As movie titles go, the clunking moniker of Steven Seagal's latest attempt to convince the world he's still an action man is pretty pathetic. What exactly does it promise? A movie about a time bomb? A terrorist strike? A killer clockmaker?
Actually, none of the above.
"Half Past Dead" is the name dreamt up for Seagal's near-death experience in the first reel of the movie. After being shot by the cops, Sascha (Seagal) flatlines, sees the tunnel and the white light, but decides to spurn heaven to come back to kick some more butt.
If only he'd stayed with the Lord!
This is as dreary an 'action' film as any Seagal has put his name to (well, maybe not his environmental message movie "On Deadly Ground").
Trawling for that golden demographic which'll keep him off the straight-to-video slide a little longer, "Half Past Dead" sees Seagal copying the limited success of the "Exit Wounds" formula by hanging with the homies and drafting in rapper Ja Rule for some gunplay.
Trying to track down the crime lord responsible for the death of his wife, Sascha befriends Rule's gangsta, Nick, and serves time with him in a newly reopened Alcatraz prison.
When a terrorist group storms the hi-tech fortress to break out the first convict scheduled to be executed there, Sascha goes into "Under-Siege"-meets-"Die-Hard" mode and takes them on with the help of Rule and the rest of the prison's inmates.
Seagal gets one good fight sequence - using his hands since the rest of him is so out of shape - leaving Ja Rule to fight most of the battles while schooling the porky martial artist in some ghetto speak.
Once upon a time Seagal's fighting made him look pretty deadly. These days he's looking way past dead.
Half Past Dead (2003)
