Once more big old Seagal makes more of a cameo appearance in this movie as---well, does it really matter who he played? It's basically Steven Seagal. He does not have that much range to him.
Anyway, he's interrogating Luke Goss who plays an army man on a special ops team, that screwed up their mission. I always felt that Luke Goss was somewhat of a poor man's Jason Statham, but I only think that way cause he took over the Rebooted Death Race Franchise. In this movie he tells Seagal the mission in flash backs that remind me of Die Hard as the whole thing takes place in a Hotel in Romania where the bad guys take over and Goss has to sneak around them to complete his mission, which is grading the head of a Cartel from people who want to kill him after he flipped on them.
The strange thing is, despite Luke Goss' character being set up as the main protagonist, it's not his name that comes 1st in the credits (Or rather second after the extreme cameo Seagal). It's some guy named Georges St-Pierre. He does not look familiar, but I'm guessing he's a MMA fighter. My guess is based on the fact that he has that cauliflower ear thing that Randy Couture has. Wonder if you get that ear and they force you to retire and become an actor? I hope not, and I hope he's a better MMA fighter than he is an action hero.
Speaking of action, that's the real reason we go see a movie Seagal's big head would be the center of on a poster right? Well the action is mediocre. Cartels is more of a crime mystery movie as the players try to figure out a tangle web of people double crossing each other. This leaves the filmmakers trying to make something that looks suspenseful but does not have that much action to it. But unlike a lot of movies I've seen recently were Seagal is given a fat check so we can watch his fat ass sit around for ten minutes trying to sound cool, he actually does get up and puts down a few moves, like the fight he has with Georges St-Pierre, which becomes one of the rare moments when someone is able to put Seagal on the floor (or rather the stuntman, in fact I would not be surprise if Seagal did not even know that his character showed a moment of weakness until the film came out). Plus,there was this really neat action sequence that had a lot of gun play inter-cut with a lot of fight scenes in which the good guys had one on one battles with the bad guys.
It's not the best movie (far from it) but I still get a kick from watching Seagal slur thorough lines wishing he was Brando and repeating the same moves over and over again that he's been doing since he gain the pot belly, but I would skip it unless you're that big a fan of Seagal (or just like making fun of him)
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