Le protecteur

After the semi-entertaining,back to basics approach of Belly of the Beast it appeared that Seagal was on a minor comeback.Then along comes out of reach to flush all that down the toilet.

Seagal is a retired agent(how many times can one man play a retired agent!!!)who crashes a human slavery ring in Poland headed by Matt(Transporter)Shultze.Get ready for some bone-breaking,gun-fighting,neck-breaking mania that never happens.Its not that it is totally boring,just unexceptional.

Out of reach is missing a lot of the trademarks that make up a Steven Seagal movie.Not a lot of hand to hand action.More gunfighting instead. The final Mano a Mano between Shultze and Seagal is just modest at best.Seagal actually takes a few hits.The setting seems like the same faceless location of his last three movies.

Seagal is a little better here.He handles the fights okay.But the dubbing and the raspy voice make one question his health.Ida Nowakowska holds her own and does a pretty good acting job as the cop helping Seagal.Matt Schultze is the best thing Out of reach has going for it.He plays a nasty villain as usual with high potential.But ends up wasted and Ill used.

Good Idea undone by producers?Bad Director?Star?Who knows.It had some potential.Its mauled by one of those freeze-frame-feel good endings.

I paid nearly 4 bucks to rent this and I don't feel good.

I feel so ashamed...I watched this movie from beginning to end. What can I say? I'm an idiot. I could have spent the time doing something much more enjoyable, like blinding myself with toothpicks or drinking lit Sterno. But, no, I watched and I suffered.

Segal's acting was never passable and his movie scripts were always formulaic and tedious, but his mastery of Aiki-Jitsu made the movies great. Now, he relies on gun battles almost completely. I think it's because he has trouble lifting his arms. The use of a double was so apparent throughout the film one has to wonder if Segal spent more than a weekend in Poland working on this movie. They even had a double dubbing his lines. But, to his voice double's credit, he did do a superb job of getting Segal's voice exactly, perfectly wrong. Either he's so fat that he can't breath deeply enough to talk (can you say Orson Wells and Marlon Brando) or they couldn't keep the food out of his mouth long enough to record the tracks. Judging from his sweaty, greasy, bloated and just plain frightening close-ups, what time he spent in Poland was most likely spent at the blini stand. Really, he looks like a Mr. Potato Head that's been dipped in oil. I think he has become the evil clone of Elvis. A huge, disgusting mockery of the genre. Unlike Elvis, though, he never really had talent. His self-created persona of the "Special Ops Killer" turned Ghandi is wearing so thin that even Paris Hilton has more credibility. However, I'll bet Segal's breasts are bigger.

Another point... I don't understand going to another country to make a cheap movie. There isn't anything in this movie that isn't here in America. We have lots of nice buildings and plenty of lousy, unknown actors. But, it seems the really bad American movies have to be made in foreign countries. Perhaps his next movie can be filmed in Nauru or Tuvalu. Or, even better, how about in his backyard using his cell phone camera? Can't be any worse.

Here are a few title suggestions for his next movie:

1) Out of Breath 2) Out of Ideas 3) Out of Cheetos 4) Out of His Mind 4) Hard to Watch 5) Out to Lunch 6) The Fatriot 7) Belly of the Star 8) Box of Clementines 9) Today You Diet 10) Enormous Shadow Man 11) Heart Attack Force 12) Fat of Fury and, of course... 13) Marked for $1.99

We all know what the story line will be.

Out of Reach (2004)

This is a bit of a disappointment. It's another Taken style action movie, without much action. There is a gun fight and as shown in the trailer a sword fight, but even that is pretty bland and uninteresting.

Seagal is William "Billy Ray" Lansing an ex-military, ex-government agent who now wanders around the woods of Alaska and writing to a 13 year old girl. Which is a tad disturbing, what he talks to her about in the letters is also a bit worrying too.

Seagal's hair in this movie is just silly. It's a jet black, strange-looking mullet. A lot of his dialogue is overdubbed by someone who is clearly not Seagal and there are many scenes that are clearly not Seagal in front of the camera as well, even something simple like walking around in the woods is a double.

This was a Franchise Pictures release... remember them??

The plot is ridiculous, we don't know why the feds want him dead after he refuses to rejoin them, he has no real reason to go to Poland, no panic written letter by the girl, he is just psychic. For the second movie in a row (after years of no love interest) Seagal's female partner is unrealistically attracted to him, and the scene where he operates on her to remove a bullet is laughable.

That said, I was never bored, even if I was laughing at the absurdity of the obvious double, the voice over or what was happening on screen.

All In all, Out Of Reach is a pretty entertaining entry in the filmography or Seagal. There's enough out-and-out silliness to keep you engaged.

An American action thriller; Next stop Poland for Steven Seagal. The premise of the film is quite good - a martial arts master and former covert agent turned survivalist in America has lost touch with a young girl/pen pal from an orphanage in Poland. It transpires she has become a missing person. Seagal decides to investigate and track a human trafficking ring into which the young girl has unknowingly entered. "Out of Reach" bears some similarity to the film, "Taken", but it is a low budget production - badly dubbed, poorly edited. poor acting in parts. The story is directed in a style that resembles a fable rather than a feature film. As an action film, tension is at a low ebb and so the detective work becomes the main interest for the viewer. There is a memorable sword fight-off scene at the end: prey vs predator, protagonist vs antagonist, which is set in a white palace and this symbolising of purity as irony is impressive. This sequence is well directed and choreographed. For all its faults, and there are many in the storytelling, there is a heart to the film and an important subject.

The plot is like the movie: pretty neutral and not above standard, like almost every Seagal movie.

Clean settings - the white building is beautiful as a setting, a little highlight.

For the Seagal-fans, there is a bit of fighting in here, I think not enough for you guys. Seagal acts like always, somewhat 'unpersonal'.

All kinda standard things we'll see: typical bad-guy, in Poland everybody drinks :-( and there are a few one-liners (like "wrong answer").

Because I have a bit weakness for Seagal (he was like a small hero over ten years ago in his old movies).

So for that, I'll rate the movie ** out of ****