Out for a Kill (2003)

I only wish there was a rating below 1 for this turkey. What can I say: bad editing (oh and you don't have to be an expert to catch this), terrible acting and dialogue, ridiculous fight scenes, stupid character development and on and on.Seagal must have been short on alimony payments or something to put this mess together and lay it our for viewers. Most action heroes get better with experience but Seagal'S earliest works are so superior to this.Instead of being a semi-plausible character like a Navy Seal or CIA operative or cop, he plays an archaeologist who dresses like he's auditioning to be Neo in the Matrix or John Shaft. Looks completely ridiculous on a dig in the wilderness of China. They try to explain in hindsight where this professor got his superior kung-fu fighting skills, but it works as badly as their attempt to explain how a convict gets a doctorate in archaeology while in prison (without any field work of course).Then there's the simple technical aspects of the film like being in Bulgaria, but all the signs are in English and the people are either Chinese or American. Even some of the Chinese dialogue is subtitled in English completely wrong.Then there's the acting. First the movie contains some of the worst Steven Seagal pseudo Feng-Shui/Asian/mysticism/philosophical babblings that one could ever imagine. Stupid metaphors that apparently only make sense to him. Chooi King-Beh as Wong Dai is definitely the "Wrong Guy" as he desperately tries to deliver each line as some sinister comic book villain rather than the Chinese businessman that he is. Cory Johnson is equally as stupid as a FBI agent who has no role other than to wander through scenes and deliver lines that insult Catholics, Chinese and the French. What I didn't understand is how him and his partner seem to be able to walk around steps behind Seagal invisible to him and the Tong until almost the very end.This is not even a good action film for those who enjoyed Seagal as Casey Ryback. The fight scenes are either prolonged patty-cake slapping with dubbed bone cracking to the height of dumb with the monkey style kung-fu in the barbershop complete with all the ridiculous gravity defying stunts of Crouching Tiger.I cannot conceive of any audience other than reviewers for the worst film of 2003 that this movie would appeal to.

You know when you want a degree there are course you have to take just because someone thinks they are important. This is one of those required to complete your degree in Seagalology. Think of it an as ordeal you must get through to pass.There is not noble purpose here. Seagal is just out for revenge on those who killed his wife (Kata Dobó). He is up against a Chinese syndicate that reminds us every 10 minutes that "This Gwilo professor is becoming a problem" after each of their 10 henchmen die at Seagal's hands.DEA agents Michelle Goh and Corey Johnson are following the trail of blood, but they don't want to arrest him until he finishes.Lots of blood and martial arts, but nothing else.There one more done.

Silly plot to start with, a whole cross nation Chinese criminal organistaion vs a kicking ass invincible professor who kills each one of the criminals to save the day. Everywhere he goes, the criminals fear him, runs away from him, avoids to put up a fight and eventually he marches straight into their headquarter and beheads their leader with one accurate throw of a Japanese sword.Sloppy action, fake wirework, CG effects, superhuman strength, we sees Steven Segal tossing people in the air and giving them broken arms to whoever attempts to fight him...Stereotypical Chinese villains eg. deadly Shaolin monks employed as assassins, mythical Chinese cults, gangster tattoos on every gang member.....Lack of depth in character background and a very very weak storyline. Steven stars as a professor on Chinese studies, which suddenly turns out also to be a martial art expert with a criminal record? In what significance does his female partner, which the only thing we've been told is she's a Policewoman from Hong Kong relates to the plot? What is on with the whole Chinese criminal network sitting in the same room, discussing same own boring conversation throughout the whole film until Steven Segal finds and kills them? This is just a absolutely retarted movie.....

Out for a Kill starts in China somewhere at an archaeological dig where Chinese archaeological expert Professor Robert Burns (producer Steven Seagal) is running things, however his crocked boss Sai Lo (Hon Ping Tang) is an international drug smuggler & using archaeological artefact's dug up by Burns has a nice line in drug smuggling going on. However Burns finds out that he & his dig is being used to smuggle drugs & isn't happy about it, he tries to escape to the border but the bad guy's shoot dead his pretty female assistant, then he is arrested & framed for the drug smuggling himself but is let free when two international DEA agents want to follow him in the hope he'll lead them to the big boss. Unfortunately the big boss doesn't want Burns complicating things so he has Burns wife blown up, big mistake because the bad guy's have framed him for drug smuggling, they killed his assistant & now they have blown his wife up. Burns decides to dish out a little vengeance...This American Aruba co-production was directed by Michael Oblowitz & is yet another terrible straight-to-video/DVD Seagal action flick which almost defies words. The script by Dennis Dimster is simply terrible, Out for a Kill is one of those films which on paper sounds OK & is a film you need to experience to get just how bad it is, nothing I write will properly convey how bad this film is. The films as a whole is utterly predictable, it makes absolutely no sense, the character's are awful (Steven Seagal as a archaeological Professor? Ha, ha, ha, ha!) the plot is awful, the dialogue is awful, the pacing is awful, the narrative is awful, the fights are awful & to try & illustrate how stupid it is for some bizarre reason all the bad guy's have tattoo's on their wrist's which when combined spell out some sort of cryptic message & it's just hilariously bad & a real chore to sit through. I honestly don't know how to convince you that Out for a Kill is as bad as I suggest, without actually seeing it which I don't recommend you'll just have take my word for it & if you do decide to watch it don't say you weren't warned!Director Oblowitz does nothing to make this watchable, the plot is a mess the use of slow motion is just annoying, there are random scenes of strippers which ordinarily wouldn't be a bad thing but here they are literally just randomly inserted, the fights are poor with Seagal's opponents doing all the fancy kicks & twirls only for Seagal to just stand there & when attacked just knock the guy out with the least amount of fuss. What the hell is that guy who can crawl across walls all about? The film also has the annoying habit of putting a caption on screen to indicate the time & location which becomes irritating & is utterly pointless. The action scenes are poor, the film is unexciting & Seagal is just out of shape & too fat.Who on Earth keeps giving $20,000,000 to Seagal to make a film? I don't know if that figure offered up by the IMDb is correct but there's no way this looks like it had 20 big ones spent on it, it's terrible & the CGI computer effects shots look awful. Shot in Sofia in Bulgaria. The acting is awful although Michelle Goh is a pretty hot looking chick. Seagal mumbles his way through the film as usual & is terrible as usual.Out for a Kill is an awful action film that isn't unintentionally funny enough to to be watchable, it's hard to explain in words how bad this film is. Not recommend even to Seagal fans if any still exist.