Black Dawn

• Also known as Foreigner 2: Black Dawn
• Directed by Alexander Gruszynski
• December 27, 2005

Jonathan Cold goes undercover to stop a group of terrorists before they bomb Los Angeles.

Because The Foreigner (not the good one) was such a hit, the public cried out for a sequel. The ONLY character returning is Seagal’s legendary Jonathan Cold because the rest of the cast in the last film did not matter. I guess Cold works for the government again. Not sure. And I’m not sure if Steven Seagal even knew either. Black Dawn has all the quality one would expect in a Seagal film.

Let’s start with some technical issues. The movie opens with a shootout where those involved are clearly close enough to land a hit regardless of whether or not they have worse eyesight than Stevie Wonder. A smart director would use cuts to imply that the participants are further apart than they actually are. Director Alexander Gruszynski either did not care or did not get that bit.

Humorous or not it’s laughable that whoever Steven Seagal is pretending to be could pass as a doctor or look anything other than laughable in a lab coat. In the opener as part of a prison break he switches places with a doctor whom he looks nothing like via some computer hacking and forged identification. It is safe to assume whoever he was impersonating was there before yet nobody thinks something is up.

Cold for purposes of infiltration is getting James Donovan (John Pyper-Ferguson) out of prison at the behest of his brother Michael Donovan (Julian Stone) so they can steal a bomb for some Chechen rebels that want to blow up LA because the CIA killed their previous leader. Notably neither brother has a matching accent. They sound like they grew up in two different parts of the world. Huh? It’s kind of funny, but the longer it goes on the more it takes away from the suspension of disbelief.

There is a kill on sight order out for Cold at this point. Considering nobody kills him when sighted you begin to question what’s going on? And the character that pointed it out doesn’t even seem concerned that the agent that spotted him didn’t kill him. It is all no biggie!

Seagal was never a great or marginally passable thespian but he’s not even trying here. He does the same thing as he does in every other movie and speak in varying accents while looking at those in the seem like they’re stupid. There is the obligatory movement of people telling you how bad ass his character is. Show it. Don’t say it.

Black Dawn uses a lot cheap green screen. Not questionable but clearly fake. That goes along with very bad CGI that you couldn’t find in even the worst games from the time and some very poor delivered lines that either didn’t get recorded correctly or were changed in post-production. The words don’t match the movements of the lips.

This is an improvement in comparison to many of his other direct-to-video movies I’ve watched. It doesn’t mean it’s good, but if someone else was involved with the crafting in some way-a disinterested third-party perhaps-I think this actually could’ve been a quality low budget movie. There’s plenty of good to be found but it is overwhelmed by the bad. And the bad is because the star is also the money man behind the movie and he has an ego. He has a well-known ego. Undeservedly so.

Black Dawn had the potential to be something entertaining. Maybe not great, but quite good. Unfortunately, it’s harmed by the man in charge having too many hats when it comes to the production.