Really Surprised!

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Seriously, this film plays like it was written by a (stupid) computer. Every single cliche is just put together by dog-dirt actors in order to provide yet another vehicle for Seagal. Does he believe he is actually a good actor or is he just doing it because he knows it will make easy dollars. If he wasn't a 7th dan karate, or whatever the hell he is, I would love to punch him in the face....in fact I may well dedicate my life to becoming an 8th dan, just to be able to beat him.

Fire Down Below (1997): Dir: Felix Enriguez Acala / Cast: Steven Seagal, Marg Helgenberger, Harry Dean Stanton, Kris Kristofferson, Stephen Lang: One of the dumbest films that Steven Seagal ever conjured up. He plays an agent who arrives in a coal mining town to put a stop to the toxic waste that is poisoning water. He makes a few friends as well as the expected enemies who wish not to be bothered. Boring concept followed by numerous fight scenes before concluding pretty much the same way. Director Felix Enriguez Acala is working with material that has about the same value as diarrhea. Even the production is boring. Seagal spends 90% of the film in combat where he beats up dozens of people including cops. I could only shake my head as some big lout threatens him and he beats the sh*t out him in short order as well as kicking around a bunch of his buddies. In lame supporting roles is Marg Helgenberger who clings to Seagal while he beats up her abusive brother. Harry Dean Stanton is far too valuable for this sh*t. Kris Kristofferson plays the standard villain in a role that is totally beneath him. Stephen Lang plays Helgenberger's nasty abusive brother who will end up with Seagal's foot up his ass. There is no reason to see this garbage unless one has severe anger issues that therapy cannot cure. Pointless junk that should be burned in a fire down below. Score: 0 / 10

Plot Synopsis: Jack Taggart, an agent working for the EPA, is shocked to discover that his best friend & fellow agent has been killed while investigating reports of people in a rural town in Kentucky getting sick. Posing as a church mission carpenter, he visits the town, uncovering a conspiracy to dump toxic waste in the abandoned coal mines in the nearby mountains by Orin Hanner, a shady businessman whose son runs the town. Faced with a wall of silence in the town & the presence of the dumpers, Jack attempts to expose the dumping & prosecute the people responsible.Film Review: Faced with a dip in popularity during the mid-1990s, the action stars of the 1980s & early 1990s (Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Van Damme, Bronson & Norris) tried a variety of ways to continue their careers – Schwarzenegger & Stallone both tried their hands at comedy with varying results; Van Damme's popularity actually going up a notch for a brief time before crashing down so low that he became stuck in DTV land for the next decade; Norris turned to television while Bronson made a trilogy of DTV films before his death. As for Steven Seagal, the real-life aikido master, police officer (I'm serious), blues musician & actor (I was going to include CIA agent in that list of achievements but I'm not exactly sure if Seagal ever worked for the agency for real), he tried to reinvent himself as an environmental activist, making a trilogy of films in the mid-to-late 1990s that were eco-thrillers (ON DEADLY GROUND, Fire Down Below & The Patriot)… at least in basic plot thematics, that is.Excepting On Deadly Ground, these pro-environment films almost killed Seagal's career stone dead, mainly due to being ridiculously heavy-handed – the villains are all very shrill one-dimensional cardboard cutouts & clichés; the scripts are poorly written; & the most serious flaw of all – the action scenes are poorly staged.Fire Down Below starts out in a way that seems to indicate that Seagal is planning to forsake his customary martial arts sequences for some good old fashioned investigative skills. Not counting the short scene where Seagal stumbles onto a cannabis hydroponics farm, there seems to be a lack of anything that even remotely resembles the sort of brutal martial arts fights that Seagal's early films had showcased.But shortly after it starts, the film degenerates into a muddled blend of one-dimensional stereotypes, tepid car chases & poorly-choreographed fight scenes. There are two things I hate while watching films – having my intelligence insulted & being preached to (by that I don't mean social commentaries or satire – I mean films that beat you over the head with messages). Sure enough, Fire Down Below does both. I find it hard to believe that there could be a person (Kris Kristofferson's villain) so cowardly & stupid that he dumps toxic waste in his home town's mountain range. As for the acting, Kristofferson is actually a good actor, but here he has no motivation for his actions. As for the preaching part, the film lays on the let's-look-after-the-environment message with all the subtlety of a kick to the groin.All of Seagal's films (including the dreck that Seagal made during the 2000s) have this concept of White Hat / Black Hat characters (the White Hat is Seagal, while the Black Hat is a really despicable villain). Of course this scripting idea first manifested itself during Seagal's debut film ABOVE THE LAW & continues in this one, with Kris Kristofferson's businessman being an evil coward who spends his working hours in the company of female escorts.The other actors are quite competent in their performances, especially Marg Helgenberger as the love interest (I kind of liked the idea to give her a shady past, but the film indifferently throws this away by making her brother turn out to have committed the deed) & Harry Dean Stanton (Brain from John Carpenter's ultra cool sci-fi classic ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK), who gives a good impression as the hick local who proves to be Seagal's greatest asset.

The usual in Steven Seagal's movies take place in "Fire Down Below" too. He's the good guy again; the hero again; he's never got punched but he kicks and punches lots of guys with the little help of the editor who makes his moves even faster. This movie resembles "On Deadly Ground", so here we have Seagal saving the Earth of the bloody hands of powerful and corrupt business man who are destroying rivers, oceans and trees and all. The major difference between "Fire Down Below" and "On Deadly Ground" is the quality of the movie (for some reason I like "On Deadly...") and the violence/action. While action is dumb and so non breathtaking here, on the previous film was something great, although at times badly used or excessive, especially towards older people, it was literally no country for old men (e.g. the old friend of Seagal tortured and killed in 1994 film). In "Fire Down Below" the same thing happens but it is only implied, nothing is shown on screen and other times it's only a threat.In the story Seagal is a Environmental agent who goes to a little town in Kentucky investigate the murder of his friend who discovered that a powerful company, owned by Orin Hanner Sr. (Kris Kristofferson), is being paid to dump toxic waste into an abandoned coal mine shaft. With the assistance of a Reverend (Levon Helm) and a woman (Marg Helgenberger) and some other residents Segal is gonna find the truth and kicks some villains.The lack of action ruined this movie. The lack of violence ruined this movie. The lack of someone able to kick Seagal on the face ruined this and almost all Seagal's movies. The great vantage of this against "On Deadly Ground" is the quotes delivered by Seagal, funny things and for incredible as it might sound these quotes are not unintentionally laughable, they're there for the purpose of being funny. The scene in the casino when Seagal takes down 4 security guys trying to arrest Kristofferson is amazingly funny. I'll not say this was Seagal's worst film, but perhaps his performance was not good enough and the whole supporting cast was very effective and good compared to him. Marg Helgenberger was great, her part was very interesting as the forsaken woman of the town; Stephen Lang plays his usual sinister figure in a twisted character; Kristofferson was quite good and funny; and Levon Helm was the best on scene. The movie includes some bad acting from Brad Hunt (he plays the son of Kristofferson) whose presence is annoying, and some wasted acting by Harry Dean Stanton and Richard Masur (who appears in the beginning in some flashbacks), seriously they deserved a better flick to appear. Again, it is a movie to wait and wait again for action and it will be a few good things in it. Director Felix Enriquez Alcalá made better with the TV film remake of "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three". 4/10