Half past dead film cast1/2/2024 ![]() ![]() Linda Thorson's character survives only by dint of being thrown out of the helicopter and subsequently saved by the skydiving Steven Seagal. I can’t believe it’s really the first, but for the time being it holds that honour. We’ve reviewed over 50 films at Exploding Helicopter and this amazingly is the first one we’ve seen where suicide is the method of destruction. But let’s not forget we’ve seen that sort of thing in a lot of other films (Eraser, Live And Let Die, Point Break amongst others). Seagal’s sky dive pursuit of the hostage is a delightful little extra. A nice, dirty, orange fireball erupts and wreckage is thrown out towards the camera engulfing the screen. There’s a warm glow of anticipation as we await the inevitable explosion. Richard Bremmer winks cheekily at Morris Chestnut after he’s signals his intent to blow himself and the chopper up. He then blows himself, the villains and the helicopter up.ĭon Michael Paul doesn’t fluff this. Meanwhile, Richard Bremmer rips open his shirt to reveal he’s wired up with explosives. Only, surprise, he’s got a parachute on and he’s able to save her. Having blackmailed a helicopter out of the FBI, Morris Chestnut flies away of the prison with Richard Bremmer and a female hostage (Linda Thorson) - pursued by Seagal aboard another chopper.Ĭhestnut throws Thorson out the chopper to stop the pursuit, but Seagal suicidally dives after her. But Don Michael Paul is saving himself for the finale. The copter then plummets from it’s precarious perch into the ground, where it catches fire but doesn’t explode. A rocket launcher is fired at them, but incredibly Ja Rule manages to shoot the missile before it hits the chopper. Later, Seagal and Ja Rule use the guns aboard the helicopter in a fire-fight with the villains. However, a storm causes the chopper to crash into a guard tower and then through the roof of the prison, where it hangs dangerously above the prisoners heads. The villains plan to escape the prison by helicopter. Director Don Michael Paul (never trust a man with three first names) throws us a bit of a fake early in the film. OK, so we need to talk helicopters and there’s plenty here for us to get stuck into. He didn’t do it by latching onto punk, new wave and acid house. He did it by unswervingly sticking to what he did best. Now, Charles Bronson managed to keep grinding out action films into his 70s. All it does is make Seagal look every one of his 50 years and paunchy inches. It’s like the producers are desperately targeting these different youth demographics they keep reading about in magazines. As confusingly in the second most of the action is sound tracked by nu-metal which was all the rage back then. It’s clearly not enough that they’ve paired Seagal with Ja Rule (the Dogg Pound’s Kurupt also stars) they slap hip hop tunes all over the film. This is a period in Seagal’s career when it was compulsory for old totem face Seagal to be paired with a comedic foil. Ja Rule is cast here as the comedy sidekick. They’re out to get a death row inmate Richard Bremmer, who’s about to be executed, to reveal where he’s stashed millions of dollars of gold bullion. Still undercover Seagal and Ja Rule wash up at in the same prison just as a criminal gang led by Morris Chestnut break into the prison. Seagal plays an undercover cop who nearly dies - hence the title - during the arrest of car thief Ja Rule. It flat-lined at the box office, and Seagal was consigned to the world of DTV. With his career on life support Steve followed up with Half Past Dead. Big Steve’s ‘message movies’ had caused a mid-career wobble temporarily salvaged by the unexpected success of the message free Exit Wounds. How the lean, mean aikido machine became the chunky, pony-tailed parody of his former glory.Įxcluding his cameo in Machete, this was Seagal’s last US theatrical release. Now, for many, Seagal is just that stony-faced fat guy who’s in a lot of incredibly bad films that always seem to be on TV.Īll this is a roundabout way of getting to Half Past Dead (2002). For those of us who care about Seagal, the film marks a turning point in his career. Or at least not from Steven Seagal through the medium of action cinema. Sadly the public didn’t want to hear these messages. And promote his spiritual beliefs by regular championing Buddhism (The Glimmer Man, Out For A Kill). Then he tried to use his fame to save the planet by highlighting environmental issues in his films (On Deadly Ground, Fire Down Below). Seagal made his name with a series of classic films: Out For Justice, Hard To Kill, Above The Law, Marked For Death. Of the actors from the classic era of action films – the 80s – Steven Seagal is for me the most interesting. ![]()
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