Mercenary for Justice

“That’s it for you, poophole!”

Picking on a direct-to-video Steven Seagal movie these days may be like shooting fish in a barrel, but sometimes it has to be done.  Mercenary for Justice isn’t the worst of his movies, but is it entertaining?

Seagal doesn’t show up until about 12 minutes into the film, and his first line sounds like it was dubbed by someone else. After that he seems present at least, although it’s hard to tell if he’s interested.

The martial art scenes are fairly few and unfortunately not very exciting. Seagal is actually in them for the most part, which is a step up from some of his other DTV work. The gunfights range from competent to poor—most of them are decent as far as direct-to-video stuff goes. The film has some pretty dull sections in the middle but the action does pick up in the last third.

Roger Guenveur Smith's acting is probably the worst thing about the film, aside from the script. I’d say he was making a hammy attempt at playing a British villain, but his performance is so unenthusiastic that you can’t quite call it hammy. It’s just wretched.

And the script. Seagal is a mercenary (for justice?) robbing banks, breaking into prisons, killing guards and bank security guys and whoever shows up, in order to get another mercenary a US military burial. Don't ask how that's supposed to work because the movie certainly isn't going to explain it to you. There’s a lot more to the plot but none of it really makes sense.

That’s probably not going to stop anyone from watching Mercenary for Justice, or even enjoying it if they’re the right kind of viewer. No one is watching Seagal movies made in 2006 looking for sense. Or even good fights. I think we’re mostly just looking for a bad movie. The biggest problem with Mercenary for Justice may be that it isn’t bad enough.