8: China Salesman

Mmm, hello and welcome to the Onsgal Podcast. I am your host, Trevor Gumbole. I am joined as always by my co host, as one might say, the China salesman. You are joined by the China salesman. Oh oh, dear god, Trevor, I want to have yourself for a quick to Ye.

Yeah, this is me Chris, the co host of this podcast. And this is the final episode because after this, well can we can we really watch anything else? After watching this? We are going to be talking about the most recent, one of the more recent Steven Seagal films. Now, let's just get this out of the way.

Trevor, you're you're gonna agree with me. This is the least Steven Seagal movie we've watched so far. I don't think you can even legally be called a Steven Seagal film. I don't know. The posters have Mike Tyson and Steven Seagal on him.

Mike Tyson's in it more than Steven Seagal. Is Seagal? I should have counted, but he was only in there like five minutes. Yes, that correct? So yeah, on this episode of On Seagal, we are going to be talking about twenty seventeens China Salesman, otherwise known as Deadly Contract, otherwise known as Tribal Warfare, otherwise known as the movie that advertised itself as when Mike Tyson and Steven Seagal would fight, and that was the first ten minutes of the movie.

Are you here to retreat the skald? Whoever wins the bidding wins respect. You see, I will only kid from mister yet. We need to find ye Jan and kill him. Oh now, let's all welcome mister Yung Jian, the great China Salesman, new leader to South.

The Block government murdered him. The last two companies entering the final phase are empty M Telecom M d H Telecom Girl. Are you determined to put each telecom edit disadvantage? How can the H compete with the MPM? Your technology is way behind?

This is unfired engine. It's now same as Susannah wants this bidding to be in sinking with the ladiest the technology. I suggest the witching standard two staging. Whoever wins the biddings respect. I wouldn't make you come, miss yet, You'll not welcome here.

China sells Man. June Us feted from China reach the source of Abga the years ago or a single horse play all of why not know from the South is not? This is your chance on the constrous communication collapses fire, but the entire telet communication will flock is down. It's just fight with them in in fixive MISTAKESM I need a stunt, want to go with someone does not want to different? You're not welcome here.

China sellsman. Oh god, so let's talk go Let's start from the beginning. Will Yeah, how many? I don't usually do this because I think I have a pretty good memory. I took notes about this film.

Yeah, and I got forty three notes taking about this film. My first note is how many fucking companies produce this thing? A lot of Chinese companies, including Glowden Rod Films Glowden because they misspelled Golden. Yeah. It's so It's directed by Tan, being written by Tan, being with rewrites by Scott Salter.

And so before we talk about the movie, let's just get this out of the way now. Lee dong Hui plays Yan Jian, the titular China salesman. And then they call him every chance they ever again, which he keeps telling them my name is Jan John. It reminds me of Chin Man Chinman from Attrition. But so yeah, let's just get this out of the way now.

This movie has Mike Tyson and Steven Sagal in it barely. It is a out lee dong Hui as Yan Jian, So let's just get that out of the way right now. He's an IT engineer for a phone company bidding on a contract in Africa, that's the plot of the movie, and these other companies are trying to sabotage him to get the contract themselves. This is for they've because they've invented a three G network or something like that. They just have a three G network, so I guess it's network.

North Africa's not covered in cell towers and doesn't have cell phone signal coverage, so DH China or whatever the hell it's called. They're bidding for the opportunity to build towers in Africa, which is obviously very lucrative. It's a couple million dollar contract. And you have this character of Jon who goes to North Africa to help his company win and he runs into all these weirdo people in Africa. Yeah, and he gets embroiled in like a civil War almost Yeah, all for a cell phone company.

Yep. It's like Verizon meets Michael Bay. It's a very strange plot. Yeah, because there's more time given to three G networks and particularities of phone and telecom than I think this movie should have. Yeah, at least a movie like this should have quote unquote.

I had to turn on subtitles because I couldn't understand it damn thing people were saying because they were talking so low and it was so that the audio was so terribly done. The dubbing was god awful. Oh my god, Oh the a dr dude, Oh the ADR in this movie. I was taking shots of like short videos of the movie and sending it to some friends of mine when I was watching it, because, like some of the ADR is just this movie is not only a bad movie structurally and from a storytelling perspective, but it is also a bad movie from a technical perspective. It is it's nice to look at, but in twenty twenty or the late twenty twenties or late teens, I guess that's not impressive.

Anybody can go spend money on a camera like well, the Taholic Year movie looks good in twenty twenty. Even the technology there, even the technologies are trying to sell in the film, is not impressive. No, it's three G network. We already had five G in twenty seventeen, or we were close. Yeah, we had way faster.

I mean, I guess maybe impressive for the for the town they were in, for the African country they were in, but like unnamed African country, unnamed Africa country, they just you know, slap, it's an Africa still. Of course, poverty and civil war. That's all people know about Africa. That's all the filmmaker knew about Africa, was like poverty and civil war, even though Africa is a lush, beautiful land. But you know, they just want to focus on the poverty in the civil war, and they figure Africans are living like cave men, which is very offensive.

Yeah. I mean again, I I don't know what country. I mean, if this is if this is meant to be somewhere in northern Africa, well somewhere that is less civilized, you know, less third we're a first world than the United States, sure, but I honestly had a fucking hard time figuring out what in God's name was going on. Most of the time anyways. Because well, speaking of which, the editing is terrible because we cut from Mike Tyson to lead, you know, to the to the jan the China salesman.

We cut from we got from Mike Tyson to the China salesman. I like, are we watching two different movies here, because it seemed like they were two separate things altogether, because they don't really come together and tell what maybe halfway through the film or something like that, because the plots seem to come now. The Mike Tyson got being involved with the China salesman at all doesn't come in until later, but we don't know that, so we're thinking, what the fuck is going on here? These are case First we're fine, we're following the Chinese salesman trying to sell his wait, and now we're following Mike Tyson in this bar looking like he's meeting a gangster or a crime boss or something. And Mike Tyson is just always not a good actor, that's for sure.

Well you know in this movie he fit right in. Um you know what, Okay, here's the thing though, you say that, but I want to say something, Lee Donghui. I couldn't tell you if he's a bad actor or not, because this is not a fair judge of that, because his English wasn't very Yeah, because he had heard about the English. Well, that and the fact that he for the most part, if you go on his IMDb page, the Gentleman doesn't work on anything other than Chinese film. I mean, yeah, one Quinn quin Chen bing d She Die doesn't sound like an English titled filmed Well, I'm well, I'm talking about his acting, notwithstanding, sure everybody else also sucks.

Well, Yes, Mike Tyson is great in The Hangover because he's playing himself. He's playing himself. Yeah, No, Mike Tyson's great in Mike Tyson's Story or Mike tyson Mysteries because he's playing himself. Is he playing an assassin in this film? So he's introduced as a warrior with a lineage of warriors.

And then we need to talk about his first scene, the scene he is wait, wait, hold on, time out, Get this out of the way now, Trevor. How quickly into the movie does this happen? About five minutes? How that if you were to put a percentage on how much of the fight shows up in the trailer for this movie. How much would you say, I gotta be honestly, I didn't watch the trailer.

The answer is eighty percent of the fight shows up in the trailer. The trailer is two and a half minutes long. You've seen then, you have seen all of Seagal in a substantive way in this film. Yes, yeah, I just want to get the side of the way. Now.

If you saw the preview for this movie, you saw all of Seagal, You've seen the good parts of Mike Tyson. This movie reminded me before we talk about the scenes specifically, did you do you remember that movie that came out a couple of years ago. I think it was actually last year that had Jackie Chan and Schwartzenegger in it, The one no one saw, the one that's like this where it's a Chinese made movie with American actors just to get the trailer over here to us, but ultimately no one in the States went and saw it, at least not because they wanted to, but maybe they were like, oh, that movie has Jackie Chan and armed Schwartzenegger on the poster, maybe we should watch it. We're not talking about a round of Warren eight days, right, No, I'm talking about the other movie that has them in it.

It's called Like No, it's called VI to Journey to China, and it was released in the United States as Iron Mask or The Iron Mask. Right, Oh my god, I remember this. Yeah, it has Jackie Chan in the trailer and Schwartzenegger and it has other American or English actors. That has Jason Fleming, Charles Dance, Rutger Howard. But yeah, that's what this movie reminded me of.

It's like you bait and switched to had better actors. That other movie had better quality actors. So if they're not being used in a substantive way, it doesn't matter. There you go. I don't know if they are though, but I will tell you I would contend they're probably used better than Steven Seagal and Mike Tyson are in the first five minutes of this movie.

Maybe we should do it on Schwartzenegger podcast and have to watch the film. Yeah, but everybody, Yeah, but everybody likes Schwartzen Ainger movies. We bring up schwartz and Ager movies on this podcast, and I'm convinced. Let's get to the scene where Mike Tyson meets Steven Seagal, he has served a mug of urine. Yep, why we see it?

We see okay, first we see the bartender. We see him from the back and we see him looking down and he looks like he's taking a piss. I thought to myself, okay, this it just looks like he's taken vestit's toy until they serve him the mug. By the way, impressive for that bartender filled m that pill, whole goddamn stein full of piss, steine full of piss. And they want Mike Tyson to drink it because he insulted them or something like that.

No, Mike Tyson's character, his tribe did not drink they He says that his tribe abstains from alcohol, which is why they were making such a big deal of him saying no to the drinks. And then they were like, well, if you're not going to drink alcohol, then drink my piss, motherfucker, like basically as an insult. So this leads to a fight between between between Mike Tyson and Stevenagle, which is it's not a bad fight, it's just a brief one and an unnecessary one. I think it was just put in the script because Steven Zagle fights Mike Tyson. We gotta sell it somehow.

I think it was put in the script because they got Steven Zagle and Mike Tyson, and you'd be stupid not to have them in your movie and be willing to put them on screen again. It has one of the funniest shots in the film, the ear punch. You see his fist go right by his ear and it wiggles. Yeah, and I thought that was hysterical and so um. After the fight Mike Tyson, I think to the bartender, um, he says it to Seagal once he slammed his head into the wall.

You serve me pe, you die. Yeah. I wrote that down because I didn't want to forget that line. You die. Steven Seagal gets beaten in this movie.

Yeah, it's kind of surprising. We have not seen anyone get one over on Seagal yet, and Seagal never gets one back on Mike Tyson. He doesn't bleed, nobody gets knocked out. He gets his head jammed into a liquor like cabinet and it gets knocked out. Steven Seagal was gotten the better of which is a first on this show.

And I wrote down here cell phone speed espionage. So we had this rival company to the China salesman trying to basically fuck up his chance of getting this um deal um with this major company. And for some reason they go wentto the desert and a kidnapping plot ensues. Yeah, they come upon a ritual in the desert. Like I thought, maybe it was like one of those forced um general mutilation exactly.

So that's what it seemed like to me. The China salesman's co partner gets out of the car, takes the girl and steals her away. And then we find out that that's not what was happening at all. It was just a and the mother actually is happy. The mother of the child is like happy that she stole her daughter's Like, oh, I understand, it's a simple misunderstanding.

Come join us in our tribal um, you know, can't fire whatever they call it. And they give them this jar of something that no one knows what it is, and they just drink it. They don't ask questions, they just drink it. They're given an unknown liquid and it was apparently what was it, goat's milk or something like that as alcohol. Just buy a goat's milk.

I don't buy alcohol. Yeah, god, it's it's shocking to me that this doesn't Okay, let me just say right now, if what we're saying doesn't make sense to the people listening to this podcast, trust me, it didn't make sense to us either. I mean, I don't know if it didn't make sense. It was just very boring. Like it's it feels like it was stupid.

It feels like a movie being stupid. It feels like a very cheaply made action movie. It feels like cheaply made action Yeah, but it feels like General Commander, and it feels like, you know, I'd rather watch General Commander again. Yeah, but it feels like those kinds of movies where it just it's competently shocked. For the most part, it's competently lit, but you have I see.

Here's the thing. What I don't know is who is this for? I was competently lit to watch this. Well, you know, I don't know who this is for, Trevor, because this is for and I read this a lot online. I read a lot of Christians about the film, and this is one that came out the home.

It was for Chinese propaganda. Well okay, yeah, sure, but oh yeah, okay, sure great, let's just get that out of the way now. This movie is Chinese propaganda too. Yeah. I mean they're better at the technical, at cell phone technology and all that good stuff, and the Americans everyone else is just plotting against them.

I don't think it's Americans or anything. I think it's I think China in many ways, hey, yeah, which is fine. I don't think they say anything negative about anyone else. I think they just take it upon themselves to really show off how great of a country they are, which is perfectly fine. But man, uh, I just I don't want I want to know what love is.

Yeah. I don't understand why this movie has made other than propaganda because it is a very boring move. Pointless. Well's just boring, pointless, It's boring. My favorite scene in the movie was, did you take a note about the scene where Steven Goal goes speak English?

Oh? Yeah, that was real. That was real, And you know what, it seemed real at the time, right, It was like I knew that I read it IMDb trivia. He told him to speak English because he didn't know his line. Yeah, I knew that's what that was.

He saw that scene. I was like, that's gotta be a fucking mistake. He Marlon Brando that scene. He didn't know his line, so he has everyone else, you know, change everything for him. I know, I loved it.

It was great. He went Marlon Brando, and I thought that was you knew, you knew when you saw that scene that that was real though, right, it seemed real? Yeah, it did seem real. Yeah, that's just it, just that form. He's a prick, and the sad part is Segal's most entertaining thing about the filmy.

He's not the least entertaining, that's for sure. But when he was on screen, I I was happy because, you know, I mean, it never really was made clear what Seagal does. He's kind of played the same character in a bunch of these movies, just like a dude Hagan arranged the dude who's a boss of something, a former something. I've noticed in writing the descriptions for a lot of our episodes for this show, a lot of them start with Segal plays a former or retired something. In this he's an usually retired business mob guy.

Well, when he's a former or retired, it's usually something in them in the lines of like cioperative or Special Forces Forces or anything, which is what I assume he was in this movie, like a former Special Forces guy. It's like, if what was the last recent what was the last recent Segal film we did again? Attrition? No? That was Nutrition?

Wasn't Attrition? No? Are you're talking about the one with Bobby Lupo? No? No, no, the one before that?

Well, Attrition, Oh yeah, that was at and Attrition. He's a retired um CIA operative in General commander. He's a retired CI operative And then like he was playing his character in Attrition, but as a bad guy. Yeah, well, I'm not even sure that he's good or bad in this movie. I mean he survives to the end of the movie.

I mean they have a throwaway line of like and louder is often South America now, like great, give a shit? I mean, what's what's what I don't like about this movie is how they marketed it. This is not Steven Seagal versus Mike Tyson. That movie would have been a good movie, at least an entertaining movie, at least a movie that we could have had a laugh at. This is a movie about a phone salesman trapped in North Africa trying, yeah, trying to restore the cell phone lines with Steven Seagale and Mike Tyson fighting in the literal first ten minutes of the movie, because they know that the audience isn't going to wait around for Steven Seagal and Mike Tyson to fight.

And if they get them to at least rent it and watch that scene, guess what, they have your money exactly? They already have your money anyways, it doesn't matter. But if it's Segal and Tyson that gets you through the door, they need to deliver on that. And I will say that for the most part, that scene delivers as much as I think it could if it's being made in twenty seventeen. Now, if this had been made at the height of the nineties with Segal and Tyson in their prime, that would have been fucking cool as fuck.

Here, it's just like you got an old Seagal and an old Tyson. Do they look like they have kept their shape for the most part, yeah. Do they look like they can move on their feet, Yeah, But it's not what it could have been. And to me it smacks of like the Expendables like, oh, isn't it cool to see all of them together? Like yeah, but now it feels like they're doing it on purpose as opposed to organically because it was cool at the time.

Well, I mean to anyone listening, if you decide you want to watch this film, if you turn it off after the Mike Tyson Seagal fight, you'll be fine. Honestly, just go watch it on YouTube, like, yeah, this is the first money, it is the first movie. I would suggest you just watch this scene on YouTube because the rest the movie is two hours long. Yeah, and it doesn't need to be. It really doesn't need to be it and it like ends halfway through the movie.

It ends in about an hour twenty minutes, like straight up, it ends there and then like and then like yeah, and literally as the movie is ending, it reminds you know what it's like. It's like remembering water Boy. I Like, the movie is over and then all of a sudden, his dad shows up and he's like, hey, Bobby, imagine if that scene and water Boy went on for another forty five minutes that is trying to sales you have, Like the movie end and then the bad guy shows up and goes but wait, there's another forty minutes to the movie. Chris, Why did you have to make me think of Waterboy? I like water Boy.

I fucking hate water Boys. I like Oh my God, I like Happy Gilmore. I like I love Little Nicki. Okay, I'm gonna get on a tangent here. We're gonna get back in a second.

Go for it, Go for it. I like Early Adams on the films. I love Happy Gilmore. I liked Billy Madison. I thought Little Nicky was underrated, but Little Nicki is amazing, Dude.

Little Nicki Adam Sandler's best movie. It had a great Quentin Tarantino cameo. It has the best thing Quentin Tarantino's ever done. You make the load very nervous, hell fares burden me a laugh. And it has probably the best, the best advertisement for Popeyes ever.

What about the best Clint Howard role. It's two floors up on the ride? Oh God, You'll never listen to Two of Hearts by Stacy Q the same way ever again, Sure as hell haven't. And the film Candle Wax either. I love at the end of the film where they were telling everybody what they're doing now.

His four roommate did a one man shown only one person showed up. This guy guy, this guy. But man that like for me, this movie like just watch it all, my dude. Yeah, pretty much. It's like a worthless piece of shit.

Yeah, because like the movie, like I said, it goes for about an hour like ten, and then it could end, and then it's about to end and it just detours back into the movie. Here's the thing. It goes on these rants and these these these rants and these it goes on these tangents that are unrelated to the plot. Yeah, yeah, completely for no other reason that the pat up the running time and make it an action film, like the scene where they go into the like we were talking about, what was the point nothing? And don't forget in that scene that you were talking about where it's like, oh, it's a big misunderstanding.

You took my daughter. Yo. They are shooting at her with guns when she's driving away. Ye, Like what kind of misunderstanding did you think this was? Because they were expending live rounds at this woman and they could have killed her, like yeah, And suddenly what the funny thing is is that they're trying to get a message to this just chief or something or president to say that we do not want war.

Let's let's have a ceasefire. That's that's what they're trying to accomplish with the phone lines. But the people, well, they're trying to sabotage the Chinese commandity. They cut they blow up all the all the sidelights, and but for some reason the villains can use their phone. Well yeah, I mean, that's the thing about this movie is on the face of it, and it was way too easy.

How they solved that problem, by the way, what problem was movie easy? How they made it so the phones worked again? Well yeah, but I mean they could have also just like sent a guy to the south of town. Yeah, basically like the south of the country, just like let them know what they go on. They put the chap sails in the middle of the Civil War for no fucking reason other than, oh wait, our sell foot technology can get a message to the president to tell them that they do not want war, to let's have a ceasefire.

Right, That's the only reason. What I really like about this movie is the fact that like I've gone and like looked on the like fucking Entertainment Weekly and IMDb and stuff. They advertise this movie like this movie was advertised. They was a press junkin. There's pictures of Mike Tyson doing press for this film.

It is insane to me, all of your General, Commander, beyond the law. Those movies came out went straight to Redbox or whatever, or you know, direct TV on demand. You know, people who saw it were people probably just fiddling around looking for something to watch, oh, Steven Seagal whatever, or saw it at Walmart for five bucks. But man, this movie had a budget of one hundred and ten million yen. That is wild.

This is a high budget movie that I cannot believe exists because what is going on in the movie is not at all what it is being advertised. And I have got to believe people who went to see this in the theaters, if it was being shown in theaters, which I've inclined to be believe it might have been, I have to believe people left, they walked out of this goddamn movie. There's no way this again. I'm not saying this movie movies bad. I'm just saying that this movie is not what it is claiming to be.

Every piece of advertising features who Segal and Tyson. It's even build as Mike Tyson versus Steven Seagal. Make that movie, don't make this. Don't try to bait. This is a baton switch.

It's a master baton switch. It is. It's masterfully done too. They turn this China salesman into a fucking savior. Yeah, they literally stay, help me, You're our only hope.

How many China salesman? You're my only hope? Like, yeah, well, that's what I wrote down in my note, is like, help me, China salesman, You're our only help. That is what they say. It's a direct reference to Star Wars.

I don't think they knew that they did. You don't. You don't say that by accident, or maybe you do. It's funny you're that these filmmakers are so stupid. They probably did say that by accident, didn't.

I don't know. I Again, for me, this is kind of a hard thing for me to say, you know, bad or good, because again, I almost feel like watching a foreign film. It feels like a foreign film, like it does. It doesn't feel like a film made with Western sensibilities, does it. I watch foreign films, Chris.

I appreciate foreign films, even as a foreign film. This thing is garbage. Again, I am I don't, I can't. I can when I am saying that this movie is bad because of the way it's advertised. It's just a boring ass movie, Like it is almost a non movie outside of the Segal Tyson stuff.

But the problem in my mind is the Segal and Tyson stuff is the horse that they have hitched their wagon too. Problem is you get you get that horse five miles down the road and then it runs off and re saddled with the rest of the journey with characters we don't care about, actors we don't know, and situations that are not nearly as interesting as fun or tan being and so Lom Guilt and whoever else helped rewrite the script. Here's okay, I need to go, I need to tell I need to I need to say something before I forget. So they're in the middle of this conflict, right, they have to get across this border. It is so apparently to get across the border, the Chinese flag is all they needed.

Oh yeah, that was the Yeah, wasn't that the most propaganda of propaganda? I mean again, I'm not going to sit here and say that it's not a propaganda movie. It totally is. But I think it's funny that the fucking flag is blatantly it gets them across the border, and it's blatantly It's like the most important flag in the world. Is what this apparently?

You know? I mean, it is just it's again, it feels patronizing. It is very patronizing, and it is very much in the pocket of China, of course, intentionally or unintentionally. It's intentional. I don't know if we want to get this into a political thing, you know, considering what China's going through right now.

All I'm saying is that kind of thing happens a lot in other countries movies. People in our country do it too. It's just the way it is. I love how after all this fighting and all this killing, all these people that Mike Tyson is killed, Let's give him a break, let him go, and he kills himself at the end, so it's okay, No, And when you think the movie's over, then there's a sudden lawsuit plot line. He gets arrested.

At the end, the main character goes to jail. The film is resolved in text text on the screen. That is how the movie resolves itself. I need to go through some of my notes because there are some things I forgot happened, like the seams Seagal on a bike and has obviously cged his eyes on the mask. Oh my god.

Oh that feels like that feels like the Game of Death, like Bruce Lee in the Game of Death, Like oh God, where it's like a dude sitting at a mirror holding up a cutout of Bruce Lee's face over his It feels the same way it was, like clearly done and after effects it's just like this, like the t zone of Seagal's face. Yeah. No again, Like I said, it's not a very well made movie either. Like it's a movie with a huge budget that does nothing with it. Like it has explosions, it has guns, it has action, none of it's particularly compelling.

I love how in the near the end of the film they bring in a snooty British bad guy. I know, like, of course they did. They happen again though, it's like two movies smashed into one. It really feels that way. Yeah, but neither of the movies are good.

No, I agree. I again for me, this movie is two hours long and in that two hours. I was entertained all of five because that's when Segal and Tyson are on screen, and that's what was promised. And when I was watching what they promised they were going to show me, I enjoyed it. When it was a random China salesman running around, I could couldn't have cared lesson.

That's because the movie, because these characters are not written very well. That they're not weren't supposed to be. They're not interesting, they're not really someone that you care about. They're not I mean, I would have watched the movie with segalon Tyson smashing each other through walls of random environments into new environments, just fighting each other for an out. Whenever anyone gets hit in this film, they fly a good ten feet.

Yeah, Mike Tyson's hitting people with like the force of a fucking mactruck. But it's fucking wild. He's hot, dukating every fucking person, and he finds when he punches like stone walls, they crack like. It's yeah again, the stuff was Segal and Tyson together is interesting, Yeah, but when they're separate, look Tyson. When Tyson doesn't open his mouth, he's great.

He is imposing. But the minute he opens his mouth, we all know what Mike Tyson sounds like we all know about the Yeah, yeah, we all know about the you know now Kith, like we all know about that, Like that's you know. But yeah, he's not. He's like brock Lessner. He's not intimidating.

If he opens his mouth, don't let him open his mouth because he's intimidating. Dude, he's got a look, he has a facial tattoo, and I don't question it. Like, if you have a facial tattoo, first off, props to you for having the balls to do that. Secondly, if you have the balls to do it and you can rock it and look like a badass, Mike Tyson's a badass. I mean he's also, you know, a rapist.

Yeah, it's also a rapist, sexual assaulters, sexual predator, just like Steven Seagal. So let's get that out of the way too. But but allegedly with Seagal, let's not forget Mike Tyson. Allegedly. Yeah, Mike Testmoon's convicted.

And that's why I say allegedly versus convicted, because one of them is convicted. Do I need to go on my hangover rant. What they you don't like to hangover? No? I love the first hangover first thing that was funny as hell, the second the second one was just the first one, but worst.

The third one they were going to have this camera. No, no, the second one that was the cameo. They were gonna have a cameo with mel Gibson as a tattoo artist. Right, But Zach Galafa Nakis vetoed it because of what mel Gibson said, because of mel Gibson's past. But I'm thinking to myself, you're okay with a convicted rapist wing in your film.

Convicted rapist too, I convicted rapist cameo leading in your film. You have a problem with mel Gibson doing a cameo as a as a tattoo artist. I mean, mel Gibson's a piece of shit, don't get me wrong, But so as Mike Tyson. Yeah, exactly, so, don't you know, don't Mike Tyson may be a lovely man, but he still raped someone. He did he raped someone, which is piece of shit behavior.

Again, he may be a lovely he may be a lovely man. He may be the nicest, sweetest man in the world. His daughter passed away unfortunately recently, of a horrible accident on a treadmill. I feel for the guy. He's also a convicted rapist who served prison time.

Hollywood has seemed to have embraced him in the lately. I mean, yeah, he did the Communist Central roast of what who did he do? The com centraal roast of Charlie Sheen. Is also an ip man three he was. I thought it was always ip man, but I guess I'm I don't know, I man, I don't know anyway, he was.

He has his own adult swim cartoon. Yeah, Mike Tyson Mysteries fantastic, and he seems to have bounced back pretty well for a convicted rapist. He's also a famous convicted rapist, not famous for convict He's let me put it this way, he's a convicted rapist, not famous for the raping. He is famous for everything else he's done, so the rape thing just kind of gets forgotten apparently, yea, which speaks to our culture on taking people seriously about raping and being treated like rapists after they're done serving time for being rapists. And I mean, when Kobe Bryant died you remember what happened.

Then I do, And I was one of the few people who was like, I'm good, not good that he's dead. But he's a convicted rapist. Why are we looking up? He wasn't convicted me, he was alleged rapist. Well, Evan rachel Wood made that tweet after he died and a shit storm blue.

Well, yeah, because Evan rachel would also defended David Bowie, and David Bowie did the same thing allegedly, and her ex Marilyn Manson ag have we heard a word from her about him? Well? No, no, she was one of the people I think who said something. Okay, okay, look we have gone we have gone through the reckoning. We're still in the reckoning.

It's a good thing. It needed to happen. But I do I do not understand the selectivism because I mean, look, in my mind, in a society that works, someone who goes to prison spends time in prison. When they come out, we it's a balancing act. Maybe they've gone to prison like they've yeah, I mean they're I mean that is part of it.

I mean that he's gone to prison, he's paid his price. I mean again, but go and ask the family of the woman that was you know, assaulted assaulted by by him, and they would say otherwise. I'm not but I agree in my mind, if you go to prison, you serve your time commisserate to your crime. You are you in my come out not with a clean slate. You're still felon.

But Mike Tyson being a felon is very different than you were I being a felon, because Mike Tyson is still Mike Tyson regardless of him being a felon. Well, it's like what it's like. Well, OJ Simpson he never went to prison, but he's never gonna shake it well. And actually he did go to prison, well, I mean, but not for what he was supposed to go to prison. But he went to prison, which I think for me is good.

Yeah, but he's still never going to live it down. Well. He also was found guilty in a civil trial that he did it, so the wrongful death one. Yeah, it was financially liable. So as far as I'm concerned, he did get convicted.

But the thing he went to prison for was I think was robbery, robbing someone of his own stuff. Yeah, in Vegas. Because O. J. Simpson's an idiot.

Of course he's an idiot, I know, but he's not an idiot. He's not a convicted murderer. And that's only only an idiot would try to put out a video called just like a Prank Show where one of the pranks is trying to sell the white Bronco. I mean to be fair, that shows pretty great. Have you watched it?

The whole thing? I've watched whatever I could find on YouTube. It is shocking. I just got juiced. Nobody asked for this oj That's a disturbing image, by the way, where he's wearing the old man makeup and he says juiced, I'm like Jesus Christ, that looks disgusting.

Look again, like we've said, you can be Stephen Seagal and be accused of sexually assaulting eighteen women. Yeah, it can be Mike Tyson and be convicted of raping a woman. And yet in twenty seventeen they made a movie together. And yet in twenty seventeen they still draw paychecks. And yet in twenty seventeen they're still employed.

And they're still employed now, so it must going to be unemployed, right, it must not matter too much, or maybe they've already served their time. I can't answer this question. It's a personal question about our feelings on recidivism and punishment and what is punishment fitting the crime and what does that even look like. But I will tell you similarly to yourself. I just find it a little weird that we've given sir people pass and other people we haven't exactly because sexual assault is sexual assault is sexual assault.

It's just the way it is to put one over another. Not only devalues people who have had it happened to them, but also you're somehow putting some sort of tier system to sexual assault, which in and of itself is awful. So we're very selective on who we quote unquote cancel, correct, And I don't think we should cancel anyone should be consequences culture. No cancel someone, make them serve or deal with the consequences. That's what people don't like.

People don't like the consequences part. People complain about cancel culture. They're not complaining about the canceling part inasmuch as they're complaining about having to answer for the things that they do. And people want to just be able to do what they want now and not have to be held accountable, and I don't think that that's okay. And that's what we're talking about here, accountability.

I mean, again, we are not promoting Mike Tyson. We are We are not saying what he did was right. What he did was god awful. And I'm not even sure we should be doing a Steven Seagal podcast sometimes if I think about it really hard. I mean, there are probably a lot of women they're talking, probably a lot of women who don't want Steven Seagal to get this attention that he's getting correct.

But we mention it on every show because it really you can't. You can't ignore the elephant in the room. No, I mean maybe we're maybe we shouldn't talk about him at all, but I won't go that far. Yeah, these movies still exist. Allow that too, But the movies still exist.

The movies, they're there and they're undeniable. I mean, someone's got to talk about the movies. I mean, there are movies that deserve to be analyzed. Go one step further, it's unfair to everyone else in these movies for people not to watch them just because Steven Seagal, Mike Tyson, er Mo, because he for better or worse has been in movies with amazing actors. Yeah.

Look, look at the next film we're gonna talk about. We're gonna talk about Understiege. It has Tommy Lee Jones, in my opinion, one of the great actors one time. Yeah, top top ten as far as I'm concerned, probably top uh. He Unfortunately he cannot sanction our buffoonery.

Um, you don't get that joke, do you? I don't know what that's from. Okay, can I tell you the quick story where it's from? Sure? Okay, Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Uh, Okay, it's about to because they're about to do Batman in Forever together.

He decides, Hey, I'm just gonna see hi to Tommie Jones, say how happy I am to work with him. They're out at a restaurant. He sees them, I'm gonna ras him across the room. Yeah, he goes, Hey, I'm looking forward to working with you on Batman Forever. It's good to see you here.

Tommy Lee Jones hugs him and says in his ear, I hate you. I cannot sanction your buffoonery. Do you think he actually hated him? Yeah? I really do, because Tommy Lee Jones is not one who I think would kid like that suffer fools lightly exactly.

There was that rumor that him and Val Kilmore were refuting on the on the set that Kilmo didn't like him, but I don't think that's true. Um. By the way, if anyone's listening watch Val on Amazon Prime, it is phenomenal. Um. Okay, rant over promotion over uh but yeah, I mean Seagal, he's worked with just amazing actors, and those actors also need to be recognized for things they've done.

Yeah, I mean Bill Sadler, a man who doesn't get enough attention in my opinion talking about him in the Hard to Kill episode. You know, he needed to be talked about because he's Bill Sadler, you know. Yeah, I mean no, because say with you, well, he hires character actors who I don't think get enough appreciation. Correct. Um, you know, so, I mean there are good there are good things about talking about seagal films, and not just Sigal.

He's worked with great directors like Andrew Davis. Um, you know, great actors, um, writers, those can be those need to be talked about as well, not just Seagal. I agree. I mean again, it's this is why we do the podcast. Yeah, not just not just to like be shitty like shit on Seagal and not to be like praise Seagal and all he's done.

It's to talk about the technical aspects of the films that he's done and the people that he's worked with. Yeah, so I think we need to give we have to give credit where credits due. Well, and I think for me again also, I have a very you know, tenuous relationship with cancel culture, as do you. I have my own feelings on it, as do you. My feelings are probably not what a lot of people would have, or maybe it's like a tempered version of what someone else has, but my height as people are too too eager to push the button sometimes, yeah, I would agree, I think people are.

I think the real thing is people are too eager to push the button over the littlest things when there are genuinely gigantic things. I know, but you can push the button quickly on real things too. But I'm glad that pieces of shit are coming to light as pieces of shit. Yeah, and look, let's not kid ourselves. There is some sort of justice in Steven Seagal never working in like a big budget movie exactly.

Yeah. I mean, it's not like Steven Seagal is tearing up the screen with Tom Cruise in the new Mission Impossible movie. He's relegated to direct to streaming, direct to video, whether it be of his own creation or because the industry says, you know, we don't really want to deal with you because of that, your previous behavior, whatever that is, which is the sexual assault is just part of it. Mind you, And this podcast is not going to change anyone's mind about Seal. Everybody, like, here's this's not going to make people want to say, oh man, I forgot how awesome Steven Seagal was.

Let's rent a lot of his films and make him a bigger star again. Here's the thing. I think people's opinions on Seagal are more or less all the same, right, we all think, yeah, I think we all think varying degrees of this guy's a buffoon, but he's also kind of a talented buffood. Well, here's the thing. If he's ever in a big screen budget, you know, released on theater's film, it's only going to be a stunt cast at this point.

Yeah, machete, Yeah, Machete showed us that. I mean, I don't know if the Onion was a theatrical it was, but it's again stunt casting. That was a stunt cast. And one could go as far as to say casting Seagal and Tyson in your movie about three G Networks in North Africa is stunt casting because the movie advertised itself as Mike Tyson versus Steven Seagal, and that is not what it is about. And here's the thing.

You could have put anybody in Mike Tyson's role and it wouldn't have changed the thing in this movie. If you're going to cast Mike Tyson, give him something to do, well, it would have changed the role, and that maybe the person would have been a somewhat more competent actor than Mike Tyson is. Yeah, but like I said, stunt like you said, stunt casting. No, no, I agree, it is one stunt casting. It's just not It's not the kind I was talking about.

But it is still stunt casting. I mean, it is the worst kind of stunt casting. Yeah, it's eyes on your product stunt casting pretty much. Man, I mean Jesus, Yeah, I really like the advertising for this movie really struck a nerve with me because I hate, hate, hate movies that do this. Oh it's a it's a it's an epidemic of when they advertise films as something that they are very much not.

I know, but man, they don't. This is its own thing. They showed all of their scenes together in the trailer, Like, I go watch that trailer, dude, It's it's nuts. They show all the good stuff. And you know what, we always say that about trailers, like, oh, they showed all the good stuff.

In this case, they actually did show all the good stuff, and you know what, you have to watch the movie to figure that out. In a lot of these movies, you like, watch it and it's like, oh, okay, they showed a lot of this stuff in the preview, but they didn't show everything in this movie. They in this movie's trailer, they actually showed everything. I made a note on the on my app saying that I've seen better acting in a Neo Breen film. I mean, I've seen better acting.

I've seen better acting in a lot of movies, especially movies with actors who know what they're doing. And Seagal and Tyson are not competent actors enough to carry a film anymore Segal anymore. I thought Seal was fine. And he's not being asked to do anything though, No he's not. He's just asked to be the low talking.

Why is Steven Seagal, Yeah, not asked to do anymore than he has to. Nope, that's that's the thing. That's what I've mentioned before. They don't challenge him anymore. No, he is being stunt cast exactly.

It's just weird because normally there's only one person being stunt cast in the movies, and it's Steven Seagal. Very rarely is it's Steven Seagal and someone else. And in this movie you have Segal and Tyson and that great and man Stigal is doing did press for this movie? Tyson did press for this movie? Like that to me is just wild.

Absolutely well, this is again, this is a this is a movie like General Commander with a budget like Under Siege, and it is neither film because it is immensely unsuccessful in all regards, incredibly unsuccessful. Yeah, And the fact that like anyone watched this movie and was entertained or intrigued or interested is just mind boggling to me, because I don't know what movie they were watching. And also title for this movie is absolute trash. I think for me, what puts it over the top, more so than a lot of the stuff that we've watched, is the soul fact that, at least with the other movies that I've watched that have been bad, they've been bad because well they were just kind of failures as movies.

This is no. This movie is bad because this movie straight up cons the audience into thinking it's one thing when it is actually something else. We can go into a whole other. Yeah, we can talk all about false advertising movies, but man, this is this is as bad as I have ever seen period. Yes, it's it's the bad, it's the baddest of bad.

Yeah it's it's it's up there. This is up there for some of the worst movies I've ever seen, because again I don't see very many movies like this very often. That that just you know, spoil the entire thing that they're advertising in the trailer and then in the actual movie. Don't give you any more than that. It spits in the face of good storytelling.

It spits in the face of the viewer who's a sgal or a Tyson fan. Yeah, those are the people that are being taken advantage of, yeah, pretty much, or people that wanted to watch a good action movie because again, it has the trailer and it has the poster for a movie that it isn't. I want our viewers to look up China Salesman poster and see how fucking awful that, how fucking like bait and switch that poster is. Oh yeah, all of them, all of them. For the most part.

They probably did more work advertising for this movie than they actually did for the movie. Yeah, and man, I would love to know how much Seagal and Tyson walked away from this movie with because they must have gotten paid a lot. I know they did, you know they did. Oh, of course they got paid a lot. Yeah.

So this for me is no ponytail big time. This is he's barely even in this damn movie. To be honest with you, this is this is below Nope, this is minus no inverse ponytail, This is inverse part. This is buzzcut. This is probably the bar that we're going to measure everything else against until we until we get something worse.

Even his bad films, it's like, well it was bad, but it wasn't China salesman. General commander wasn't good beyond the law, wasn't good. But man, they weren't China salesman. I would rather watch them than this, because, boy, two hours of this when five minutes is what we're here for, Good Lord, that is that is not a what's the word enticing proposition to be made? Okay, enticening if enticing, Yeah, this is the least enticening proposition.

It's think it is the baddest bad, bad Seagal film. It's not. It's not even it's bad in a way that it's not even fun. And that's when bad bad. But that's the biggest sin of the film is it's not even entertainingly bad, but it's just boring.

It is boring. It's boring. I can't figure an audience this movie is made for. I really can't see that there's a person in the world who enjoy this film. I really can't.

No, I can't. I can't either, because it is even It is bad propaganda if it I mean it is, yeah, as propaganda goes, it's bad propaganda. I mean, look, it's not very well reviewed. No, every everybody says, you know, it's a gratuitous China patting on the back. And you know, some people are like, oh, it's you crazy over the top, it's a guilty pleasure.

No it's not. No, it isn't. Yeah. And you know what, if it had been a half an hour shorter, would it maybe be in that category of so bad They're good? Maybe if there are there are ridiculous things in the film, but unfortunately the ridiculousness doesn't happen enough to qualify it as a bad film.

And the other thing, there are sporadic instances instances excuse me of absurdity, but that's not enough to put it into the so bad it's good category now, and often with so bad It's good, the movie has to be watched in its entirety to appreciate the badness. Yeah, we want to do that to people with this movie. The scenes that you can the scene to watch can be watched on YouTube with relative ease. And you have seen that scene and you do not need to see anything else. Nope, you've pretty much gotten your freaks.

Yeah, free worth, I guess you could saying. You. Let me put it this way, if you watch this movie on YouTube, the scene between Tyson and Sigal. You will have I've seen the best thing that we saw in the movie without having to watch one hundred and forty five other you know, minutes who had one hundred and forty minutes one hundred and ten. So you will have seen the five minutes of the movie without one hundred and five minutes of garbage surrounding.

So it is an unnecessarily long movie, and that's one of its biggest Yeah, that's yeah, that is one of the worst things about it. It's a bad movie that overstays it's welcome by a half an hour at least. So the case it overstays it's welcome at the moment the Seagal and Tyson scene is over for that matter. So bottom line, go on YouTube search Mike Tyson Steven Seagal fight. That's all you need to see of this film.

So on a good note, let's get talk about our next episode. It's a big episode. It is a big episode. We will be talking about the Seagal Dare I say Classic under Siege. It's definitely the movie that I would say is his biggest movie.

Yeah, this is the one that skyrocketed in. Yeah, I mean this is this is if you're going to talk Seagal, this is the movie is under Siege. Any let me put it this way. A person on the street will have heard of under Siege. Yeah, hearn to kill out for justice kind of maybe who knows under Siege is the film that defines him?

Ask a person name a Seagal film undersee under Siege. That's the one they will mention pretty much. And for this episode we have our first special guest, and Chris, would you like to mention who this guest will be? Yeah, So we've talked about his book on the show a couple of times, but we're actually gonna be joined by Verne of Seagology fame. The book Seagology now available on Amazon, Kindle and anywhere else you buy your books.

It is it is a yeah, it is a tongue in cheek but sometimes very serious look at mister Seagal's filmology act they titled Seagology. It's fantastic. Trevor has been reading it. I have read it. It's a great book.

And you know what, you can read it and put it down because, like a normal book, the chapters just correspond to the movies. So if you watch a Sigal movie. You can read the chapter. It's five or six pages on just that movie, and you can move on. So if you're not into just reading this is maybe you know something for you.

It's like ten fifteen bucks on Amazon. It's a great read. It's very tongue in cheek, but it is also observational and observational humor, which I appreciate, as I know Trevor does. So Yeah, we're gonna be joined by Vern on that episode, and we're gonna be talking about under Siege. I haven't seen it in a long time.

I haven't seen it in at least five years. I haven't seen it in a while either, but I know that it's a great film because I remember it being a great film the last time I watched it. We talked about it on the podcast A Culture Cast in twenties sixteen or fifteen, because I talked to Damian Choppa for that movie. Oh yes, Although if you ask me to name a Damien Chappa film, I just say street Fighter. Ken Ye Ken Masters, he is Ken.

He is not a good Ken either, but that's beside the point that street Fighters another another topic for not this podcast, because street Fighter is a good movie, though it has its moments. Yeah, it is a good It is a good bad movie. It is a very entertaining good bad movie. And the thing is, here's the thing about the film as a good bad movie. There are actual, legit good things about it.

Yeah, like Mario Brothers movie, that is ali bad movie. I don't even think it's bad, but well I know, but like in the grand scheme of things, yeah, it is a bad movie, but it just happens to be a very successful bad movie. I am one of the Internet's, like, you know, outliers when it comes to the Super Mario Brothers movie. The Internet is I don't think you're an outlier anymore. Pal, It's become pretty much, it's become kind of a cult classic.

I mean that. Yeah, have you seen the recently released extended version. No, but I you told me about it. Yes, Look, I like the Super Mario Brothers movie. It's a bad movie, but it is a interesting failure it Again, unlike this movie, you can fail, but fail in a way that is still compelling.

The story can tell me it's a Mario Brothers movie and then not show the Mario Brothers on screen, but for five minutes the story of the making of the film is very good. It's very entertaining. Can you imagine what the story behind making this movie must have been? It must have been weird. Now, the story was, Hey Sigala, you need a couple of couple thousand bucks?

Sure, yeah, okay, we'll need you for a day. That's about it. Okay, yeah, probably less than that. Two days, one day, five hours. Hey Sigal, you want to be the star of our action film?

Yeah? Other fifth grade one? Am I gonna do? You're gonna play an assassin? Oh my god, that's amazing.

Gone, that's that's a pretty good Mike Tyson. That's a good Mike Tyson. Dude, I'm not joking. I'm impressed. You're gonna get served a mug of pith.

Oh my god, how much? How much you're gonna pay me with that? I'm gonna get paid to do with I'm gonna get paid to do what I do on the weekends normally for free. Drink p oh. That's the secret.

A box and drink PIF before every match and you'll be unstoppable. See that's pretty good, Mike Dyson. But I am looking forward to under siege under stage. I'm very much looking. I'm very much looking forward to talking to Verne.

Yeah, this is a guy. This podcast basically is we have this inspired by psychology. Yeah, I mean it really is. I mean that Seagology book and the way Verne presented what the way, the way he talks about the movies is what I wanted to bring to this, which is watching the movies and having no expectation going into them because Verne getting Verne gives the DTV the direct to video movies. He gives them a fair shake when nobody else would.

So, well, that's what we do. We don't go and expecting to hate the film. No, I go in with an open eyed every time. Even I really wanted to like this movie as I know to Yeah, I know. I mean, I'm surprised how much I liked Attrition me too, I know, I was thinking about that when I was watching Time of Salesman.

I was like, man, I really liked Attrition And this is really needs This really needs an end credit sequence for Seagal paces guitar and sings. This really needs Seagal writing the script. It does. I mean, a script written by Segal is more competent than this one. That's shocking.

Yeah, that's an indictment of your film if I ever heard one. I mean, it's kind of feel it kind of feels like it. So until then, Trevor, where can people find you? You can find me on Twitter and Instagram. Twitter at bad Vertigo, Instagram at mad Vertigo.

I still think I am. I don't usually use Instagram very often because I don't think they're interesting pictures in my life, isn't that interesting? Best SIDESI podcast? So where can people find you? Chris uh c stashu dot com.

That's where all the things I work on are. Like Trevor said, we do this show together. Trevor is on the Culture Cast, my main show quite often. So if that's where you want to find us, you can find us csts dot com Culture Cast on Seagal, this show has a couple episodes where only man quarter of the way, not even through Seagal's photography. Probably we're probably getting we're probably getting close to a quarter, I would think, yeah, because this is episode eight and underseages nine.

So I don't know if Seagal has more than thirty movies. He might. Right off the top of my head, I can't tell you, but yeah, I mean, that's where you can find me, That's where you can find Trevor. You can find this podcast on Facebook at on Seagal, but just go find the RSS feed at on sagal dot com. Maybe hit Steven Seagal up mention us to him, see if he'll come on our show, because I've reached out to his people and they said me, he's not really promoting anything, so like, okay, we don't care, but he cares.

But he might not want to come on after what we said about him. I mean again, if the guy can't have a if the guy can't you know, make a I don't know, make light of his own past, then yeah, maybe he doesn't want to come on here. Well yeah, I mean he's always welcome. Yeah, we are opening invitation, mister Seagal if you're listening, come on the podcast anytime. We'll give you as much time as you want to talk.

Yeah, sure, why not? And you know what, we probably won't have the same reaccent Lord Michaels did. No, we will not. I don't know maybe, I mean again, depends on how radical views get. Yeah, you can find us here.

You should check us out on Facebook everywhere else that's where Trevor and I are. Thank you for listening.