Steven Seagal Movie:

		List Price: $29.99		Label: 20th Century Fox Salesrank: 35965 Released: May 19, 2009
		Our Price: $13.40
		Used Price: $12.49
		MPAA Rating: Unrated Media: Blu-ray

Editorial Review:

Genre: Action/Adventure
Rating: UN
Release Date: 19-MAY-2009
Media Type: Blu-Ray

Driven to Kill [Blu-ray] Reviews:
a major russian affair . . .
2009-12-25 - In recent years, Steven Seagal has been cranking out a prodigious number of films for the direct to video market. While the number generally regarded as good, has been in the minority, Driven To Kill (2009) is a step in the right direction, and can be added to the list of decent efforts in this period. This film has an East coast vibe, with a very heavy Russian flavor, with lots of foreigner actors who look the part, Russian language spoken, and Russian music part of the soundtrack.

Seagal is Ruslan Drachev, an ex-ganster turned author, who returns to his old stomping grounds in New Jersey, to attend the wedding of his daughter Lanie (Laura Mennell). Drachev's ex-wife Katya (Inna Korobkina) has remarried, and her husband Terry Goldstein (Robert Wisden), is a lawyer whose clients often include criminals. Mikhail Abramov (Igor Jijikine, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) a mob leader, is the father of Lanie's fiance, Stephan (Dmitry Chepovetsky), who is not in the mob. Just before the wedding, assassins strike, killing Katya, and severely wounding Lanie.

Seeking revenge and to protect his daughter, Ruslan enlists Stephan, and sets out to track down the killers in the seedy underbelly of town, pawn shops, strip clubs, and rundown apartments. Ruslan discovers who is behind it all, but his daughter recovering in the hospital remains in danger.

Seagal seems to be in better physical condition, and appears to be actually performing a majority of the fight scenes. Sure, the film is still sped up to make him look faster, but the fights are shot mostly without the irritating quick cutting, that only gives an illusion of the continuity of movement. An overused technique that has plagued his recent films. Drachev engages in some flashy knife fighting, and executes a few baddies up close and personal. Lively Russian music plays during his extended fight scenes, giving things a festive atmosphere. Most movie gunfights are usually unrealistic, and while that is much the case here, there are a few moments with some realistic tension.

Up until the action shifts to the hospital, the film is quite tight and gritty, except for the police being completely inept. Drachev has his cowboy moments, but at least goes through the motions of doing some detective work. Things do fall apart at the hospital, with an unrealistic assault, and some terrible acting by the hospital staff in hiding. Drachev's fight with Abramov ends in eye popping fashion, concluding what is a better than usual effort for Steven Seagal. There are more than a few problems with the script, but things don't completely unravel until near the end, which while not optimal, is still a positive given some of his recent films. There are a few bad performances, but overall the acting is decent. The fighting and action scenes are an improvement, helping to make director Jeff King's second collaboration with Seagal, mildly recommended viewing for crime and action fans.

Driven to mediocrity
2009-12-20 - This movie actually turned out to be pretty decent, but I was really concerned the first 20 minutes or so into the film that this might be another "Submerged" (2005) or "Attack Force" (2006) because I couldn't understand if Steven was trying to fake a Russian accent or it was just another in a long line of bad voice overs! Actually, I'm still not sure, but as I am not planning to re-watch the movie, you can figure it out for yourself if you like. Plus, it looked like the beginning of the film spent some time on the cutting room floor in post production because some of it made little sense in setting up the rest of the film. Having watched both "Attack Force" and "Submerged" previously where basically the whole films were cut-up post production, you can see why I was concerned!

But about 20-30 minutes into the film it started getting much better and the story actually flowed pretty well. I'm just not a fan of this storyline too much - Russian mobsters. Nice strip club scene by the way though, thanks for that! LOL

This film reminded me a lot of two of his other films: "Shadow Man" (2006) and "Black Dawn" (2005) though those films were set in Eastern Europe and have more of an espionage-quality to them. This film was less entertaining than those two, but did have some pretty good fight scenes and not a lot of annoyingly obvious stunt double work as compared to some of his other direct to videos. All-in-all a decent effort and one that I can recommend for Seagal fans.

Final Grade: C+

service great
2009-12-15 - the delivery time on this was excellent,, have not viewed video yet as it is Christmas gift.. but packaging is perfect.. looks great...

Straight to the Dumpster
2009-12-12 - I thought Seagal wasn't making movies any more. I was right. This isn't a movie. It's hard to imagine where he still gets financial backing from. Ever since above the law and the first under siege movie he's been coasting and cranking out one clunker after another. I own over 2000 DVD's but I won't be buying this one. It's not worth a nickel.

How Many Abducted Daughters/Nieces Does He Have?
2009-11-10 - How many seconds in the opening minutes did the camera stay focused on a string of pearls lying on the floor? Answer: A little less than 6 seconds. An indication of boredom to follow!
How many times can a person make money off of retreads? Answer: Over 30.
How many times have Seagal's movies involved him having a family member killed/abducted by bad "whatevers"? Answer: Most of those 30.
How many weapons in Seagal's movie arsenal? Answer: Lost track.
How many times does he intersperse gun play with fight scenes using his stiff as a board "move your hands around" and pan the camera? Answer: Almost every movie.
How many of his movies have "kill" or some variation of "death" in the title? Answer: 8.
How many times did I fall asleep and not even bother to finish the movie? Answer: 1 and that's sufficient to resolve my mistake.