Bullet Points: Driven to Kill (2009)
Recently I found myself organizing my physical media collection and I came across a four pack of post-2000 Steven Seagal movies that I picked up at Dollar Tree some time ago. I believe it was so long ago that it only cost me $1.00 and not the $1.25 of today.
So I checked the site and confirmed it had been a few months since anyone covered a Steven Seagal movie and I took it as a sign that I should probably watch and review one of the four movies in the collection. After doing a little IMDb research, I went with the highest rated movie among the four options, 2009’s Driven to Kill…
- Father of the Bride: Steven Seagal plays Ruslan, a former Russian mobster (with and without an accent) turned crime novelist living in sunny California. One day, Ruslan gets a call from his ex-wife Catherine that their daughter Lanie is about to be married and she really wants him to be there. Without hesitation Ruslan hops on a plane and heads east to New Jersey. When he arrives he first stops off at a bar where we get to see Ruslan quickly take down two disrespectful punks. Then he hails a cab to take him to his ex-wife’s new home (courtesy of her new husband). The new husband, Terry Goldstein, is a defense attorney and seems unreasonably upset that Ruslan will be attending his own daughter’s wedding.
- Married to the Mob: As it turns out Lanie has fallen in love with Stephan Abramov, the son of notorious Russian gangster Mikhail Abramov. But Stephan has no desire to follow in his father’s footsteps and wants to start a non-mob life with Lanie, where the two can live happily ever after. When Ruslan visits with his daughter and meets Stephan, he can’t help but question if Mikhail may hold it against Lanie that she is taking Stephan away from mob life. Ruslan’s instincts were not wrong and hours before the wedding Lanie and her mother are assaulted in their home by men hired by Mikhail to make sure his son was standing at the altar alone.
- Wedding Day Blues: When Ruslan finds out what has happened he rushes over to the crime scene that is his ex-wife’s house.. The place is swarming with cops and Detectives Norden and Lavastic are trying to piece together what happened when they catch Ruslan posing as a detective himself and asking questions, primarily about his daughter who is being stretchered out. Lanie is still alive but in rough shape, Ruslan’s ex-wife was not as fortunate. Ruslan convinces the police to not let anyone know that Lanie is still alive, not even Stephan… speaking of Stephan, he shows up and is obviously heartbroken and angry. Mikhail is with his son and acts totally surprised by the horrific events, as does Terry Goldstein. Goldstein even offers to hook Ruslan up with a guy who he defended once that he knows can get Ruslan the weapons he will need, since he knows Ruslan is going to look for who is responsible for these heinous crimes.
- Bushwhacked: When Ruslan goes to Goldstein’s gun guy, the guy gets a mysterious phone call and seconds later is accusing Ruslan of being a cop… and just when he thinks he is about to take out Ruslan, him and his boys get taken out. And when Ruslan checks the phone, he sees the call came from Terry Goldstein… the plot thickens! Ruslan grabs the hardware he is going to need and recruits young and totally in over his head Stephan to help him find those responsible for attacking Lanie.
- Saving Grace: Driven to Kill is a pretty unremarkable and predictable film, but the movie’s saving grace comes when the info that Lanie is still alive reaches Mikhail’s ears (thanks to a dirty cop) and Ruslan is tipped off by Lanie’s doctor that the police protecting Lanie’s room have suddenly gone missing. Ruslan has the doctor move Lanie to somewhere safe (it just so happens there is an entire wing of the hospital that is not in use and this becomes the backdrop for Ruslan and Stephan to take on Mikhail and his goons (all masquerading as cops). There’s an intense shootout followed by Ruslan having to take out Mikhail’s men one by one and SPOILER ALERT, Ruslan ends up killing Mikhail in a brutally awesome way.
IMDb did not steer me wrong this time and I can see why Driven to Kill has a solid 5.0 rating. The third act steals the show, but that’s not to say the first two acts of the movie are unwatchable, unless you are a person that can’t stomach Steven Seagal, but if you are are you probably aren’t reading this review or these Bonus Bullet Points…
- If You Ever: …wanted to see a woman use the promise of a threesome with her girlfriend to get Steven Seagal to reveal a secret, then Driven to Kill is the movie for you.
- AKA: The working title for the movie was Ruslan and it was released in several parts of the world as Ruslan.
- Parking Garage: I mentioned the obligatory bar fight that Ruslan found himself in, but I did not mention the danger he encountered in the parking garage when that bastard Terry Goldstein attempted to set Ruslan up for a second time. The parking garage ended up being much more dangerous to the guys trying to kill Ruslan, than it was to Ruslan himself, but it still reinforced my theory that parking garages are among the most dangerous places in action movies.
- The Name Game: Not to be confused with 1991’s Driven to Kill starring people you probably never heard of.
