Gutshot Straight

source: Gutshot Straight

A few good actors in supporting roles made this movie tolerable to watch. I expected a worse movie (S Seagal in the cast)

Gutshot Straight is a drama. There is no action whatsoever except two brief fist fights. The problem is when you put Steven Seagal in your movie people expect a bad action film, not a character drama. George Eads (CSI) makes an untriumphant return to Las Vegas as a low life unlucky gambler who gets in over his head with the wrong people and has to try and get his way out in a story we've seen played out hundreds of times before. The supporting cast is full of familiar faces including Ted Levine, Stephen Lang, Vinny Jones, and Fiona Douriff which elevate Gutshot Straight a bit higher but ultimately can't save it. As I said, the story has been done to death and you know where it's going at the halfway mark, the rest of the time is spent just waiting for Eads to get where we already are. Seagal fans (do any still exist?!) will be disappointed by the big boys cameo role, and others will avoid seeing his name. Honestly I'm not sure who to recommend this to?

I'm going through all of the movies Steven Seagal is in and this is one of the worst so far though Steven is only given a "supporting role". This movie starts off with this man having gambling debt, he can't see his daughter and then he meets this rich guy. The man is impressed by the guys ability to read people.Until just over an hour into the movie you're just watching filler, meaningless nothing. I feel this movie lacks motivation instead of showing off some guys house, showing off how pretty someones girlfriend or wife was and boy what a lovely rented Maserati. I feel if there was some extra dialogue that could have been injected into the script it may have saved it as Jack is as boring as they come. You don't feel you're him at all. I wonder how this movie even saw the light of day it is because of how dull a majority of this is. Skip this one. Steven is hardly in it and there is so little going on in this movie you could put it on in the background and get just as much out of it glancing over at it from time to time as this movie and get as much out of it. This does deserve your attention and the score in it is so nonexistent it just screams film student project.

I just watched Gutshot Straight This was a bad one Steven Seagal I have to give credit to George Eads, who at least makes for a watchable lead. AnnaLynn McCord is fine as a powerful mans wife, who offers Eads $50,000 to sleep with her!! I don't think it's spoiler territory to reveal he said no!! Seagal is Paulie Trunks (great name) a Las Vegas mobster (at least I think he was a mobster) and is nothing more than a cameo. Vinnie Jones isn't given much to do either. To be honest nothing noteworthy happens and I mentally checked out (within half an hour) and started looking at things on my phone. It fails at being a crime drama and a dark comedy (if that is even what it was aiming for) the dialogue is weak and the plot thin.

There was little content with Seagal on it. The guy from Prison Break and CSI is worse than in those two series. Boring. Ordinary gambling, action, problems. Nothing to see. Not convincing, negative, immoral, disconnected events. Unrealistic how naive characters behave and no tactics, logic, strategy. Just some random sudden naive things happening. Nothing to look forward for. Empty end. No emotions. The main character but also everybody looks tired, disinterested, and evil.

I like George Eads. He was entertaining as MacGyver's partner in the reboot. His connection to CSI has given him a lot of experience, so naturally a film set in Las Vegas seems a natural for him. So why is this movie not rated higher? No explosions. No car chases. No blazing gun battles. Nope. None of that stuff. Just Jack. He wanders from point A to point B, getting along. Sometimes his crappy Volvo starts. He plays cards. He has a few friends. He needs a shave. Sometimes he gets punched in the face. He can take it. He's looking for money. Duffy gets to him. And then life happens. Supporting characters are pretty strong. Vinnie Jones and Steven Seagal are underworld types that Jack orbits. Steven Lang (the colonel in Avatar) and Ted Levine (Jame Gumb in Silence of the Lambs) are psychopath brothers who unfortunately don't share screen time. Tia Carrera (schwing!) is forgettable as a barfly. This could have been a more powerful movie if it were a little tighter on the direction. Other than that, it was fun to watch.

The film centers on Jack Daniels (George Eads) a drinker and gambler. He owes Pauli (Steven Seagal) money. Paulie takes a shine to him, but Carl (Vinnie Jones) who collects for Paulie doesn't. Jack gets involved with a rich man (Stephen Lang) who wants Jack to do different things (AnnaLynne McCord) for money, but not nearly as entertaining as "Cheap Thrills." The plot was straight forward and plodded slowly without any character development. The title is a poker term. Drawing two cards to an inside straight is really risky, stupid, and lucky in draw poker. However in Texas Holdem' starting out with two cards together and then building outside is not that remarkable. Seagal and Jones are briefly in the film. Jones delivered his half dozen or so lines convincing. Seagal lit a big cigar and started talking like Marlon Brando while looking like Eddie Munster (see hair DVD cover). If that was your goal Steven, I was laughing with you. Might want to wait for a real Seagal film. What I did love was the 60's kaleidoscope opening with a decent theme song. I thought I was going to watch a quality Bond film. Mensa Porn Star Tia Carrere plays a small role as a * soliciting a drink at the bar. She is outsmarted by Jack. Parental Guide: F-bomb. Brief sex. Nudity.

I didn't know what to expect with this movie. Maybe having little expectation is why I liked it. First of all it had a pretty good variety of good/known actors. Stephen Lang (Sargent guy from Avatar), Ted Levine (The Silence of the Lambs), even Tia Carrere and Steven Seagal have an appearance. Although the hat was a little silly. Really who wears a hat like that these days? I know, I suppose it was to add character. Not fantastic, but not that bad either. Definitely a notch above the average at least. With out giving anything away, the film had a nice dark film noir feel to it. This movie might be sort of a sleeper, I bet it will gain popularity in a few years.. It might not have many reviews, and, a lot of them might not be great but I'd recommend it to anyhow who likes noir/mystery/dark style!

Review: After looking at the poster for this film, I thought that it would be half decent but none of the big actors are actually in the film that much. The film is about a professional gambler called Jack Daniel, played by George Eads, whose approached by a man in a casino with a proposition that is hard to pass up. With all of his debts piling up, Jack calls the guy and ends up spending the whole night with him, in a strip bar and then he goes back to his house and finds out that all is not what it seems. After a bad accident, he ends up in deep trouble so he turns to Seagal for help, who he owes money to. This is one of those cheap movies which has a terrible storyline. The director had loads of chances to make it interesting but the whole concept was just too unrealistic. The acting wasn't that great and it seemed to go round and round in circles. On the plus side, it's quite short so it gets right on with it from the beginning but it goes nowhere fast and I got fed up with it after a while. Disappointing! Round-Up: After watching a couple of Seagal movies lately, I thought that I would give his films a chance but they all seem cheap and badly put together. It seems like Seagal, Vinnie Jones, Danny Trejo, Ving Rhymes Christian Slater, Cuba Gooding Jr etc, all use the same agent because they all make the same type of, straight to DVD, low budget movies that are quite bad. There must be an audience that actually enjoy these films because they do produce a lot of them but I personally only watch them for a laugh because they are so awful. Anyway, I thought that this was going to be about gambling, with loads of violence but it was just about a man who has to get himself out of a tricky situation. Seagals scenes weren't bad but I won't be watching it again in a hurry. I recommend this movie to people who are into their thrillers about a gambler who ends up in a impossible situation after sleeping with a sketchy man's wife. 3/10