The Foreigner (2003)

Director:

Michael Oblowitz

Writer:

Darren O. Campbell (writer)

Release Date:

20 June 2003 (South Korea)

Genre:

Action | Thriller

Tagline:

If they think they can stop him, they're dead wrong.

Plot:

This story is about a freelance agent (Seagal) who is the courier of a package from France to Germany. He soon finds that many people want to get their hands on it.

Plot Keywords:

Courier | First Of Series | Chase | Title Spoken By Character

Cast

Steven Seagal	...	Jonathan Cold
Max Ryan	...	Dunoir
Harry Van Gorkum	...	Jerome Van Aken
Jeffrey Pierce	...	Sean Cold
Anna-Louise Plowman	...	Meredith Van Aken
Sherman Augustus	...	Mr. Mimms
Gary Raymond	...	Jared Olyphant
Philip Dunbar	...	Alexander Marquee
Izabela Okrasa	...	Clarissa Van Aken
Grzegorz Kowalczyk	...	Rolls Royce Driver
Dianna Camacho	...	Hotel Clerk Imke
Deobia Oparei	...	The Stranger
Grzegorz Emanuel	...	Jonathan Look Alike
Przemyslaw Saleta	...	Security Guard
Jan Jurewicz	...	Man with Porsche

Also Known As:

Cudzoziemiec (Poland)

MPAA:

Rated R for violence and language.

Runtime:

Argentina:96 min

Country:

USA | Poland

Language:

English | Danish | German | Polish

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Iceland:16 | Sweden:15 | Netherlands:16 | Finland:K-15 | South Korea:15 | Argentina:16 | Australia:MA | Germany:18 (JK/SPIO) | New Zealand:R16 | Norway:15 | Singapore:NC-16 | UK:15 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Berlin, Germany

Company:

Franchise Pictures

Trivia:

The plane crash pictured in the newspaper that Cold was reading occurred in San Jose, Costa Rica on 16 January 2000. It killed five people.

Goofs:

Factual errors: There is a big sign right beside the main entrance of the train station which reads "Achtung! Stromleitung!" ("Attention! Electric line!"). It is highly unlikely that such a sign would be there because either the line is wired in a way it doesn't harm people or it wouldn't be there at all (due to the vast amount of security protocols and rules concerning electricity in Germany).

Quotes:

Dunoir: Now, no more bedtime stories. Where's the package?
Jonathon Cold: [sarcastically] What package?
Dunoir: [fires a warning shot near Cold's foot and chuckles] You're running out of hiding places my friend. Do you believe I found this barn through premonition? Do what you can to eliminate the innocent from this equation.
Jonathon Cold: Well, then it looks like you've been had, Dunoir. Because Meredith may have sent you to kill me, but she's already got the package, and I thought you were a lot smarter than that.
Dunoir: No, no, no, no, no. You're much smarter than that. I know you like I know myself.
Jonathon Cold: Well I'll tell you what then, why don't you go ahead and kill me? Start your own little easter egg hunt.
[nods down to Mimms' watch which is beeping]
Jonathon Cold: That sets off a homing device. Folks'll come and find you in a couple of meters.
Dunoir: That's, who'll know where to find you?
Jonathon Cold: Foreign ops.
[...]

Movie Connections:

References First Blood (1982)

As bad as any movie I've seen in the past year.

The Foreigner is a straight-to-video Steven Seagal film that was originally intended to be released as a theatrical feature in March, 2003, an intention which was reportedly reversed when Seagal's prior film (Half Past Dead) tanked at the box office. According to some reports, the film had a lavish $20 million budget, including location shoots in Warsaw and Paris, and was completed as part of the studio's obligation to a two-picture deal which was negotiated after the relative success of Exit Wounds seemed to indicate that Seagal still had a solid following.

Despite the size of their investment, Sony Screen Gems probably made the right move in shelving this movie. It is nearly incomprehensible. What am I saying? It IS incomprehensible. I don't think I understood what was going on at all, except in the very broadest terms.

Seagal is employed by a mysterious guy to deliver a mysterious package to another mysterious guy. Other mysterious guys try to stop him. Other highly mysterious guys try to kill the moderately mysterious guys who try to stop him. Other really, really mysterious guys do especially mysterious stuff, all of which which was in fact too mysterious for me to figure out. The intended recipient's mysterious wife tries to intercept the package before it can be delivered to her husband. Because he is a self-proclaimed "consummate professional" who has been hired to deliver the package only into the hands of the husband, Seagal at first defies the wife, then later gets involved in protecting her and her daughter from other mysterious guys with unexplained agendas, as well as from her husband.

Many people have mysterious, cryptic conversations. Many people blow each other's brains out. Some guys seem to die more than once, while in other scenes gunfights end without a clear view of the result, so the audience sees somebody die, but is not sure which one of the gunslingers is headed to boot hill. Allegiances shift often, adding further mystery. Or should I say confusion?

I don't know who was on whose side, or what anybody really wanted, and the resolution was as unsatisfying as the exposition. At the end of the movie, I just sat there thinking, "That's the end? What the ...?"

I couldn't even figure out the credits. IMDb says that Aussie actress Kate Fischer (from "Sirens") was in this film, but I'll be damned if I know where. Either she was left on the cutting room floor or she wisely opted out of the project. She could have found some activities more beneficial to her career, like having unnecessary surgery, ripping those pesky insert cards out of magazines, or taking some community college courses in animal husbandry.

Seagal used to be a pretty fair hand-to-hand combatant, but the action scenes didn't manage to redeem this film at all. Seagal is in his 50's now and is a very large man, so he is reduced to a mimimal level of physical exertion and even during that he is contained in a knee-length coat to hide his inchoate Brandoesque girth. He might even get a little winded removing the wrappers from candy bars, although that's understandable if you estimate just how many of those he must have to eat to maintain his present girth.

Steven Seagal seemed to be making a comeback with Exit Wounds, but if his last film was half past dead, this one must be pretty close to filling out the other half.