Brilliantly funny look at the films of Steven Seagal, the sort of book that threatens to give fan boy writing a good name. Vern looks at all the films in Seagal’s career – not just his early 80s classics, or more mainstream actioners in the 90s, but also all – all – his direct to videos. Inevitably the quality of the films in the latter section of the book makes that less interesting to read, but Vern doesn’t a consistently bright and entertaining job, and there’s always a random Seagal twist – an album, an energy drink, the appearance of Imelda Staunton in the support cast (!) – to keep things interesting. And it actually ends on a feel good note, with an unexpected rise in the quality of Segal’s films, an excellent summing up, and a sweet coda where Vern goes to see a Seagal concert.
Vern says at the outset he wasn’t doing a traditional biography, but he has done research. Not just watched all the films, he’s watched some several times, read a few articles and copies of scripts, listened to commentaries. At times I wished he went the extra yard and did more of a bio – I have a feeling the more he found out about Seagal the better this book would have been. But its terrific fun and a great read.
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