Under Siege 2: Dark Territory

Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995)

Runtime: 100 minutes

Directed by: Geoff Murphy

Starring: Steven Seagal, Eric Bogosian, Everett McGill, Katherine Heigl, Morris Chestnut

From: Warner Bros.

After an unexpected but deserved day off from reviewing films, it was a recent messageboard discussion that spurred my watching this for the first time since the VHS days. The topic was Steven Seagal’s early work; now, no one likes him as a person or for his beliefs. Rather, it probably is nostalgia in part but it was him as a movie star, a wacky SOB who wasn’t a great actor by any means yet was someone who broke limbs and uses an uncommon martial art, at least to Western eyes. Under Siege is technically his best movie due to the budget, the cast and the director.

The sequel isn’t as good yet has its own merits. This time it’s Die Hard on a train and if you thought the first Siege copied that formula, wait until you see Dark Territory. Mad genius and his henchmen take over a train because reasons in order to control “a satellite weapon”; it’s the sort of weapon you’d expect a Bond villain to have—heck, some of them did have similar devices of destruction! What a coincidence then that Casey F’ing Ryback and his estranged niece are on that train also.

That niece was famously played by Katherine Heigl; those faded memories told me that her character was the standard bitchy teenager. In actuality, it started off that way but they actually started getting along even before the villains boarded the train. Either it was me conflating her role in My Father the Hero w/ this, or through the passage of time it was Heigl’s reputation that clouded my memories! Concerning that, way back when she got static for being “difficult”; without knowing any of the details, that could be way overblown or even just plain wrong. What I can say for certain: she was 16 at the time of filming and that was her implied age in the movie… yet more than one guy acted creepy towards her, and off-set Seagal allegedly made highly inappropriate comments towards her. I’m starting to become more sympathetic towards her…

Anyhow, the film has many famous faces: Kurtwood Smith, Nick Mancuso, Morris Chestnut (as goofy comedy relief who at least became more tolerable after the first act), several That Guy actors like Patrick Kilpatrick and Peter Greene; is it a spoiler to mention that Everett McGill and Jonathan Banks portrayed bad guys? However, the highlight of the movie was the out of left field casting of Eric Bogosian as the mad genius Travis Dane. Someone who is IRL a monologuist and a playwright managed to be a wise choice for a heel that (literally) brags about being smarter than everyone else in the room and most of his dialogue was incredibly condescending. Not a surprise to me in 2023 after I finally saw Talk Radio late last year.

The film itself is silly yet an enjoyable R-rated action film with what was considered a big budget at the time where the action entertained me. As stated at least on a few occasions, we don’t get movies like that anymore. Some of the effects during the finale haven’t aged well; a shame as otherwise most of the practical effects looked at least fine. Most of the EFX in the finale are pretty rad-nice miniatures getting wrecked. I shouldn’t have waited literal decades to experience this one more time-that’s on me.