Bad Movies that are Awesome! #1: Marked for Death

Hey everyone, welcome to a new segment of the site called Bad Movies that are Awesome or BMTAA! for short.

Once a week I'm going to blog about a guilty pleasure movie. A movie that I have no allusions on how bad it is in reality but somehow manages to kick ass.

First up we have the Steven Seagal masterpiece, Marked for Death.

Marked for Death is kind of an end to makeshift trilogy of sorts. While he was playing characters under different names much like the man with no name (who did have a name in each of the three dollar movies), Segal essentially plays the same guy; bad ass cop/cia agent/dea agent out to get the bad guys who end up threatening his family or worse. Even the trailer below insinuates this.




In this particular film, Seagal plays John Hatcher. A DEA Agent who has seen one too many bad things including his partner being shot down like a punk by a Mexican whore.

Please note, when busting a drug cartel, there's a good chance even naked whores are armed.

Anyways, Hatcher has quit the DEA and has gone home to live with his mom and sister and his sister's little girl. We discover Hatcher is good with guns. He has a collection of old ones in his old room (apparently Hatcher's mom left it exactly how it was) which for some reason he decides to clean one of them as a family reunion is going on downstairs.

But Hatcher's small town dreams are slightly dashed while he is visiting his buddy Max (played by awesome bad movie staple Keith David). Max and Hatcher were in 'Nam together, that's why they're buddies. But all around the field there are evil Jamaicans selling weed, coke and GASP the eviliest of all 80's/90's drugs, crack.

Meanwhile the vile Jamaicans offer a deal to the slightly less vile but certainly more greasy Colombian drug lords. We discover the Jamaican bad guy is named Screwface (guess the due liked Bob Marley) who has magical voodoo powers. Or as another evil Jamaican puts it best in Predator 2 "Fookin voodoo magic mahn!"

The Colombians tell Screwface to fuck off.

Meanwhile, Hatcher and Max go to a bar. Colombian greasy drug guys are there... in bursts the Jamaicans and the shoot the shit out of the Colombians and the entire bar. Hatcher catches one of them and makes him feel pain! By the way, the Jamaicans name is apparently Monkey...I am amazed that the NAACP did not complain about a black guy not only being portrayed as a drug dealer in the movie but a black guy named Monkey who deals drugs.

This sets off a vendetta between Hatcher and the Jamaicans. First the Jamaicans drive by Hatcher's house and brain damage his niece. The Hatcher and Max go after the Jamaicans with the most awesome of dialogue:

Drug Dealer: "Hey you want some blow?"

Hatcher: "Yeah, I want some blow. Put your hands where I can see 'em or I'm gonna blow your head off."

How can you argue with that?

That then leads to the Jamaicans breaking into the house and Screwface himself is about to sacrifice Hatcher's sister to some voodoo god or something when Hatcher saves the day.

Then Hatcher goes to Jamaica and decapitates Screwface.

Then Screwface comes back from the dead!

Oh wait, it's his twin brother no one realised existed.

Hatcher kills Screwface #2 by taking both thumbs and jamming SF#2's eyes in past the sockets and then trows him down an elevator shaft on to a sharp pointy thing.

It is terrible and awesome at the same time

Now beyond that awesome, the film is very important in bad films in various ways.

- Marked for Death also marked the end of the first round of Seagal as Bad Ass Cop. His next few movies he became a Bad Ass Chef/Military guy.

- Seagal was still reasonably in good shape.

- This also appears to be the first time we see the musical side of Seagal as he co-wrote one of the songs that regga vet Jimmy Cliff. Seagal would later go onto more musical glory with his band Thunderbox.

- The last part of the last note was sarcasm.

Despite how bad this film is there is something wonderfully awesome about it. Especially the violence. In the 80's and 90's, people always complained about the amount of violence in action movies. But now that I looked back at least there was consequences to that violence. Sure it would take 20 bullets but at least they bled and died, now guy gets shot once and he falls over but he might as well be sleeping.

And COME ON! SEAGAL POKES A DUDE'S EYES INTO HIS HEAD WITH HIS THUMBS!!!

See you next week.