Eye Candy #527 - "Exit Wounds" (SEAGAL! #10)

Exit Wounds:  Another sterling example of acting oeuvre of one Earl Simmons, better known as the  rapper DMX.  It’s the same sort of gritty crime action flick he always seems to find himself in, this time with the immortal Steven Seagal playing star-maker here.  Seagal is Detroit cop Orin Boyd, who doesn’t play by the rules.    This shouldn’t be confused with his standard “LA cop who doesn’t play by the rules”, “NY cop who doesn’t play by the rules” or “ex-Navy SEAL who doesn’t play by the rules” schticks.  It’s all about nuance here, people.  Busted for being insubordinate, he is relegated to the worst precinct in town (so bad apparently, it has a miscast Jill Hennessey as precinct commander).   Once there, he comes in contact with a local dealer Latrell (DMX) doing a drug buy with an undercover cop.  Soon a large quantity of heroin goes missing from the evidence lock-up,  all signs point to a team of dirty cops.  On top of that, Latrell isn’t who he appears to be.  Boyd stumbles into the midst of this criminal conspiracy and all it gets resolved through a modicum of excessive violence.  The supporting cast also includes Isaiah Washington, Bill Duke, Anthony Anderson, Michael Jai White, and the equally immortal Bruce McGill.  Eva Mendes and Jamie Foxx have small parts, too (this came out back in 2001, long before their respective ships finally came in).  This is the beginning of Seagal’s long decline into a decade of mediocrity; this film is cheap and looks it, particularly in HD.  Seagal doesn’t do all of his own stunts (there is an extended bit involving a motorcycle and the person on the bike is so obviously not Steven, yet we get to see extensive shots of the stunt double from the front), he’s already starting to put on some weight, and there is some goofy misplaced wirework as well.  With the exception of one vaguely interesting fight with paper cutter blades (vaguely in the sense that I have never seen a fight with paper cutter blades, just forget that no reason is given for the paper cutters to be there in the first place), there is absolutely nothing here to write home about.  This may be Seagal’s first and only film (loosely) based on a novel.  Director Andrzej Bartkowiak is a much better cinematographer than he is a director (he also directed “Doom” and “Cradle 2 the Grave”).   There are lots of talented people here trapped by a terrible script. Woodchuck sez, “Skip it.”