Mercenary: Absolution [2015] Review

[EXTERNAL REVIEW] Oh my God. This is great already. It opens on mumbling and then Vinny Jones turns up. We are in for a ride!

Several terrible supporting company credits at the beginning, probably just made in After Effects 5 minutes before the edit was finished to make it seem legit. The opening mumbly monologue was written by Seagal and set over Seagal sitting awkwardly in a chair smoking a cigar and drinking scotch (lots of chair action throughout). Seagal said he was attracted to the lead role because “I’m always trying to find something a little bit different from what people have seen me do before. I wanted to play somebody kind of mysterious and on the edge, so you don’t really know if you like him or hate him until the middle of the movie.” (This was achieved using lines such as: “I’ve been a very bad man” and “I learned not to trust anybody”). Flashback to a past love that has no relevance to anything. Single usage of film scratches, despite the prop camera, used being digital. He says he wrote his character’s line “I want to do one good thing before I die even if I die in the process of doing it”. Lots of grainy stock of cities. The first semi-naked woman was at 5 mins in and it took another 10 mins or so to get to the strip club (“It all started here and it’ll end here.”) There were many continuity problems, Seagal’s glasses’ colour changing, a person’s hat – on their head in the previous frame – now in the middle of the street and the same shot of the car going down a street twice in succession (not even horizontally flipped or anything like that) to name a few. Absolutely mad logic/tactics, the enemy boss who they found out was called ‘the boss’ and Seagal bumbling along and around corners when absolutely necessary. The budget was 5 million USD, probably mostly used for the painting at the end. The painting is hanging on the wall of Seagal’s house. Pan down to the female (he tried so hard to ‘respect’ in this one) putting on a vinyl (unfortunately not ‘Love Doctor’, as would be more appropriate). She tries to get Seagal to stand up to dance, fails, then ends up sitting on Seagal’s lap and they awkwardly hold hands. There are multiple flashbacks of Seagal’s wife/mother/lover/friend/mistress/daughter/etc., which one we never find out. No continuity in character positions in a room. Seagal’s penultimate battle was with a tiny man who he beat up solidly for about 2 minutes (choosing to do this as he knocked several people out with one punch and chose not to use his gun until shooting the person behind the tiny man after they finally had enough). Apparently, it[‘s a] sequel to ‘A Good Man’.

[CONT’D] The ego of the man. Putting a painting of himself in the background [foreground]!