A Dangerous Man aka On The Run - Reviews

Martin01

Well-Known Member
Staff member
Thank you very much for your review. Sounds great and the pictures are also great, the optical looks better than I thought.
 

DiDa

Super Moderator
Staff member
Question: Does Steven have some cool oneliners in the movie? And is he a real bad-ass (does he uses the F*** word a lot when killing the bad guys)?
 

SimonLustenberger

Well-Known Member
lee nicholson;200787 said:
Bought A DANGEROUS MAN this morning (but didn't watch it until later this evening, because, as usual, the girlfriend watched it with me...bless her!)

***********This review may contain soilers*********

THE PLOT

Seagal stars as Shane Daniels, who we first see defending his wife from a car-jacker (within the first minute or so of the movie) and after beating him up a little, Shane gives chase after the crook. Skip forward to the next day, and the car-jacker is found dead (not to mention, brutally mutilated) and Shane (given his 'special forces' history) is imprisoned for the murder.
The opening titles kick in, and they're pretty stylish (showing scenes from the movie, to introduce the actors, and giving them a kind of pastel coloured background around them) see pictures:
Fast forward 6 years, and it seems that Shane's wife can't wait any longer for him, whilst he's still in prison, and writes him one of those 'Dear John' letters. Daniels is now all alone, but the good news is that vital evidence in his appeal, proves that he did not actually murder the car-jacker, and he is released (although, understandably angry)

It seems that whilst this is going on, a gang of Chinese crooks are smuggling immigrants into the U.S, and they take one special refugee aside (more on that later)
Anyhow, Daniels now released calls into a liquor store, and is soon back in trouble, when two (foolish) hoods try to rob him. Despite pleading with them to "leave him alone, before he (quote) "f**ks them up ugly" Daniels gives them both a severe and brutal beating, drives off in their car, bottle in hand, and heads to (what he thinks is) a deserted wasteland to remember about his wife (with some quite 'sexy' flashbacks....so prepare to get jealous, girls!)
Also driving through this wasteland are two Russian youths, who stop to unload empty beer cans from their van. Suddenly a deputy sherriff in his police-car pulls up another car, and interrogates two Chinese drivers, who are reluctant to say whats in their boot, and promptly shoot the officer dead, and notice the two witness Russian youths. One of the young Russian men is killed, Daniels intervenes killing one of the Chinese criminals, and knocking out the other one. Looking in Chinese car boot, Shane finds a carry-case full of money, and a tied up Chinese girl. Daniels, the girl, and the surviving Russian drive off with the money. The Chinese girl wakes up, and tells Shane that her uncle is an important business man, who has been smuggled into the country by the Chinese gangsters, but (upon realising that he's a VIP) they've double crossed his neice, and are now holding him hostage. Daniels agrees to help her, if her powerful uncle can secure him a visa out of the U.S. The grateful Russian man, also thanks Daniels, and points out that his father is a powerful Russian mob boss, who will gladly help him out (should he need it?)
Daniels and the girl, part way with the Russian, but soon realise that there's a 'tracking device' in the bag of money, and Shane finds himself killing more Chinese hoods, intent on retrieving it. The chinese hoods, are also working with a corrupt U.S cop, who's only one step behind nailing Daniels himself.
With the net closing in, Daniels visits the Russian mob boss (who thanks him for saving his son, and swears undying loyalty) but soon the Chinese hoods are blasting the mob bosses mansion, so Daniels, The Girl, the mob boss and his son, take the war to the chinese, and attack their HQ to rescue the girls uncle.....

THE MOVIE
A Dangerous Man is a fast-paced action movie, that even in the non-Seagal scenes moves along at a brisk pace, with rarelly a dull moment. The cinematography is crisp, and the camerawork is great. As previously mentioned, the opening titles are really good (and get the viewer pumped up for the next 90 minutes) The film has numerous fight scenes, explosions, profanity....everything a good 'Seagal-movie' should have

SEAGAL
Steven gives an ok performance (better than THE KEEPER, on par with DRIVEN TO KILL) He performs most of his fights and dialogue (read more about that later) and still has amazing hand-speed, and his usual 'baddass persona' is present and correct.

FIGHTS
As mentioned there's a well spread out series of fight scenes (again, probably on par with DRIVEN TO KILL) and more (basic) 'bang-for-your-buck' action than THE KEEPER

DUBBING
Probably the worst aspect of the movie. Seagal is dubbed throughout (although not as bad as KILL SWITCH or ATTACK FORCE) it's all the more infuriating that the dubs are actually the same dialogue that Seagal is wording anyhow (i think the directors should tell him to "speak up" during takes?) I'd say about 20-30% of Seagals dialogue is dubbed

DOUBLES
Yes, we tend to know that when you see a shot of Seagal from the back, it's usually a 'double'. This happens quite a lot, and in a few of the fight scenes. But it seems to be SEAGAL doing most of the good stuff (as my pics illustrate)

OVERALL
A dangerous Man is another good movie for Steven Seagal (had the dubbing/double issues not arisen....i'd rate it higher) As it is, the casual viewer would probably not notice these gripes, and enjoy it for what it is....a simple-minded fast-paced action thriller. It's nowhere near as good (or as flashy as UNDER SIEGE 2) but for a DTV release it's a pretty good movie. If BORN TO RAISE HELL is 80% as good, i won't consider it a failiure, and gladly welcome MACHETE when it hits the big screens.

Big Lee gives this movie a solid 8 out of 10

Thanks for the Review and the cool pictures Lee! It looks like that Seagal uses more aikido-moves in this than in Driven to Kill.
 
Have bought my version in 3DVD Box Set with Keeper and Driven to Kill. So soon will be posting my review.
To the dubbing stuff, I think the sound recorders are unprofessional. Every time actors have to make dialogue recording in studio again but Steven don't have time for this (and the studio don't have money to pey him for this work) and they make it with dubbing.
Really don't know but Seagal's movies are not the only one where is a dubbing used like this.
 
slawek_wozniak;200796 said:
Have bought my version in 3DVD Box Set with Keeper and Driven to Kill. So soon will be posting my review.
To the dubbing stuff, I think the sound recorders are unprofessional. Every time actors have to make dialogue recording in studio again but Steven don't have time for this (and the studio don't have money to pey him for this work) and they make it with dubbing.
Really don't know but Seagal's movies are not the only one where is a dubbing used like this.

Yes, Slawek you are right with the dubbing. The once problem is (like always) money.
 
the dubbing is atrocious...cant the director direct Steven to speak up in some scenes??thanks for the review though,is it more polished than DTK??
 

DiDa

Super Moderator
Staff member
slawek_wozniak;200796 said:
Have bought my version in 3DVD Box Set with Keeper and Driven to Kill. So soon will be posting my review.
To the dubbing stuff, I think the sound recorders are unprofessional. Every time actors have to make dialogue recording in studio again but Steven don't have time for this (and the studio don't have money to pey him for this work) and they make it with dubbing.
Really don't know but Seagal's movies are not the only one where is a dubbing used like this.

You're right. There are more movies where voices are being dubbed. But with other actors I can't hear what is dubbed. Our hero has such a specific voice that it can't be dubbed....I like Steven's voice. I hope in the future the dubbing will stop.

So i'm curious: will Steven also be dubbed in Machete? Probably not because that's a big production....
 

NCS

Active Member
Saw this movie yesterday. Here is my short review...Seagal enthusiasts, ask any questions I haven't covered.



Firstly the story is not bad for a DTV movie, it combines some of the usual DTV elements, girl is kidnapped, Seagal is wrongly accused blah blah blah, but it encorporates them into a reasonable story overall, a little more effort to create an original story has been put in here.



Love the titles, very retro and cool. The DOP is pretty good, the locations are nice and some attempt at giving the movie a certain "look" has been achieved, rather than just going for straight up, simple DTV lighting with as little colour correction as possible.



Seagal is pretty good, he doesn't appear in the movie too much though, probably about 40-60 percent of the movie he is in. His acting is reasonable in this one. Supporting actors are good.



The action is okay. It's quite well done in some places, and badly edited in others. For example during the fight scenes, the cuts are pretty quick, you can see Seagal hit them and kick them but as with the majority of his movies the camera is too close.



The end fight with Byron Mann is a particular disappointment. I was glad to see Seagal getting his ass kicked a little in Driven To Kill but here Byron doesn't even get one hit in, which is disappointing considering he's a good martial artist.



Other action is okay, you get a couple of sizeable explosions, some pretty brutal stabbings etc, this is probably his most violent since Urban Justice.



Overall the movie is okay, on-par with The Keeper I would say but not as good as Driven To Kill, Pistol Whipped or Urban Justice.

One more thing.. the dubbing is there, it's not as noticeable as before, but it's there in a few scenes. I just get the impression Seagal was not around for this one as much as on The Keeper for example. His screen time is more limited than usual.
 
i bought the DVD today and all i'm going to say is it was amazing the fight scenes were all seagal and he used plenty of aikido and the action was non stop i would say this is one of his best in a very long time i highly recommend it. only downside was some dubbing but i give it a 9/10
 

lee nicholson

Well-Known Member
To answer some questions:

1) Steven swears quite a lot in this movie, he even swears at the Chinese girl a lot, when she isn't giving him all the information about her uncle. "F**k" being his favourite word of choice.

2) He doesn't have any great one-liners, but seems extremely bad-ass throughout, and kills lots of people (some of the kills are quite gory)

3) Seagal uses a mixture of 'aikido' and his usual 'slapping' technique (which i think looks cool) He does his trademark 'irminage' (i think it's called?) move a few times (on the same opponent)

4) The music is quite good....not quite Jerry Goldsmith...but ok all the same (i.e, it's not intrusive to the plot)

Hope this helps, any more questions, feel free to ask?
 

lee nicholson

Well-Known Member
bacurrie45;200811 said:
i bought the DVD today and all i'm going to say is it was amazing the fight scenes were all seagal and he used plenty of aikido and the action was non stop i would say this is one of his best in a very long time i highly recommend it. only downside was some dubbing but i give it a 9/10

To be fair, there was a few fight doubles i noticed (especially when taking exensive pictures from the fight scenes, as i did)
I have them on my hard drive, but won't bother posting them. They're not too noticable when watching the film, and i don't want to spoil anyones enjoyment of it. Plus i think Seagal did great in his fight scenes anyhow. In fact i didn't notice any doubles in the final fight against Byron Mann

But the doubles are there
 

supertom

Disgruntled fan!
My Review:

After returning to form with, The Keeper, Seagal unfortunately steps back again. What made the Keeper his best since Pistol Whipped, was it's simple story, competently told, and mostly the fact, Seagal was playing a character a little different to the norm. He seemed engaged, and had some charm in that film. Here though? Seagal's character doesn't seem to have any redeeming qualities. He gets out of jail for a crime he didn't commit, and the first thing he does, is, as luck would have it, accidentally find himself confronted by a couple of punk muggers. Okay, these guys are douche-bags, but Seagal's character just cold bloodedly, murders them and in fairness, for little reason. A Seagal beatdown is one thing. But he murders two idiots, and from then on, you can't really feel any empathy for his character. It's not simple the nastiness of it, it's also how stupid the scenario was. And like a lot of this film, the scripting is awful. It just meandres from point A-B, to C etc, etc. Seagal co-wrote The Keeper. The Keeper's screenplay was far better.

The film looks okay. Nothing special, clearly DTV, but it does look high end at least. The score was also pretty decent, especially for this kind of film. As for the direction: Once again, Waxman is competent. Nothing special, nothing too bad. He still has a tendency to film the action too tight, and rather flat, and unlike The Keeper, the dialogue scenes here, lack energy and drive. But that is more to do with Waxman's screenplay. Side characters and bad guys are uninteresting, and Seagal just seems bored.

As for the action: It's okay. Nothing special. There's plenty of it, and the film has a couple of lengthy shootouts in the final act, while there's some vintage Seagal death scenes as well. But like I said. Seagal's character has no likeable facets to him. You never get much sense of any purpose to what he's doing. The film really lacks some standout set pieces too. The shootouts are rigid, while the fights are filmed too close, and edited too choppily. The film is very, very violent though. Those worrying whether the UK version is cut, need not. This is the uncut version I'm 99.99999999% sure.

There is also a lot more doubling in this one than The Keeper. Mr Stand In, Mr Fight Double (a lot of shots you don't see Seagal's head, and he's film from behind...meaning, I'm afriad, most likely a double) and Mr Over-dub get to work out in this flick having had most of the previous film off.

Overall, I found the film to be quite wretched, boring, and flat. I'm disappointed after The Keeper, which had some charm to it, and some energy. It started out quite promising, aside from some really stupid scenes (like Seagal inexplicably beating someone to death with a gun), but lost energy in the middle. The bad guys, headed by Byron Mann (sadly underused here- and often appearing in scenes that serve no purpose in the film at all- hell, there's a scene where he's just reading the paper, and that's it. It tells no story, doesn't further the plot...pointless). By the time the final 20 minutes kick back into almost non-stop action, I didn't really care. Especially as the two gun battles at the end of the film, both felt too similar, and both too long and lacklustre.

I didn't like Driven To Kill, and I did think Dangerous Man was at least marginally better than that. I think die-hard Seagalites will probably enjoy this because it's got plenty of action and gory deaths. I didn't though. **/*****
 

lee nicholson

Well-Known Member
Supertom
I hear what you're saying but i would like to pick you up on a few points.

1) Yes, Seagals was over the top with two punks outside the liquor store, BUT he did ask them to "leave him alone" before he "f**ked them up ugly" And despite going to great lengths to tell them about his 'special forces' skills...they still came at him with Knifes and guns.

2) Secondly, he didn't kill them...if you notice when he goes back to the liquor store to retrieve the CCTV tape, he tells the guy behind the counter to "Phone for help for those two fools"

3) Thirdly, as good as THE KEEPER was, SEAGAL looks (and acts) a lot livelier in this one. THE KEEPER was more of a well made movie (coming after the sluggish AGAINST THE DARK and KILLSWITCH).....but THE KEEPER was more guilty of the terms (quote) "wretched, boring, and flat" than A DANGERUS MAN (in my opinion)

At least he had due reason to be angry in this picture (given his unfair incarceration, wife leaving him, etc) the last thing he needs is two wise ass stick-up guys hassling him. Notice also, that he only agrees to help the chinese girl rescue her uncle, only if he'll get him out of the country? As it's clear that Shane Daniels has had his fill of the 'states'.
Seagal seems rightfuly 'jaded' in this movie...and i think he exhibits a bit more 'character' than you gave him credit for.
 

SimonLustenberger

Well-Known Member
I´ve just seen the movie. I will keep it short. I would say this one is as good as Driven to Kill. In a Dangerous Man Seagal uses more aikido moves than in DTK. What is pretty cool.

OK, there was the dubbing and there was the fight-double. But hey, it could be worse.

Good old fashion Seagal-flick.

Now bring on Born to be raise Hell.

7/10
 

supertom

Disgruntled fan!
See what your saying there Lee.

My main point about the two guys is, that I just felt it was too much. The whole, taking punks out thing, is a Seagal trademark. And even looking at classic SS flicks when he has the token liquor store/bar beatdowns, and often kills his opponents. I did feel beating a guy in the face about a dozen times with a gun part, and then punting him through a car window, was a bit too sadistic. It was never really revealed whether they were killed, but at least in the case of the guy he beat on, with any logic, he'd most likely be dead. Granted, this is Seagal world, but still. It was cold blooded. I felt it lost SS the high ground, that he had in say HTK, after taking out the armed robbers.

I also got the sense with Seagal's character, that he was a bit of a ghost. A guy who could get things done. I never quite got why he'd need help getting into another country...especially from someone who struggled to do so himself.

I still believe there were too many scenes that served little purpose.

In terms of the Keeper, I found that to be a bit more light-hearted, particularly Seagal's characters. He had a certain charm to him in that one. I just didn't connect with him on this film. But I do believe, most on the forum are gonna enjoy this one.

But putting aside Keeper comparison, I still think it's a long way short of Pistol Whipped.

I definitely preferred Keepers script, and so I look forward to Born To Raise Hell, with Seagal penning again. It'll also be interesting to see a new director. The trouble is with all those two in a row jobs he does with the same directors, is you know what your getting a lot of time.
 

NCS

Active Member
I hear what both of you guys are saying, it was a little sadistic near the start, I thought myself, "Damn, this is really OTT violent!!" But Seagal did seem to display a really angry and disgruntled character. But hey, he'd been in prison for 6 years for a crime he didn't commit. Not sure coming straight out and beating a guy senseless was the best way to go about it haha.

The end fight is cheographed to some extent, to answer the above question. It's disappointingly short though, Byron Mann is very underused and the whole end shooting/fight scene with Byron is very choppily edited and Seagal just throws him around without Byron landing one hit. That bit was most disappointing of all for me.

On the plus side, Seagal's clothes were pretty cool. The hoodie and t-shirt style clothes suit him a lot better than those huge jackets, but wtf was he wearing at the start!! Jeeeez that was horrible.

Another thing is, Seagal has to stop having 20 year old women get naked and rub themselves all over him whilst he just sits fully clothed and smiles. I was laughing uncontrollably about that bit.

Right now there are a few things stopping Seagal from being taken as a credible action guy/actor again.

Firstly, the women are far too young for it to be believable. Second, he really is over-weight, he can still move but again, why would these 20-30 year old women be attracted to what essentially is a ridiculously dressed, overweight, almost 60 year old man. Thirdly, the dubbing and doubling is there but if the dubbing is eradicated and the doubling kept to a minimum it's okay, especially if it's well hidden. Overall though, this is a little bit of a step back.

I'd rank his recent movies like this...

Pistol Whipped 8/10
Urban Justice 8/10
Driven To Kill 7.5/10
The Keeper 7/10
A Dangerous Man 7/10
Kill Switch 4/10
Against the Dark 2/10

It's very difficult though because there isn't too much difference in quality between DTK, TK and ADM in my opinion.
 
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