Steven Seagal... why does it seem everyone is so down on the guy?

Probably people are down on the guy for being a narcissist, compulsive liar with sociopathic tendencies. He tried to hire a current CIA agent to kill the retired CIA agent that was his former friend because the retired agent outed him about a long-term lie Seagal used to tell claiming he was also a retired CIA operator. All of his many ex-wives and female colleagues state he is abusive to women and avoiding the police sexual abuse investigation he faced is why he resigned from his volunteer Sheriff duties. He has been caught lying in courtroom proceeding numerous times. He has assaulted other actors on his movie sets before. He was such a jackass to his stunt men that Gene LeBell used the power of judo to make him poop himself.

What does a person hafta do before you dislike them?

 

to be fair, we all have advantages and disadvantages in our genetics... him being 6'4 or 6'5 allows as you basically said for him to get away with certain moves maybe without perfect form... but if it still works with him being tall, then so what? Are we talking pure technique or what works?

 

To the mainstream public... yes, he did. I never would have heard about it without seeing his movies and asking people about him.

 

Yeah... you do.

 

No, I really don't - I just have a very good skillset, a LOT of experience and a plethora of world class instructors and training partners over the years. I have solid credentials and am not ashamed or embarrassed to mention them

I also have a low tolerance for idiocy which is sometimes where the confusion sets in

 

Always a fine line between just being that damn good and having an out of control ego.

We used to walk around and act like hot stuff in the sniper platoon I was in. We got called all kinds of things but you know what, we never messed up and always had success in what we did. Hell, I remember they made our platoon run the PFT/CFT (standardized fitness tests in the Marine Corps) twice because the command didn't believe that everyone in the platoon was THAT in shape and could score THAT high across the board. It's a nice feeling being that good. Let the haters hate.

 

I often have wondered how I would do with tests like those just taking them for fun... if I didn't have a shot shoulder that is.

 

Nothing steroids can't fix!

Not really though.

 

I had thought of doing a cycle of Deca tbh, but that only helps to ease the pain and may speed up healing. My shoulder socket is misshapen and has to be reworked, so between it being illegal, and not really helping in the long run... it's not worth it.

 

Some years back westerners were being recognized as reincarnates of various figures from Tibetan Buddhism. The Tibetans stopped doing this when they observed how tripped out some people became.He wun't the only one.But his recognition is "legit",in a manner of speaking.

Yeah,I knew about Seagal years before the movies. If I recall correctly he was the only non-Japanese to teach a JMA in Japan in his own training hall.

Which is probably worthy of a note of accomplishment in the Akashic Records of MA History.

Ah,yes.Refer to the book "Kung Fu:Cinema of Vengeance",circa late 1970s.Or,what else is new in MA flicks?

Oh well, it's hard for me to pick on one guy's movies out of the overwhelming majority of MA flicks.Which overwhelmingly aren't very good movies.Even the best non-comedy "MA" flicks pale next to mediocre Peckinpaugh!

 

Peckinpah, Akiro Kurosawa and others made great action movies. Kurosawa did use traditional Koryo MA in some of his movies and also lent heavily on nature (wind, rain, mud, forests etc) - which are central to Japanese Shinto spiritual belief. For me Peckinpah's best was Straw Dogs.

Even James Bond movies were kind of cool (although Connery's do look kind of dated now) and most of Connery and Roger Moore's much more tongue-in-cheek Bond movies had there element of MA in there - but the story-lines were great classic narratives with excellent direction.

For sheer action dramatic tension, I don't believe anything will ever beat 'Das Boot' (The Boat) the adventures of a German U-boat crew in WW2 - and there is not 1 scrap of MA in there.

To be honest, when I see Seagall's joke movies it somewhat sobers me up to realise that my piddling MA practices - even postings here - are essentially a means to survive - and not some ego-driven partisan debate of political twaddle - and nothing else i.e. there are more important things in life than MA.

 

In movies I look for 1 of 2 aspects generally - which don't often come along together.

1) Does the movie entertain me? i.e. take me to a fantasy world for a couple of hours.

2) Does the movie make me feel and believe a 'reality' of what is being presented? i.e. make me sweat, bleed, my heartbeat increase etc.

Seagall's movies do neither of these for me.

 

I think that there is probably a lot of jealousy with people when it comes to Seagal. I'm not saying here, although there may be a few. I could understand why considering the guy is a jerk and has made plenty of movies from his a little on the corny and far fetched side.

 

I haven't seen the movie in quite some years. But I seem to recall that they actually did precisely that at the beginning of the movie. I remember (I think) seeing a training montage at the beginning featuring footage of Seagal teaching aikido.

And I have to agree with Hannibal. Joe Public couldn't name the founder of aikido or any of its seniors. But I've talked to myriad non-practitioners who knew that what Seagal was doing was aikido. And, even if they didn't, they recognized that he was doing something different than Van Damme, Norris, Sho Kosugi, and any of the other action stars of the time were doing. So they trundled off to find out what it was. Thereby still putting aikido on the map.

Think about how much attention the Bourne movies garnered for systems like krav maga (which isn't actually featured at all) and kali (which is). And those connections are much less obvious than Seagal's association with aikido.

Even amongst people with a knowledge of martial arts--people who could actually have told you who Morihei Ueshiba was--aikido may just not have been much in their consciousness until Seagal. I know that was the case for me and my friends.

All of that said, my overall impression (fairly or not) is that he's kind of a prat.

EDIT: Found the opening scene from "Above the Law" (aka "Nico") on YouTube

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86OU9u7O5HI"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86OU9u7O5HI[/ame]

 

A good summary Stuart.

 

That looked like a terrible class. He just spent the whole time throwing his students around!

 

I always ask myself and try to answer in the most honest way... could I fight this person? Not if I had to, but would I willingly fight them without any gear or rules.. I have to say... no, I wouldn't. I think many here would say they would, but in reality I doubt it.

 

Bah! Keep the gloves on, I would love to test my self against seagal gloves on of course, win or lose I dont want to hurt anyone. Who wouldn't want to say they got to throw a few punches at seagal. I always imagine fighting people, but I never think of it in terms of who will come out the winner/ looser, but how much fun it would be and how much I would learn. Heck there's a few MAP members I think I would have a blast sparing with, I would probably loose horribly, but I'd be laughing the entire time. :evil: .

Seagal, van dam, jacky chan are all fantasy matches

 

I'd try and pull a joe son on his pudgy butt.