Out For Justice


Richie: “What are you gonna do, arrest me? I'm out of bullets!"
Gino: “That's a shame, because those bullets could've saved you a lot of pain.”



release year: 1991
genre: action
viewing setting: home Bluray 2/7/23 and home DVD 5/10/15 and 1/10/09 and 2/24/03

synopsis: A drug-crazed thug goes on a murderous rampage, and everybody wants to take him out: the police, the mob, and Steven Seagal. Guess who has the best chance?

impressions: This was Seagal's fourth movie, and like all of his early ones, it was one of his best. Basically his partner gets gunned down by a maniac, all three of them grew up together on the tough streets of Brooklyn, and so he has to hunt the guy down and destroy him. I had some problems with the character he played this time (he basically uses his badge to bully bad guys, even when they don't know anything) but the sheer violence more than made up for that little problem. This is classic Seagal: broken bones, pool-ball head-cracking, stick fighting, meat cleaver violence, plus plenty of gunplay and some car chases too! Some advice to bad guys everywhere: don't ever attack Steven Seagal. But if you do, don't do it in a butcher shop (or a tool shed, or anywhere else full of things he will use to f*** you up.) Other elements of note: this is the one where he wears a goofy black beret for no apparent reason, and also the one where he's on friendly terms with the mob bosses, and also the one where he rescues a puppy thrown out of a car window and later kicks the driver's ass, and also the one featuring a Buick GNX, and also the one in which one opponent is actually accomplished martial artist Dan Inosanto.

Seagal activation point: 12:57 - this is when he gets that look in his eye and you know someone's going to pay

number of asses kicked by Seagal in hand-to-hand combat: 22 (one of them two different times)

number of people killed by Seagal: 9, at least, but could be 11 (with some of the wounds he inflicts, it's tough to say)

number of people killed by Seagal after he kicked their ass: 3

number of people killed by William Forsythe: 4 (plus one offscreen)

number of people killed by someone else: 4

something this movie has that no other movie has: A corkscrew to the face!

acting: Seagal does what he does best: talk tough and break many bones. William Forsythe did a great job as Richie, a lunatic on the loose, who truly doesn't give a damn about anything. Model Jo Champa is Seagal's wife, who wants to divorce him but who he somehow wins back in-between his many bouts of kicking ass. A young Gina Gershon is Richie's sister, who also runs some kind of escort service. A very young Julianna Marguiles is Richie's ex-girlfriend, in whose house he ends up making his last stand. Jerry Orbach is the beleagured police captain who lets Seagal do things his way.

final word: One of Seagal's good ones, a must-see.

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