Half Past Dead not halfway decent

Steven Seagal's latest action flick, Half Past Dead, isn't half bad. It's all bad.

Seagal's second attempt to pair himself with a star rapper (the first being Exit Wounds with DMX) is a complete dud that doesn't provide nearly enough voltage to revive the portly martial artist's career.

Seagal plays Sascha Petrosevitch, an undercover FBI agent posing as an infamous car thief. Seagal's mission is to find information about a dangerous mobster from his long time friend and career criminal Nick Frazier (Ja Rule). Petrosevitch and Nick team up to pull off a heist job that is intercepted by the FBI. After a blood-filled shootout almost kills Petrosevitch (unfortunately, he pulls through), Petrosevitch and Nick are sent to "New Alcatraz," a state-of-the-art maximum security prison.

The prison is set to be the site of the execution of Lester (Bruce Weitz), a notorious criminal responsible for stealing and hiding over $200 million dollars worth of gold. A myriad of notable persons are set to witness the execution, including Supreme Court Justice Jane McPherson (Linda Thorson).

However, the party is interrupted by a group of well trained mercenaries led by vicious psychopath Donny Johnson (Morris Chestnut) and his leather-totting sidekick, "49er Six" (Nia Peeples). The group of commandos, who call themselves the "49ers," are there to free Lester and find out the location of the gold (their brilliant plan is to threaten a man on death row). When Lester refuses to tell them (surprise), they begin to take hostages, including McPherson.

That leaves it up to Ja Rule and his bloated partner, Seagal, to rally the inmates (which features more rappers than Bad Boy Inc.) and stop the 49ers. You can literally hear Seagal's joints crack as he performs his unimpressive, slow martial arts moves.

The only relief in the movie is the fact that Seagal's graceless action scenes are far and few between. In the interest of preserving this flabby fossil, director Don Michael Paul left much of the action scenes to Seagal's sidekicks.

The result is a dismal film that leaves you wondering if the title refers to the lame plot, or to Seagal's career.

This movie is rated PG-13 for action violence, language and sexual content.