Review: Under Siege

The crew of the USS Missouri are set to celebrate the birthday of ship’s captain (Patrick O’Neal), whilst the ship itself is close to being decommissioned. Unfortunately, a plot is afoot as faux musician William Strannix (Tommy Lee Jones) boards the ship supposedly for the party, but the former CIA operative with a screw loose sets about taking command of the ship, along with a team of goons (including Colm Meaney and Eddie Bo Smith) and inside man Commander Krill (Gary Busey), who is the Captain’s treacherous Number Two. Our one last best hope? Ship’s cook Casey Ryback (Steven Seagal), currently confined to a meat locker for pissing off Krill and fellow hard-arse Ensign Taylor (Glenn Morshower, effective in a rare bad guy, non-Secret Service agent role). How can a lowly cook save the day, you ask? Well Ryback’s no mere cook. He used to be a Navy SEAL who got into shit for striking an officer and since the captain liked him, he allowed Ryback to serve out his days as the ship’s cook. Basically, he’s a bad arse not to be fucked with. After escaping his freezing holding cell, he sets about saving the day. Along the way he encounters a drowsy Playboy Playmate named Jordan Tate (Erika Eleniak), who had passed out on sleeping pills inside a giant cake she was set to emerge from for the party. Andy Romano, Dale Dye, and Nick Mancuso are among the military/government ‘talking heads’ monitoring the tense situation as Strannix reveals his insane intentions. Troy Evans and Raymond Cruz are ship’s crew members, Bernie Casey turns up briefly as a commanding officer, and musician/actor Michael Des Barres (of all people) plays a minor part of the criminal scheme in a cameo.

The very brief peak of the cinematic career of Steven Seagal from a commercial standpoint, this 1992 Andrew Davis (“Code of Silence”, “Above the Law”, “The Fugitive”) film is also one of his two best films alongside “Hard to Kill”. Yes, it’s just ‘Die Hard on a boat’, but it’s very slickly made, boasts a better-than-average cast, and Seagal is in quite good shape for perhaps the last time in his career. In terms of his physical condition, as with his theatrically released acting career, it was pretty much all downhill from here (and his films eventually skipped theatres altogether in the late 90s/early 00s). It’s a shame Davis hasn’t directed a film since 2006’s “The Guardian”, because he and Seagal seem to work pretty well together.

I can’t imagine having Seagal, Gary Busey, and Tommy Lee Jones all on the same film set was terribly easy, but two of those three do good work nonetheless. The third being Seagal, who has never given a ‘good’ performance, but watch him in this film and then watch him in anything he’s done since. Good actor or not, it’s night and day. I think it’s because back in 1992 he at least seemed to give a shit. I’m pretty sure that of all his theatrically-released films, this is the only one where Seagal has a whole team of people helping him in the climax, albeit in a minor way. So even though he’s playing a typical Seagal special ops guy, he’s no superhero as such. Well, OK it’s still Steven Seagal and once he escapes the meat locker he’s practically untouchable (in my view one of the reasons why Seagal wasn’t as long-lasting as a top-tier action hero: No vulnerability whatsoever), but still at least he delegates a few tasks to other people here. You won’t get as much of the violent wrist-snapping Seagal in this as in “Hard to Kill”, “Marked for Death”, or “Out for Justice”, but he and the film are very efficient and effective in the action department nonetheless.

I know he earned an Oscar nomination for “The Buddy Holly Story”, but as far as I’m concerned Gary Busey has never had a better moment on screen than he does here playing a complete arsehole who is also kind of insane to boot. What I love about Busey in this is that for a while it appears that he could be a bad guy or he could just be an arsehole who doesn’t like the hero. At any rate, you definitely want to see him get punched in the face. Hard. Busey and Tommy Lee Jones appear to be having a blast, and I wasn’t aware that Tommy Lee Jones knew about fun. During a sweet time for him as a character actor (1991-1995 in particular he was everywhere seemingly), Jones is a high-powered hoot, even if his ruse of being a rock ‘n’ roll guy is pretty unconvincing. He doesn’t even pretend to sing, just doing some talking and playing the harmonica. Also, what self-respecting rock ‘n’ roll guy calls themselves ‘Bad Billy’? Laughable really, but maybe that’s the point. Former “Baywatch” and Playboy alumni Erika Eleniak got supplanted by Pamela Anderson in pretty short order in the public eye, but she’s pretty perfect here as Miss July ’89, now reduced to jumping out of a cake on a big ship. The funny thing? She really was Playboy’s Miss July ’89 in real-life, but it just sounds funny that she’s playing a Playmate from about 5 years ago who did one episode of a TV show. There’s a lot of familiar faces in the supporting cast (even Patrick O’Neal, as the captain!), but I was rather disappointed that the talented and versatile Bernie Casey only has a mere walk-on of zero distinction.

Pure early 90s action entertainment, slick and efficient. Nothing fancy, just well-directed, effective, and entertaining. A better than usual supporting cast helps give it a little bit of a lift too, whilst star Seagal at least seems committed for perhaps the last time ever. Scripted by J.F. Lawton (“Pretty Woman”, “D.O.A: Dead or Alive”), it’s the best of the “Die Hard” rip-offs, and better than any of the “Die Hard” sequels as well. Strong score by B-grade action specialist Gary Chang (“Firewalker”, “Death Warrant”, “The Perfect Weapon”,  “Sniper”, “Double Team”), too. 

Rating: B+