoidable. Watch Lundgren's Direct Action instead. **

Syeven Seagal is gone for good. All he ever makes these days are crap B movies. The old stuff like Nico, Hard To Kill, Out For Justice and Under Siedge is in the past... If you don't wanna see a crap movie then just skip this one. Totally crap. I have seen all of Seagals movies and this is in the league of one of his baddest to date. Oh my god I say. Gary Daniels I expect this from but from Vinnie Jones? I hope I never see something this bad again ever in my life. But I know I will some day :) Forget this crap. I give it 1 out of 10 stars and that's just cause I have to give it one as it is the lowest. Pls Steven, get some backbone and stop making crap movies.