19: Fire Down Below

Mmm, Hello everyone, and welcome to On Seagal, the only podcast on the Internet all about everyone's favorite Iiketo Master Steven Seagal. I am one of your hosts, Chris Dashue, the host of The Culture Cast, and I am Trevor Gumble and I am also co host of on Segal and occasional co host of The Culture Cast. And Chris, I think it's been burning when IP lately. I think I have a veneral D disease because I have a it feels like a fire down below and had to work hard to get to that one. I feel like, yeah, I really did.

I thought you were gonna I thought you were gonna say something about a firecrotch. I mean, I guess you did say a firecrotch of a different sort. I guess yeah. But it wouldn't if you If you don't, if you don't know what we're talking about, and you've clicked on this by accident, well hello, welcome. You're listening to a podcast that's an audio experience.

Least turn us off. But if you are here, you know what we're gonna be talking about. We're gonna talk about a little film from nineteen ninety seven that well, in a lot of ways. One might say it was a it was a turning point for our our dear friend, mister Steven Seagal. But we're talking about a film that came out in nineteen ninety seven, and it was his final film released in theaters to film chock full of country Western singers, point guns of people.

We're talking about nineteen ninety seven's Fire down below. So the film is directed by Felix Enriquez Alcala and it stars, yes, well, it stars the one and only Steven Seagal as Jack Taggart, a man from the EPA who goes to a small town in Kentucky to stop Chris Christofferson from dumping cyanide into the water supply. Yes, this is actually the plot of this movie, and no, I'm not kidding. Steven Seagal falls in love with Mark Helligenberger, a woman who is attempting to have a relationship with the cinematic equivalent of a Tueby for Harry Dean stant is also in the film, playing a man who might be slow, but we don't actually know, because the movie doesn't actually know. And there's also a weird subplot with Stephen Lang playing an incestuous brother to Mark Helligenberger.

Boy, this movie is a mouthful and this is a lot to get out of the way out of it right at the top. But Trevor, what did you think of Fire down Below? A movie I know you had never seen before. I'm gonna say this right off the bat. This is one of Steagall's best performances.

Yeah, because this Seagal actually tries to emote, He actually tries to be charming, to be you know, likable, and unfortunately it's in a movie that is cut to hell. This movie was butchered man. It's written by Jeb Stewart, And if that name sounds familiar to you, he was the screenwriter of what many consider an action classic, if not the best action film ever made, die Hard And Yeah, and when they're going to say The Fugitive also an action classic, he wrote that too. Yeah. I don't know how he got roped into this.

Maybe it was a victim of one of the Seagal's little rewrites. But all I know is his script and the final product got chopped up to hell. Like there are tons and tons of deleted scenes in this film of this film, and you can tell because there are moments in this film where it seems to cut out of nowhere, like it's a sudden cut, Like it seems like they're in the middle about to say something and it cuts to the next scene. Yeah. I you know, there's not a lot of like information on Wikipedia or other sources about this movie.

I mean, we do know that there are a lot of deleted scenes in this movie, probably similarly to On Deadly Ground. We know that movie had a lot of cuts made to it, right, like a literal hour long finale. I think this movie had similar things going on clearly. And I'm gonna agree with with you on this. I think is Steven Seagal's best post Undersea performance, Which are the bigger movies that he's doing lesslie like Cop on the Ground in Brooklyn beating the shit out of people with poolballs in a sock.

Like he's not doing that anymore. He's taking on big worldly or global or bigger threats like an entire town and see and I guess Aquifer being destroyed by Chris Christofferson's character. Yeah, all that aside, Steven Seagal is really good in this movie. But he's also again like he's restraining himself but he, like you said, he's restraining himself from doing the fucking whisper talking shit that he was doing in Glimmerman. Because he was doing it in Glimmerman, he doesn't do it a lot here.

He's like you said, he's kind of charming and he does have some good comebacks in one liners and quips. I mean, he's not like without the charm here, and he can turn it on. It's just like, hey, he turned it on a little too late, dude, because at this point your career is going to be very different post to this movie. And as I was watching his film and his performance, I was thinking, this is the same guy from like the China Thing and Absolution, China Salesman, Absolution and all those movies that those performances in this performances are fucking night and day, because in those performances he's just whispering his way to the end. In this film, he's actually, you know, he's got personality, He's got somewhat of a charm to him.

I'm not quite sure I believe him and Mark Helligenberger as a as a couple, But then again, no, I don't believe them as a couple at all he said, like behind the scenes. He said, she's a great actress, but she's not like, you know, stunningly beautiful. He said something to that effect, typical siagal Bro. Come on, come on, don't do that, Like I know, I'm not doing anything. I'm just no, not you him, don't do that.

It's a bad I mean, look, it's a bad look. He's never He's one of those dudes that sometimes he just should know better. Right, Yeah, foot and mouth disease. Right, this film has a better cast than it deserves. I mean, fucking Harry Dean, Stanton, Mark Helgenberger, Stephen Lang, Chris Christofferson, well, Chris Ristofferson.

He's done his fair share of shit. Yeah, but he's also done his fair share of actual acting performances. And he's not he's not really not much in the film until like the second half, because in like the first half, it's Chris christofficer Christofferson's son, and a bunch of like FuG henchmen because apparently people have, um there have been mysterious in this in this city of his town, rather of other EPA agents and shit like that, because he keeps sending them there and they keep mysteriously dying mysteriously um like, well, they show in the flashback in the beginning, like they get like fucking shot in the head. His friend was one and I'm trying to investigate and he ended up getting killed.

Which, by the way, if you're gonna use John Deal in your film, don't give him just a glorified candy o man. I mean John John Deal of such films as Jurassic Park three and Remote and Madhouse with John Larkent and Christie Alley. Uh do you buy Steven Seagal as an EPA agent because I don't. I don't know. I didn't buy it in On Deadly Ground either, No, And I find it very amusing that they keep trying to pass this.

This could be a fucking sequel to the On Deadly Ground, and I probably believe you. I'm there's in a lot of ways, there's part of me surprised that it's not. I mean, the only thing he does in bring to this role is the kind of again, hit again again, because it's real, you know, kind of folklore and religion that he was speaking of with the indigenous people in that movie. But there's none of that in this movie. But I'm kind of surprised that there's not.

Yeah, um, because it was like that movie was just chock full of all this like bogus interpretations of religion and folklore of the indigenous people, and like, yeah, this is the only thing this movie's missing. And then it would be that character from that movie. This is the this is the only Steven Seagal film that even mentions the concept of God or god being like you know in like being even mentioned in his films. Well, yeah, because you've got a Levon Helm playing the reverend drummer of the band. But you see what I'm saying.

Usually when you see segalf film, he's usually going these ancient like mystic but it's his like whacked out interpretations of them. Yeah, exactly, Like there's none of that here. But that's the only thing that would lead me to believe it's a different character. But he acts the same way as the dude from on Deadly Ground. He's like but again, like it's it's kind of always just Segal doing himself.

He really in this movie does come off a little he's charming when he needs to be. But I think you're right he and Mark Helgenberger do not have chemistry. I don't believe it for a fucking second. Sorry, And the film is okay, so I mean we have. It almost got cartoonish when it came to the Henchman.

I don't think that helps because of the people who who are playing them. I mean Mark Colly. We have Mark Colly, who a lot of people will probably recognize from He's a singer also, but I know him a lot from The Punisher, the Thomas Jane Punisher film. He played the Johnny Cash like motherfucker in that film, played a similar character the character he plays in this movie. Just a guy who's doing what somebody else is telling him to do.

This just happens to be sound. I just it just kept getting cartoonish to me because they would say the same thing just at all, you better watch yourself, but we're gonna get you, you know. And he ends up kicking their ass. They recover say that same shit again to Stolone and get their ass kicked again. It's like a fucking Warner Brothers cartoon and they're the fucking wily coyote or He's like, it's like they're like home alone villains.

In terms of oh, it doesn't help that our lead is operating out in broad daylight going in. I mean, at one point he's talking with levon Helm about Levin. I was like, I'm going to testify if you get me on the stage and Chris, I'll testify. And they're standing within earshot of the people that they're gonna be testifying. Again, I didn't even have to know they were an earshot to think, oh, well he's dead now.

Yeah. But like because why he said, well, I'm I'm I'll testify, I'm like, well, you're fucked. But but right, because like how predictable it was. But again, but to be fair, like in another movie, it's like you don't have to see them up on the hill to know that's what's going to happen, because again, that's normally what happens movie, right, And it's like that's kind of the issue with this movie. It's like this movie is kind of written.

This movie is written in a way that is a little bit too and then and then and then and basically yeah, but I mean again, it's an end then movie. This happened, and then this happened, and then the Reverend died, and then the sun and then this and It's like, but what what was the point? What was holding this together? Again? I think Stagal is okay enough in this movie to kind of hold it together throughout the almost two hour run time.

But yeah, it's kind of a weird tonal mix up because the characters, the actors playing a lot of the characters in this movie are country Western singers that are not particularly good or abundance of those. You have like Travis Trip, Randy Travis fucking Marty Party Stewart, but Marty Stewart's just playing himself. And then you have Chris Christofferson and Mark Colly, yeah, and lev and Levon Helm. I mean he's not country, but he is a musician speaking of country. I did like the music in the film.

The score and the music were great, perfectly fine. Yeah, that was it was decent. Little you know, I don't dislike this movie. I just think that this movie is really a mess from the plot because again, I mean, you have what seems to be a dastardly villain of Chris Christofferson, but he feels so removed from most of the movie and most of what's going on, and villains that hire other people to do their bidding never do, right. I mean he's like, oh, my son go deal with them, and my son will hire people.

This film with with the Christopher character, just goes in circles. It's always the same thing. The Sun calling the dad because he fucked up again, the Sun calling the dad because the attentionman got beat up, and it just that's it just keeps repeating that until finally Chris Kristofferson doesn't even go to the town. I think he meets him Seagal and meeting game at his casino. Now he goes to the town at one point when they're having their like like festival or whatever.

Okay, sorry, but again that's like two thirds of the way into the movie by that point. And again I mean in I was talking about this with with Dustin on Bollywood Cine Him a Club, another show that I do, and we were talking about Tigers into High and the villain in that movie is not a threat when he doesn't have a gun, and just yeah, if he's not a gun's not a threat. He's not a threat, which means he has to hire other He's just like Hans Grouper, right, Hans Grouper is not much of a threat when he doesn't have a gun, you're one of them. Like, I mean, that's what we're talking about. When he has a gun though, he's you know, confident and in his ability to kill you.

And Chris christoffers the same way. So the moment he Steven Seagal gets his hands on him is not going to be rewarding. But the difference between Christofferson and Rickman is Rickman's character was written very intelligent. His character is smart, but he also surrounds himself with fucking goons that are memorable too, yes, and he usually has them to do his dirty work, right, And in this movie, there aren't memorable goons and none of them are physical threats either. They're basically no names.

It's like Henchman number one. They might as well be called no. But I mean I'm talking about like the country Western people, like, they're not threats. Is Randy Travis a fucking threat? Is Travis Trip a threat?

Mark Cawley is a skinny motherfucker in this movie? And I'm like the small dude. He's a small dude. And no, I'm sorry, I will never ever buy Randy Travis as a villainous threat to anything. No, I mean the only person I kind of halfway believe is Stephen Lang.

But that's because he's a bull. Because Stephen Lang, yeah, he's a Lang has proven himself as a villain actor. Yeah, but I wouldn't say at this point he was known for being a villain. I'm just talking about like screen presence. He's a bigger guy.

He has a bee can stand Look, he can stand up against Seagal and not be dwarfed by him because Seagal is like, what six foot three or four. It's not a small guy. That's the other thing. Nobody is going to fight Segal believably and be a foot shorter than him. It has to be someone who's about his eye, just like Bchwartzenegeran Stallone.

You can't have someone who's smaller than them fight them and go, oh, this is a fight that I don't already know the outcome. But Chris, it goes to the fact that there's no tension in that regard because we all know Stephen is not going to get hit, not once. They're never ever going to land a punch, They're never ever going to land an injury on him. Yeah, but this is us with twenty win. This is us with twenty twenty vision though, like, yeah, I still think back then people probably knew that.

I yeah, but I think it's I mean, it just speaks to a bigger issue. It's a bigger issue where that's just one of the easy ways to kind of highlight it. It's just a lack of self awareness about what Steven Seagal's character needs to be up against. He should never be up against people that are these Eric Bogosian types, or the Alan Rickman types, or the fucking Chris Christofferson types. He should be going up against someone like Vernon Wells with Commando, right, someone who someone who when you see him up against Seagal standing next to him or tussling, you say to yourself, this is someone who is a match for this person.

And look, I'm not saying it's because Steven Seagal can't fight someone who's smaller than him. It's because Steven Seagal is a bigger guy height wise. And it's just it's very obvious when it's not someone who is physically of the same kind of build or stature, and it's just hard to it's hard to get me to believe it. And then you just in every single one of these movies. It's like William Sadler, for fox sake, that guy's not intimidating to Steven Seagal, Bogosian, Chris Kristoff, pon.

None of these actors are intimidating because they're just actors. And you got to give him someone to actually like play off of physically, like a Bill Duke or a Vernon Wells or someone who is Ventura, even someone who's his size. Well, another thing is it's hard to do that when they keep throwing henchman at shoot with no names. They don't they don't give him even when the henchman or his size, it doesn't matter because you don't know who the fuck they are. They're just random henchman, and he's just beating up random henchman.

And really there's like, you know, they're not a threat because they don't even have a name. No well and again, I mean the ones that do have a name, like his son are just kind of again like poorly, poorly written. His son's a pussy, yeah, but he's a poorly written character. He's like he's a very generic stereotypical character that you see, he's the spoiled brat who daddy to fix everything, right, I mean, he thinks, he thinks he's he thinks he's a big boy like his dad and eventually gets brought down to earth by Seagal. Seeing that another Seagal movie, seeing that in another act.

Yeah, me too. I mean there are a lot of shit here that you're like, oh, I've seen that before, right, So again, like it works on My point is like it works other places, and it works other places to the point where you don't point it out. But in this movie, Brad Hunt is getting not given much to do. I don't think it is a reflection on him as an actor. That was Oh that was okay, I forgot who played the other henchman, Mark Coullie, Ernie Lively?

Oh okay, well see that's I don't even remember the henchman's names. Ernie Lively I believe is related to Blake Lively in some respect. Oh, I thought you meant Robin. Well they are related. Robin and Blake are related.

So that's that's his daughter. M So really yeah, Look, I think for me, ultimately, with a movie like this where you have this quote environmental message unquote, and again we've seen this already now is to go. I think I think, well, I think the original I think the originality is neither here nor there. I think it's done better here than in on Deadly Ground. It feels less tongue clicking and kind of like, oh, you should feel bad because you use oil.

It's just like it's bad to dump toxic waste places. Can't we all agree on that? It's like, yes, And let me ask you something. Was the subplot about marg Helgenburger as a child being molested by her brother necessary? Wasn't just her brother as her brother and her dad, because that's implied why she killed their dad.

No, but Steven, well, no, no, no, Steven's a gollum basically figures everything out. I don't know how the fuck he did it. I mean just because the micro film. But he saw the microfilm at the library with her talking about her murdering the father. Well that well, the brother actually killed the father, but wanted her to take the blame because she was a juvenile, nothing had happened to her and it was self defense when in fact, I okay, I lang the way I interpreted how Lang was Steve and Seagal was telling stories that the father didn't do anything, and it was the brother who did it, and the father found out and got pissed, and that's when he killed him.

It wasn't the father, Mollstinger, but Stephen Blank's character was musting her. Oh wow, yeah, okay, that's what That's what I got from Steven Seagal telling what actually happened, Like the father got pissed when he figure that out. I asked you that just a few minutes. I'm answering with a question, how did he figure that out? I have no idea because he was very fucking specific in like what actually happened?

Oh my god, how does the move? The movie really doesn't explain that very well, does it. It really explained a lot of things. It kind of expects it kind of expects you, is the audience to fill in the gaps? Yeah, But then it shows us the villains hiding in a few inches away in case we don't know that it's them there, And you know, I mean, it was just being Seagal.

It was just Steven Seagal being seven Seagal again, you know. I mean, it's not a bad not in a bad way. I didn't just like this movie because of Steven Seagal. I actually neither, no and that. But here's the thing.

A lot of the movies we watch, it's it's he is almost a non issue in them, right. I mean a lot of the things that we watch that are contemporary are you know, Absolution or China Salesman or Attrician where he is advertised as a big part and he's not a big part. I mean some of these movies he is. But in a lot of these movies, at least the more recent ones, he is not the main actor, but he's advertised as such. It's a little bit of whiplash to watch a movie where he's advertised as the main actor and he is the main actor.

Because again, at this point in ninety seven, say what you will about the movie, but his performance is not a problem with the movie. It is definitely not the problem. He might be a little wooden, but I feel like at this point, if you're complaining about Stephen Sagale being wooden, I don't think you've seen other Stephen Sagal movies that were coming out before this one. Is because he's kind of always just weird. But like being weird and being wooden are two different things.

If you have an actor who's normally not wooden, and all of a sudden they're giving Stilt a dialogue, yeah, there woulden. But if you have someone who is always kind of weird, like he is idiosyncratic, one might say, yeah, then it's not him being Stilted. That's just who he is and you just have to deal with it. Well, it's like it's like I said earlier, this is the film where he tries his hardest to be the most relatable and likable. I think he kind of comes off that way in a really big way.

I mean he does a lot of sweet things. From Mark Helgenberger's character, I mean, I mean that there's a there's she sells honey to make a living, and apparently she doesn't sell much honey, so when she buys groceries, he has to sacrifice some things. So then Steven said, oh, goes up to the counter, says, okay, I'll he takes the things that she took out, and he buys them, and he goes, you know what, I'll take all the honey too. He buys every jar of honey, and you know, so basically he's you know, doing this quote unquote romantic or whatever. Again, it would be creepy if someone else was doing it.

We were talking about this earlier with the whole Dobbler Dahmer theory from how he met your mother. If I did that, if I bought every single merchandise of a of a girl, I like, that's a red flag. And he buys all her honey she sees in the back of his truck, which, by the way, why didn't she see it when she's putting the stuff in the in the back in the first place. I don't know. Cinema sins gotcha right here, buddy, right here?

What kind of commentary are you up? This is what what do they say? This is what passes for commentary on the internet these days. I'm kids and their relationship is is not believable in the well And look here's the thing though, I mean, I think we could both agree. Steven Ziagale now is maybe not my cup of tea.

Steven Seagale nineteen ninety seven a good looking guy. It's not that it's because Steven Zagale is like some sort of hideous goblin of a human being and Mark Helgenberger is at ten. That's not what's going on. We're not trying to make that statement. It's just that when they're on screen together, they're not believable because they don't have any chemistry.

Their personality types clash well in the character that she's portraying. I find it hard to believe that she would really kind of be into someone like Seagal because he's just kind of again he's he's nice. But there is this moment where she's like, hey, was any of this real or were you just doing this that you could not get in my pants? But get it my filing cat, and he goes he goes straight to no, now that's that's not the same where he says, I'm thinking about moving here, buying a little house, and no, that's that's he's talking with Christofferson. Yeah.

Yeah, when they tell him to get out of town. No, but she puts him on the spot and he's like, hey, you know, am I you know, was this real or was this all put on? And he, you know, is like, no, I like you and it's like okay, like and he doesn't he's not like, you know, uh, he doesn't feel pandering when he says it. It feels genuine. Yeah, but I just it her and him just that that don't.

I just don't think it works. They just don't have any chemistry. And I don't think it's their fault. I think it's the script. No, it's it definitely the script.

I mean, here's the thing about this, this podcast we're doing. When we critique films of Steven Seagal, we're not necessarily critiquing Seagal because you have to have a film around him for him to work with, and unfortunately he just gets these shitty scripts all the time. I don't know, this is a shitty script. I think this movie just like I don't think that. Look, here's the thing.

The love the romance in this movie is forced. That's what it is. There's no need for it. It's almost inconsequential to the plot of the movie. It's inconsequential to the main A storyline, the A storyline of the city.

The city is threatened. It doesn't matter if she's being threatened because she's part of the city as a whole. The city is being threatened, and then walk Offer is being threatened by a character dumping toxic waste into it. Right, The romance is like the B or C plot, Like he doesn't mad it doesn't even need to be applied. It doesn't need to be in the movie.

It's forced. The writer didn't know how to write two characters a man and a woman and not have them because the audience, because he thought the audience would just expect them to get together in the end. But my point is, you don't have to have either. You don't have to have her movie. That's what I mean, right, No, I again, this is this is in the era of the nineties where every movie had to have a romance.

Well, I mean, if you were a movie and you had a lead man and a lad woman and they weren't villains, they were going to end up together. But she's not. There's not the lead in this movie. She's like giving the lead woman. She's the biggest female part in the film, right, But my point is, because she's the biggest female part in the movie, if you take her out of the movie, there's literally nothing else.

So she feels very tacked onto the movie because she doesn't even fact like her brother kind of factors into the plot, but not really like again, she we live in a time now where you can make an action movie without the hero needing a love interest, and this and this is a movie where the love interest is so unnecessary that it kind of bogs the movie down, and it kind of doesn't really gel because Mark Helgenberger and Steven said all don't have any chemistry, and so the movie would benefit from big play them and sister and I would lose nothing in the plot. It would actually probably work because you're not expecting there to be a believable romance. Look, this in a lot of ways feeds into things that we've talked about with more recent movies where there's a like an absolution where a woman is kissing Seagal and she looks uncomfortable doing it.

And again, like I think now it's probably informed by a lot of stuff, but in nineteen ninety seven, he didn't look comfortable in that relationship with her because I don't think Steven Seagal is the kind of character and character actor in a lot of ways, because he's more a character actor than a lead actor. He feels like the kind of character actor and actor who doesn't need a female character to play off of. He is a big enough personality and performance that those actors will get in the way of his performance because he just let him go on his own like to think of the first couple of days. They were good without female companionship. I mean they were there, but they again weren't great.

We talked about it then they were just felt kind of as forced into the movie then as they do now. Steven Seagal movies don't need a love interest, and not fully fans of Steven Seagal don't care. They don't go to Seagal film to see him hook up with the with the lady. They see him. They want to see his home, you know, for him to kick ass and you know, destroy the bad guy.

They don't see it to see if a believable romance happens between him and Kelly ba Brock, or him and Mark Helgenberger, him and Eric Elleniac, which, by the way, that was that was the most forced of them all, by the way, I yeah, I mean that's the way. That's the most off putting of all of that. And watching him kiss his female leads. Maybe it's because we know what we know now, but it just it it feels like you're watching that scene from Back to the Future Part two where Marty is watching that video about um Biff Cannon and it gets to the part where he kisses Marty's mother after they got married. Sure, that's how uncomfortable it feels.

That's how awkward it. It's like all the all the girls in that that he's uh the co star with him are Leah Thompson in Back to the Future Part two and he's fifth Cannon because you know, they don't want to be there like the last film we watched. Yeah, absolutely fucking nowhere, That's what I'm saying, Like it doesn't It's it when when we're commenting on how out of place it feels, it's better just to not include it. And honestly, that's kind of where I'm at with like Steven Seagal movies in romance subplots, like they feel how much do you think, say, I don't know. This is again, this is the nineties that there were love interests in all these movies.

There's love interesting on deadly ground. There was love interest like you mentioned in under Siege. There wasn't one in under Siege two, but that's because that was his fucking niece and if it hadn't been his knees, it would have been a love interest and he hit on her apparently behind the scenes though, But yeah, okay, right, but like that's it. But like again, like The under Siege two might be the best handling of romance we've seen a Siagal because it doesn't force anything. Yeah, I mean he flirsted with the bartender, but nothing really comes and that's believable.

But like in this movie, like Mark Helgenberger would not be into someone like him, and he would not be into someone like her because he doesn't need to be. It's like they try to make him more human by having him have a relationship. But I think it exposes how not unhuman his character is, but how just much of a character. His character is not a really fully realized person, because again, Steven Seagal is playing a character even when he's just doing himself. That's such an idiosyncratic person that you just that's Segal.

He's just like we said, he's just playing himself in these movies. That's our perception of it. And his earlier films, like in a couple of his films he was married. His character is married, and that's a little more believable because that confector into the plot of the film. Sharon Stone, right, yeah, sure, she was barely in that film, right, she was which one was without for Justice, I think so one of the ones where he gets I don't know, all those movies kind of run together anyway, But yeah, she was good in it, but she wasn't in it enough to matter, just like Mark Elgenberger should have been in this movie.

If that was the point. It's just they don't like he Segal doesn't need Segal doesn't need anything because he's so specific of the kinds of things that work for his movies, and romance has no point or part in any of these success Well, like I said, neither does the molestation subplot. Well, I don't even know what the point of that was. There was no point, That's what I'm saying. But what's just well, why added to the movie is my my quest.

They maybe they wanted to add a little dark, um disturbing. They're trying to lean on the fact that it's taking place in Kentucky, Like, wow, that's just tasteless, man, But that's it is kind of taste us like a movie set in the South where a brother is molesting his sister. That's a writer who has run out of ideas. I mean, it's just you just go to the incest trope when it comes to the South, right if yeah, and somehow like that's that's that's fucking low hanging fruit. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna be one to overlook making fun of the South as someone who spent a large portion of their young adults in the South.

But that's low hanging fruits. But if you're going to try to make a serious action film, don't make Deliverance jokes. My brother's sean to bang me. Yeah, it's like, what is it the Beverly fucking Hillbillies? Like Stephen Lank.

Let's talk about Stephen Lank's character, Um, yes, Land of the film. He comes into the film about what halfway through a little less before half about the second like kind of maybe like towards the beginning middle of the second meet him. When you first meet him, he's wary of Sigal, but he's not like you don't suspect you don't suspect anything? What, No, he couldn't. He comes into the scene like a fucking asshole.

He's that dude that shows up and he's like, who the fuck are you and why are you in my house? And it's like he's a friend. Some people but some people could suspect he's just trying to be protecting his sister. I'm just saying, I feel it feels creepy. Right off the bat, it does feel creepy, but I could see how some people would think he's just trying to be more protective.

But then it starts his his his the cracks start to show because all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he goes, you know, I've had a change of heart. Let me show you where the mind is. I want to take these bastards down. I'll testify and then immediately villain mode like I'm going to take him down to the mind of bury him in the rubble. And before that, he's at the house with Mark Helliga Burger and he's man handling her and a whore as well.

Yeah, comes slaps her, calls her a horror. She runs for him and locks herself in the block herself in the bathroom, and he locks her in the bathroom. Well, no, he locks her and why is there a lock outside but out inside? Whatever? Um he locks her in the bathroom and she's there for like hours before Steven Seagal, you know, I don't know if he would have ever she would have gotten out if he hadn't gone, well, he was gonna go to her house anyway.

I don't know, but it was just Yeah, I love how convoluted it is. I really do. Well. I appreciate how convoluted this movie is, because well then you have then you have the mind scene, where again, who's trying to get him Henchman, no named Henchman, But now it's it's fucking um, it's Stephen Lang and this big burly you know, bald dude. And how does Steven Seagal start?

Uh, he dumps the chemical on the guy's face. Was it lying or thee bro puts cyanide on him? Yeah? So basically, and by the way Steven Sigal, he steps in the cyanide. Wouldn't that have done something to his shoe?

No? I don't think so. I don't know if cyanide is corrosive, I don't. I don't know what cyanide does to just being in contact or even near it, but I probably it's not a good idea to be even near it when it's being dumped on someone. That would stand to reason.

Yes, yeah, so, I mean he does his usual kicks the ass of the Henchman, you know, goes to you know, the shootout, um, and what does he explodes the mind? No, he doesn't explode the mind. They were going to blow the mine up with him in it and him in the mind. Yeah, and he gets out. It's the slowest I've seen a guy escape a mind in a film in a while.

But like I kept into myself, there's no way he could have gotten away, not a fucking chance. Like the way he was running, in the direction he was running, I thought, no, this no, And then I thought, well, if there's already the opening there and it doesn't look like it's being affected by the explosion, he could have gotten out anyway. So they're playing is flawed from the get go. Well they were expecting to trap him and then get out. Yeah, just look like the problem with this movie ultimately becomes out convoluted.

It gets to where the to where everybody is in on it because we have you know, Oh, it's it's just these coupled dudes that report to Chris Christofferson, and then it's all the cops in the town. Oh, and then it's the FBI agents, and then it's his partner in the field, in the field office. Yeah, it's like everybody is all of a sudden in on it. And it's like, okay, so Chris Christofferson is like all seeing, all knowing, far reaching, Yeah, but he can't but he can't handle it in his own like hometown. Like it feels like Chris Christoffers once again, so predictable, but he's just isn't the long line of these like idiot villains that Steven Seagal has to play that are compared like the twist about his his office agent being part of it because he calls the office, he calls the field agent to get him and her protective get her protective custody.

So he sends out Randy Travis and the other guy and shit like that. And I thought to myself as he was talking to the guy on the phone, I was like, yeah, he's gonna turn on him. Yeah this no, this, No, he's a turncoat. Now, there's no way. He's not a good he's not a bad guy.

It was so predictable, man, I mean, and you're right, I was getting sick of the whole a turn who's the turncoat and who's for real? Well everybody was, I mean, everybody ends up being in on it outside of I guess like the girls who work at the store and the stand, and I guess like maybe states prosecutors Like I just again, like we have ultimately a conclusion to a film where a man who is no way shape or for him intimidating has Stevensagall come up to him and shoot him and then grab him and go you're going to jail. And it was not even a fight, man, Well that's my point. But again, like there's not a but again, the contrast that was something like die Hard, where Alan Rickman and Bruce Willis don't have a hand to hand fight.

They they exchange words and then and then Bruce Willis shots Alan Rickman is more is smarter than that. He knows that he can't defeat him by me. I also think that that movie just has better like secondary villains, Like all all of the people in that movie are very memorable, like that you should have shot when you are ducking like all that shit advice, right, all of that is a lot more. Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's plenty of memorable villains in that movie that have nothing to do with you know, them getting ten minutes of screen time. It's just they're given an opportunity to be interesting and they make the most of it.

In this movie, they could have done that. They have Randy Travis, they have Travis Tritt, they have Mark Hawley, someone who we know is good in this kind of role from the Punisher movie. He kind of steals that movie in that scene. That's the most one of the most memorable scenes in that movie. I feel like if you, I say, but I feel like, if you don't know anything about that movie but you've seen something from it, it's gotta be Well.

He's featured in the trailer, so that's right. But also that song, like again, like the trailer and the song are pretty memorable. And he's really good in that movie for the little bit of time he's given, and they don't do anything with him here. They don't do anything with any of the villains here. Basically, they they're just there to be.

They're just there to be. One of those inflatable punch bag things you have when you were a kid, where you punch him and they come right back up again. You just keep punching him and punching and punching him. Because that's all they did. There was no there was no through line it was just them.

Like I said, it was a circle. They try to beat till they get defeated. They try it again, they get defeated, they try it again. You think at some point they'd say, fuck this, it's not worth it. Well they do.

Eventually Chris Christofferson's son turns on them. Well yeah, he's the one that turn state's evidence that gets Chris Christofferson arrested. And by the way, I have expected the two agents that sick ahead with him at the casino I them to turn them at the last minute. I mean again, why didn't they Because it had enough man, because it was not even it wasn't even a climax. Man.

Because no, that's what I'm saying, Like there is unlike Diehard. Diehard has an anti climax, right, and a lot of in a lot of ways, Like I mean, what happens before he gets to Hans with him jumping off I mean that's what he I always forget how late into the movie he jumps off the building, but he jumps off the building very quickly before Hans grouper. I mean it's like very close to the end of the movie, right, Yeah, So that's the climax. And then Hans Gruber dying is just kind of like, that's the one. It's a cherry on top right the difference.

Yeah, it's not an action scene in this movie or that movie. But before this finale of this movie with Chris Kristofferson, he just beats up some dudes in a bar, like pretty much. I mean, Chris Kristofferson's character basically just plays games at his fucking casino or whatever. He's a very small casino. Might I add, yeah, he doesn't do anything.

I mean, he's wasted. He's an Actually, he's a decent actor. I don't understand what they were thinking, Like you cast, It's not like they just cast some of the dude in this film that they waste. Terry Dean Stanton is a great actor, market number, a great actress. Stephen Lange amazing acts.

Like they're casting Florian Persic Junior here. They're casting people who have curbside appeal from their name alone, like Chris Christofferson. They don't do anything with it. I don't get it. Why why would they agree to be in this well?

Why have so many country western stars in this movie? I don't get it. It's like it's a very strange occurrence that there are this many in this movie. And oh, by the way, it's not like they're all over the soundtrack. It's just like there's like a Marty Stewart scene.

I guess it's because again they thought, well, this movie said in Kentucky so and maybe they wanted to sell soundtracks. But like again, like they don't. They're not given enough to do. They're not given enough time to be interesting. I mean, you have enough.

You have enough time to spend on Mark Helgenberger and Stevens a goal having a half baked romance. You could have let Randy Travis or Travis Tritt or god again, even Mark Mark Colley give them five minutes more or anything. Because again, like I'm saying, in die Hard, that guy and die Hard the guy under the table. That's one scene and that's it. But that guy is super memorable to the point where I can tell you what he's wearing, kind of what he looks like and that.

But that's a character actor that's in this movie. You have actual entertainers. Again, they're not at they might not be quote actors unquote full time, but Travis Trait and Randy Travis know how to be entertaining, So let them do something. Don't just have them all right, just stand there and don't say anything, or just you know, do them. I'm here to take you away with me, Like all right, but here's here's here's the thing.

I think Randy Travis was brought on for cameo appeal. So people who watching the movie will be like, holy shit, that's Randy Travis. You know, said who in nineteen ninety seven? Though what who is saying that in nineteen ninety seven? I don't know.

Some people are en what what in hell do you want? Bro Man, you gotta you don't cast you don't. You don't cast actors in movies in roles unintentionally. That's what a casting director is for. So they cast a bunch of country western stars in this movie for whatever reason.

And that is the one of the few things I remember about this movie is it has a random assortment of mid nineties country Western singers from the literal villain of the movie down and it's super weird and they don't do anything with it. And that seems like, again a missed opportunity because the novels, but the novelty of it is not enough. There needed to be more to it, and again they knew that. In The Punisher, they cast Mark Coullie and the Yeah he can play get are and sing carry a tune, but they also gave him a look in that movie that was interesting, that gave him a lines of dialogue that weren't just hey, I'm gonna get you. Yeah, I am gonna make sure you don't get me.

Like there you go, Like he's exactly. He's very one dimensional in this movie, and everybody is the only person that doesn't come off as one dimensional is kind of Steven Seagal. I mean, Mark Cowley has a bit of They give most of it to Seagal, and they give some of it to Mark Helgenberger and Harry Dean stand is miscast in this movie. He is too good for this movie. I don't understand the role he's playing because at times it seems like he's supposed to be like slow maybe is what they would say in the nineties, but like, is that all a put on so that he could meet Steven Seagals.

Okay, but the movie should have done a better job of explaining. They did that a lot in the nineties. Sure you find out the slow guy isn't as slow as you think he is. Like in fucking Disturbing Behavior. Have you seen that movie?

No, Okay, William William Sadler isn't it. He plays the janitor of this high school, and basically it's a film how they're taking like the the fucking rejects and the stoners and all the undesirables of the high school and they're kind of Stepford wives ing them into being perfect students. That's the plot. And so he plays the janitor who who's kind of wise to it but kind of just keeps to himself because he doesn't want to, you know. But then James Marsden figures out because he sees the book by Kurt Vonnegut that he's reading, and he figures out, Oh, he's not a slow janitor.

He's not crazy. He knows what he's doing. So in that was the trope in the nineties, you know, it's like and it just it just it just just gets tired. I agree, And I mean Travis Tripp being in a film basically he's just doing what he usually did, and he did a lot in ninety somber he would just play a guy who's um just in a scene where he's singing and the stuff is happening around him, like he's the music background for the scene, like another film he did that in with Sergeant Bilko, where that's the only thing he did in the film was singing songs around the scene, and that was pretty just lazy way to use him. I mean he does, he has acted before.

You know, they just don't want to. They don't want to take the time to make them interesting. They think they'll get by on name or condition alone. His movie's fine. I think it's okay.

I think it's I think it's fine. I mean again, look, this is the last Steven Sagle movie to come out theaters, so none of half Fast Dead. We got halfast Dad coming up a count. This is the movie that is his last starring role. It's released in theaters, and if we view it through that lens, this movie is a failure because he it doesn't do a good enough career with Warner Brothers.

I think it was sustained problems from on Deadly Ground to then this well. He kept having failing returns, so they figure we're not going to renew with this guy. He's you know, just let him go and Look, I haven't seen the next movie that we're watching, The Patriot. That's not the next episode we're doing, but that's the next one of these movies, the older ones. I've never seen it.

I'm interested to see it because it's his first you know, straight to video as it was called then, and my hope is that it will be of the similar production value of these straight to theater actual quote productions. Yeah, but well it's got it's got Gaylor Sartine in it, and I like Gaylor Sartine. I just I look, this movie is not terrible. I think this movie has gotten a bad rap for a lot of deserved reasons. But I think it's a good Steven Seagal performance.

And I think if we're talking about Steven Seagal on a Steven Seagal podcast and we talk about his performance, and his performance is one of the most Yeah, it's not bad. He's he is perfectly likable. Again, his romance doesn't work, but he has a character. He has some good one liners. The whole call your proctologists and rubbed the ointment on whatever hole hurts the most is a good line.

Well, the whole line about going to prison and calling his friend you know too. Yeah, like all that's great, and that's that's good action stuff that you expect for these kinds of movies. And he's actually believable here. But this is the most likable he's ever been. Yeah, yeah, I mean those characters in those early movies were more just kind of like gruff dickheads.

Okay, well just let me just say he's the most charming he's been. Yeah. I mean again, I would agree. I would I wasn't doubting you when you said likable. I would agree.

I mean he's pretty likable. I mean again, like the romance with Mark Helgenberg doesn't work, but his friendship with Harry Dean Stanton is not unbelievable and they work together. Honestly, if they had taken Mark Helgenberg out of the movie and just given him a Harry Deeane Stanton more time, that would have been I think that would have worked. Born or just make the character like Stephen Lang just Stephen lying and not her, But then again that wouldn't make sense. I mean again, you just have Stephen.

You could have Stephen Lange be the secondary antagonist. He could still play a similar character where it's like he turns on Segal, but you don't see it coming as opposed to right right, so you can kind of get something out of that. And then Sigals like I knew you were you know, Dona turn on me whatever of fuck right, Like there you go, and you don't need Mark Helgenberger, but you still keep Stephen laying and you don't waste Mark Helgenberger's time with a bad role that doesn't really serve her because she's a great actress. Like you said, I again, everybody in this movie is a great actor in everything else that they've been in. And I don't think that some of them in this movie are bad.

I just think a lot of them are not given nothing to do them very well. Now, Steven Segal is kind of the only one, and that's because again he's given like of the screen time. So final final thoughts on Fire down below Trum. I mean, it's not the worst film of his career. It's not the best film.

It's a mediocre kind of middle ground, but it's definitely a good Sigal performance if you want to see Sigal trying to be a romantic and like silver age Segal not Golden age. But it's it's silver age. But like in his other films, he never tries to get the girl. This film, he's trying to do these roman antick and you know sweet gestures. I don't.

I don't blame the actors. I blame the script and the editing and look for me. I think that this is in the conversation for the better Cigo movies, because his performance is so good that it does kind of carry most of the problems of the movie on its shoulder and comes away again, comes away, and it closer to it being a win and less a failure like so many of the more recent movies that he's done well. I said the same thing, I said, it's not the actors, it's the script. This is none of the actor's fault, none of it.

They all give the performances they were supposed to give. I mean, very rarely is it the actor's faults though, well, yeah, very rarely is it the actor's faults. Yeah, But he didn't. I was surprised because Jeb Stewart has written great films, but maybe his script was hacked to pieces. His movie is pretty convoluted to and again, like the message, like the whole thing of the movie.

Is like it's not really, it's not that interesting, Like, oh, they're dumping oil or dumping noise. Now, man, because we already had on Deadly Ground, Why are we doing this again? Yeah, I don't know, I don't know. I don't have a clue. Again, like they there are like very few environmental action movies, but two of them exist in the nineties, and two of them both happened to start Steven Seagal, Yeah, because he was currently big on like the environments on Deadly Ground was more preachy, a lot more preachy.

But this movie is Look, this movie. A lot of the problems with this movie stem from the plot being kind of just not that exciting, and then everything stemming from that, and then you have problems occurring because it's set somewhere specific, so you start doing weird specific things to tailor it to where it's set. I just don't think it's the old thing. It's the same old thing. It's basically kind of like recycled material from other films.

Well, and again like not told in the particularly new, exciting, interesting or unique ways. It just yeah, it was not like there was not really much talk about the company itself that was polluting or you know how why they picked this place or because it's his home. Why he would pollute his hometown makes no sense to me. But okay, it makes no sense, like you would literally dump it anywhere. But that, Yeah, and it just the villain.

You don't know shit about him, to be honest with me, to be honest with you, I mean, because he's in the film a lot, but he don't really know anything about him. He likes women and he has women hanging around him all the time. Another Nuggies, But that's it. That was another nineties trope though. Yeah, and he just doesn't have a He doesn't have much of a he doesn't have an original personality.

He's every other fucking nineties centman that you've seen, you know, the big corporate he's he could be inner inner h Inner, matched with fucking Michael Kane. I mean again, but that's my Michael Kane was trying to do the same thing that Hans Gruber was doing. Hans Gruber Alan Rickman created the character that these characters actors, but they're not smart, they're not smart enough. I don't I don't know what it is. I think that that only worked once in a lot of ways.

But the Hans Gruber one played that Alan Rickman, who's a fucking great actor. What so is Michael Kane. But let me finish. It's the script. And he made that character very formidable because he was smart, he was cunning, and he had okay, he had this plan mapped out like to the letter when he when he took over Knakatomi Plaza, he knew what he was going for.

He had it to the you know, he had it timed out. Basically, he was more he was very you know, methodical. The villain in this one, there's no there's no sense of wit to him. There's no sense of cleverness or formidability. It's just he's the big He's the he's the the big villain in the video game that you have to defeat, the easy villain in the video game you have to defeat.

And like I said, going tote tote to Hans Gruber with them in the film, he was he was going up against Hank Gruber the whole time. It was a mind the game. You know him and Hans group where we're playing, we're playing mind games with each other. Yeah, I mean again, I don't know if having Seagal and Christophers and interacting more in the movie would have helped anything. I just don't.

I just don't think the movie. I just well, I just don't think that Seagal and these kinds of villains works work. And I don't think that no, because to me, we just want to see him up against the villain that is equal to him, or it's more believable. Yeah, you don't want to put him up against an old guy in his like sixties or seventies who is not known for being a tough guy, right, because Seagal's at this point's a tough guy, and all throughout the film he just has his henchmen do his dirty work for him, so you know, he's no threat physically or you know. Look, I like yourself.

I this movie's fine. I think again, we've seen word, we've seen better. But look the next movie that we talk about. I'm interested because it's it's a supporting role. It's not a role that Segal is the star of, and that's gutshot straight.

And he plays a character named Paulie Trunks. And I've seen the poster and he looks strange in the movie. So I don't know we'll see. I mean, this is like, this is the last traditional Seagal movie we're watching more or less, this is the last movie that's like this. So you know, it's sad.

It's a kind of a sad moment because we're finally here where we know that the movies are not going to ever be like I mean, we'll have like two movies that kind of exit wounds in from the Cradle, Cradle to the Grave or whatever the hell. The other one is like those movies are the last two that kind of he's in in theaters other than Machete. But you know, this is his last starring role from nineteen ninety seven, see almost fucking twenty plus years ago now, so shit, yeah, it's wild if you think about it, it's been it's been twenty No, it's been twenty six years. Twenty six years since he had a starring lead role in a movie that came out in theaters. So basically, you know, I mean a fully fledged adult who can vote and drink.

So so until the next time you hear Trevor and my voice talking all about Steven Sagale, you can find the two of us at weirdingwaymedia dot com. Where this show is available for your listening pleasure. From episode one to this one, Trevor did mention that he's on episodes of The Culture Cast and the Bollywood Cinema Club, and I think that's it. Those are the only guests, right and projection booths as well, which is the jewel in the crown of this network, because they would say so yeah, until then, Trevor, people can find you on social media, Bad Vertigo. You can find me on social media, but I'm not going to tell you where because social media sucks.

As for this show, you can find us wherever you get podcasts like rate and review the show, because that's what helps us find our audience and as always, catch you on the next step.