Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

RipDelight This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

Gutsycurene Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

Brendon Jones It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Samiam3 Seagal in Born to Raise Hell seems almost identical to Seagal as himself in his reality series. In some ways this might be a good thing. It means that the film acknowledges that there is no point in asking him to play act stereotypes anymore, like he did in his last film A Dangerous Man. Here he's just being himself. Something else which makes that a positive is the simple fact that the movie isn't really about him. It's more about a drug war between cops and Eastern European mafia. Seagal is just one cop out of a handful. As a screenwriter, Seagal chooses to write him self out rather than in, and subsequently we spend more time with the mafia.The fight scenes come with a crunchy sound mix, and they allow us to see more Seagal than Stunt man, but they reek of bad editing. the people who direct movies like Born to Raise Hell are not qualified for anything except music videos. this movie implements a very miscalculated Goddardian style of cutting, and a severe overuse of slow motion. We don't need to see a guy ripping a bedroom apart for jewels at five frames per second. The last scene is kind of touching (at least for a Seagal movie). It was around that part when I realized that the movie is not really about Seagal. That and the fact that we only here his name about five times. I don't wanna mislead anyone however. Born to Raise Hell will probably do the job for whatever fan base the old man has left. He's done better, but he's also done way worse.

huffthetalbot Steven Seagal is sitting down in his favorite Romanian restaurant with his 19-year old blonde girl-friend; he is wearing his favorite turtle-neck and leather jacket combination for the occasion. When he is done ordering for him and her from a dodgy-looking waiter ("She's having what I'm having, because I'm totally awesome. - What I'm having? I don't know, what are you having?"), two even more dodgy-looking pony-tailed Albanians pop up, and certainly not to sell roses...So Steven tries to get up, falls over - almost into a fire - because for some reason unknown to the viewer, he suddenly seems to be wearing no less than FOUR TURTLENECK SWEATERS! So his stunt-double is trying to get up while Steve is fighting off two dodgy-looking Albanians and multiple turtlenecks. On top of that he's wearing a MASSIVE bullet-proof SHIELD that leaves room for about seven more turtlenecks and two more leather jackets! Just as everything gets get way too complicated on the eyes, ears and brain, the muscles take over and get the job done! Steven Seagal's hand muscles - in extreme close-up: supreme slapping by Steve! Every other Balkan-type is effortlessly brushed aside with a top-spin backhand.Steve pushes a few more - also some innocent looking staff - out of the window and takes his stone-faced trophy by the hand. "This is why I hate eating out," he groans as he walks out of the place.And he is so right. Putting on multiple turtlenecks, two or three leather jackets and a kevlar suit two times the size of Oprah Winfrey must be a hassle - let alone the fans that want a word, an autograph or a smack in the face ("Please, Steve - It would be an honor!"). Add that to the fact that it takes him about five minutes to get a bite of food down. Steve is practically unable to breathe during dinner and he has to rely on ancient eastern meditation techniques to stay alive!No - bothering the maestro during a meal is certainly not a good plan. Don't do it kids, stay in school! Don't do Steven Seagal. Well, not unless you're 18, or until you're 16. Or before you're totally awesome. Like the pony-tailed sushi-chef extra-ordinaire himself, the man whose hair has miraculously started to grow back since 1988, after a mystical experience at a Rick Astley concert. The man we have all learned to love, in spite and because of everything he is, was, and will be.If one time, the day comes that I am to meet him, I will not kneel and kiss his feet - no siree Bob! I will stay out of his way, because I'm afraid he will do something unexpected , like quote Shakespeare. And that would not be right. Because, not only is Steven Frederic Seagal an outstanding thespian in his own right and time and place in time and space, he's an excellent auteur as well. So there is absolutely no in him quoting a fellow playwright. Hah! Having said that and having said this and having said earlier that what I'm saying right now may or may not be entirely according to the truth as we know it , I rest my case.

fayce-booque This movie is the last Seagal movie I will ever see. I realized somewhere after coming out of my nap, 20 or 30 minutes into the movie that I have not seen a decent, entertaining Seagal movie since Under Siege. And I guess I never will. Seagal doesn't even do any real fight scenes any more. I am guessing his age is not a factor, no it's more likely the extra 90 pounds he's been carrying around for the last 10 years. Makes him a little sloppy looking, so all his fight scenes are confined to extreme closeups and edited more than a more minced than a modern seizure-inducing music video. It's sad really because the guy used to be kind of a poster child for how cool Aikido is. But now he goes around calling men bitches. I don't think O Sensei would be proud of that. I recommend that you avoid this movie. I also suggest you consider joining me in never wasting good sleep on a bad Seagal movie. And what's with this guy's phony southern accent? He fell in love with Louisana and now he talks like he wasn't born an raised in Michigan? Poser.

Jan Strydom After seeing A DANGEROUS MAN I almost said I'm through with Steven Seagal movies but then I decided to pick up this one in the hope Seagal could be redeemed, it turns out this film was one of his more solid DTV efforts aside from the fact that it was still flawed, it had the dubbing problem but not as much as his other films, Seagal's fight scenes were edited a bit fast although there were shots that showed him actually doing the fight scenes and Seagal wears a thick coat to hide his weight now I regarded that as one of his trademarks so I didn't really give that much thought.The best moments of the film were the shootouts, they were very well done and also pretty tense, something I haven't seen from a Seagal movie in a long time, the acting was surprisingly good this time even from Seagal himself but there are two other actors that stand out, Darren Shalavi who was ideal for the part of the villain and Dan Badaru who plays a Romanian gangster out to get revenge for the death of his wife and son.Also now that I thought about it, this film features a brief love scene between Steven Seagal and a woman possibly young enough to be his daughter but she does look legal and very attractive, after seeing that scene and remembering Seagal also wrote the script, I reckoned this is one of the interesting things about being a writer and an actor, you give your own character a story and a hot little number and you add a steamy love scene between the two of you, now that's a different kind of fantasizing right there only Seagal puts it down on paper and it gets put on film with him in the scene, "sigh" some guys have all the fun.Overall, its one of the better Steven Seagal DTV entries but it is way too flawed to measure up to the caliber of a Steven Seagal classic like UNDER SIEGE.