"A Quarter Till Sucking Ass" (reviewed by OG)

Synopsis: A criminal mastermind has set in motion a plan to infiltrate a high tech prison in order to persuade a death row inmate to reveal the whereabouts of $200 million worth of gold. It's up to an undercover FBI agent to stop him before it's too late.

Okay, so I used to hate Steven Seagal (Above the Law). Then I kinda liked him (Under Siege). After that, I thought he was the shit (The Glimmer Man). And now…?

Well, now we have Half Past Dead, his latest foray into the world of Hip-Hop action, which started with 2001’s Exit Wounds, where he starred alongside rapper DMX. Due to the immense success of that particular film, the boys in Hollywood have thrown him into yet another formulaic action thriller, this time along rappers Jah Rule and Kurupt. The plot is a simple Die Hard-in-a-prison scenario, with Seagal and Rule as inmates forced to fight against high-tech thieves who have infiltrated “New Alcatraz” in order to extract the whereabouts of 200 million dollars in gold from a soon-to-be-executed inmate. Yeah. Okay. Whatever. Bring on the guns and Aikido and we’ll ignore the script.

With Exit Wounds, the trick of revealing a successful and entertaining flick came mostly from DMX, who as far as rapper-actors go, went on to do a respectable job alongside the laconic Seagal. The story itself was also fast, demented, and violent, with the typical wire trick martial arts that pepper the majority of today’s mainstream action releases. With Half Past¸ however, we have Seagal alongside one of the worst acting jobs I’ve seen in recent history. Jah Rule, my friends, is almost as bad an actor as he is a musician (and I use that term loosely), and that’s saying a mouthful, cause the guy’s rapping is fucking horrendous. Couple that with a PG-13 rating, and you have an experiment gone horribly wrong.

Now, this is not to say that the film doesn’t have its strong points. Whenever Mr. Rule is absent, the flick manages to pull some cool moves, including a decent set of supporting characters, some comic relief (rapper Kurupt is actually funny at times), and an okay bad guy (Morris Chestnut). Tony Plana, who I usually love, gave me stomachaches with his unnecessary “Hispanic” dialogue, sprinkled into what needed to be whole English (Kinda like that “Tornado” Jimmy Smits SNL sketch). And Seagal…well…the man is barely there during the movie. He’s the star, yeah, but you barely even notice him until he starts whipping some serious ass in the one or two fight scenes he partakes in…but that’s it. Surprisingly, the true star of the flick turns out to be none other than Nia Peeples (the former host of “Party Machine”), who plays a lethal bitch out to get a piece of the 200 million dollar pie. Decked in black leather and a Matrix-style overcoat, she rocks the shit out of this movie, and I may be biased…. simply because she beats the living crap out of Jah Rule in the film’s best fight scene, as choreographed by the great Xin Xin Xiong. (Once Upon a Time in China).

Half Past Dead, for some reason, was branded with a PG-13 rating, and it shows. There’s something sickening about listening to an edited rap soundtrack blaring over action sequences, leading you to pay more attention to the fact that the word “Motherfucker” has been cut in half than to, say, the actual ridiculously edited car chase. And Steven Seagal…Man…What did you EAT??? The guys looks like my bloated uncle, and the only reason I believed his fight scenes was because they involved his arms, which were the only parts of his anatomy that didn’t resemble an overfilled bratwurst. I now understand why his action scenes were as low in quantity as they were.

So yeah, folks…wait this one out and catch it when they show it on one of those “Movies for Guys who Love Movies” nights on TBS. In that venue, the flick sits perfectly. In a theater, however, you’ll be heading home with an empty feeling in your soul, and an even emptier feeling in your wallet.

(11.17.02)