Review of Belly of the Beast (2003) by Tero H — 26 Jan 2009

The story wasn't bad by itself, but it had some really odd scenes and fights that seemed at least to me impossible. I didn't get any of the hocus pocus. One major minus in my opinion was the use of guns to kill so many people (yep, they were bad guys, but they were still people). I haven't thought of myself as such a pacifist unti after seeing some films by Steven Seagal. Ok, I know, its self defense and all, but I just don't like watching people getting shot, blood and guts and all that. The martial arts was better in this film, although too incredible for my taste.

I got this on DVD, like all my seagal movies, but I don't recall the disc having any extras.

The film had much too few Aikido-moves for my taste, except one whoppy shiho-nage, which was funny to see because Seagal was using his huge height advantage - the guy practically flew over Seagal when he did that. Most of the moves seemed to me like they were out of some "matrix" films or traditional chinese kung-fu flics where people can actually fly.

It looked to me more kung-fu and firearms movie than anything else. I get the idea that a martial arts master can accomplish seemingly impossible feats, but swinging a katana to split arrows in half mid-air was just too much for me. I wonder what kind of power would be required to fling an attacker backwards 20 feet through air using only two fists. Man, does he look mean.. Looking mean is Seagal's trademark.

Its not a terrible movie, but I have seen better Seagal films.