Seagal and that Belly
When Jake Hopper's (Steven Seagal) partner is killed he decides to retire from the CIA and works as an occasional freelancer when ever his old agency contract needs some extra special help. But things get messy when Jake's daughter whilst on a back packing vacation with friends, including a senator's daughter, is kidnapped and whilst the officials do what they can Jake hops on a plane and does what he does best. But as Jake starts bashing heads together to get answers he discovers that the kidnapping wasn't just a simple case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Let me describe a scene in "Belly of the Beast" for you so you can judge what sort of Steven Seagal movie it is. After finding himself double crossed by a taxi driver who drops a bad guy line when he goes to kill Jake are hero ends up in a market where he takes down a dozen guys single handedly. This fight scene is edited so the hand to hand stuff shows it is Seagal in choreographed action but the minute it gets more physical and kicks are involved it is edited so that you can't see the head of Seagal's stand in. But this scene culminates with one bad guy slipping on a tomato as he runs away and sliding down some sort of icy fish preparation table head first into a meat cleaver. So we have bad dialogue, clearly stand ins doing the fighting and a ridiculous nature to it, so yes a typical Steven Seagal movie.
As such I am not going to waist time trying to big "Belly of the Beast" up because it is a waste of time as anyone who watches a Seagal movie knows what they are getting these days. And this offers up nothing out of the ordinary with it often feeling like Seagal has shown up for work with everyone working around him knowing full well it is his name which sells the movie. But what I will say is that whilst "Belly of the Beast" is often ridiculous some of its more creative and daft ideas certainly make you smile. And for fans of the British show "Casualty" they may smile when they see Patrick Robinson, aka Ash, in a supporting role.
What this all boils down to is that "Belly of the Beast" is a routine Steven Seagal movie with routine action, routine bad dialogue and a routine storyline. And in truth it is because of that routine and being routinely bad that it ends up watchable and occasionally entertaining.
