Urban Justice

If you have seen any one Steven Seagal movie, then you basically have seen them all. This movie follows the stereotypical Seagal recipe of how to make an action movie. You take away a man's most important thing in the world, and that man will take on a whole gang land neighborhood and emerge victorious.

Yep, it most definitely is an average Seagal movie, as he beats everyone, regardless of their skill and weaponry. And he only gets shot once, of course, while he himself takes down numerous gang members.

The story is about Simon Ballister (played by Steven Seagal) who moves into a neighborhood under gang domination, after his son was shot dead here. As the local police is unable to uncover the murderer, Simon takes matters into his own hands and sets out to find his son's murderer, taking down everyone who stands in his way.

The typical solo Seagal hero against overwhelming odds. But hold your horses, this time is he is not an ex-Black Op, ex-CIA agent, or ex-whatever. No, to add mystery, we don't get any information on his background or how come he singlehandedly defeats a whole neighborhood.

"Urban Justice" is filled with ridiculous blood sprays whenever someone is shot. The blood sprays several feet away from the one injured, both in front and back. Yeah! That's what I thought too. That was just lame.

The action teddy bear (Seagal) does deliver his usual performance, both in acting and in fighting sequences. "Urban Justice" is good enough entertainment, taking into consideration that this is a very average Seagal movie.

I can understand why Stevo fans have given this a good rating because it is an easily digestible film unlike his normal messily edited attempt at action classics like Shadow Man and Submerged... I have seen all the stevo's and this is definitely just under average (subjective to Stevo films). He is trying, but there is a total lack of imagination in this film. The fight scenes are pretty unimaginative with Stevo doing a lot of donkey kicks that aren't really used in Aikido, He's to fat to do all these kicks!!! And there is a really boring car chase and an even more boring shootout at the end where he just stands still while bad guy's walk through the same door one at a time getting shot! What happened to his unique style that got everyone hooked like in Marked for Death and Out For Justice. The music is awful and detracts from what is happening in the story which is hard because there isn't much of a story at all! No no no!

Even though Stevo films aren't amazing at least they usually have imagination!! I thought Submerged was better than this film its got a lot of potential in the story and some great supporting actors and action although ruined by lousy editing... Urban Justice stands out as a Stevo film because it is well edited even thought the Story and the Screenplay are really dull, it is just a breath of fresh air for Stevo fans because his films are so formulaic and this film is slightly different to his usual offering.

This is more like the Steven Seagal that I used to enjoy in the early 90s in films like Hard to Kill, Out for Justice and Marked for Death. He actually is this movie and appears in almost every scene.

Apparently he has run through enough dead wives that no one would marry him, so he is after the person who killed his son. He is a determined killing machine.

As expected from a film that features urban gangs, every other word is f*cker or motherf*cker. I actually think they have beaten Scarface with this film.

The only real criticism I had was the lighting. Almost the entire film took place at night and it was hard to watch. I guess that is to be expected in an urban environment.

My man, Danny Trejo, gets his 15 seconds of fame in the movie.

An American action film; A story about a former special-ops agent whose son is gunned down in a drive-by shooting where there were no witnesses, and so to find his son's killer, he probes, unleasing some of his own justice on treacherous streets and towards other unseen forces. It's fairly predictable and light on plot but heavy on action. Seagal convinces us of his ruthlessness and amorality in his pursuit of his son's killer. As an aside, the production standards here are the highest for ten years in Seagal's film career, the last of which was "The Glimmer Man," which preceded a long succession of lower-budget direct-to-video films.

Steven Seagal's career after HALF PAST DEAD and THE FOREIGNER has been on a string of direct-to-video movies (and he still makes some of them in these days) that were mostly seen by his die-hard fans. Some were quite dreadful (such as PISTOL WHIPPED... a movie so dull that it looked like it lasted 4 hours!) and some were mildly ok at best (such as this one). While it wasn't excellent like Seagal's previous efforts UNDER SIEGE and ON DEADLY GROUND, it was more of a time-passer.

The plot is very simple: in the beginning a young cop is shot during a shooting in a tough neighbourhood. His father Simon Ballister (Seagal) is a former cop who wants revenge on the people that shot and killed his son. And he will stop at nothing to get his hands on Armand Tucker (Eddie Griffin).

One of the things I appreciated of this movie is that Steven Seagal's acting looked a bit more convincing than in most of the movies of this period and he actually looked pretty cool as he wasn't very fat yet. The supporting actors' performances were all good tho nothing exceptional. And the cinematography too was very good this time.

If you are a die-hard fan of Seagal then watch it, but for those who enjoy his movies from time to time like me, it could be a nice viewing experience if you are in the right mood.