I've got to admit, this didn't turn out the way I anticipated. I just don't think the tag cloud generation software exists yet that can accurately portray a formerly super-badass government operative turned cop/chef who foils terrorist plots or avenges his murdered wife/child/partner, all the while remaining true to his spiritual beliefs. Even so, I expected the results to look something like this:
Steven Seagal – Expected Plot Summary Tag Cloud
Instead the result was:
Steven Seagal – Plot Summary Tag Cloud
Just to be safe I removed all of Seagal's straight-to-video movies from the list.
Steven Seagal – Non-STV Plot Summary Tag Cloud
Interestingly enough, there was more of an emphasis on CIA and murder in his STV movies, while anything that hit a theater tended to be about police and bombs. There's always a healthy amount of killing, but the STV movies introduced drugs and Asian gangs. Seagal has definitely become more an international ass-kicker in his direct-to-DVD days. He also seems to be over his save theenvironmentkick as well.
Steven Seagal- STV Movie Plot Summary Tag Cloud
Tag clouds were generated using the very cool Wordle.
Any true fan of Steven Seagal movies1, will recognize Out For Justice as one of the classics. Seagal was still on the cusp of nearly almost being in fighting trim, and his character was usually a tough NYC cop instead of a former black-ops superstar turned janitor/nanny/chef. I highly recommend anything from Seagal's illustrious career that was released between 1988 and 1992.
Check out the Wikipedia article. Read it, really take it in. Or just glance at it. There are 6 paragraphs, 697 words laid out in the the oddly fractured writing style of a young ESL student using a thesaurus to sound more intelligent.
Now take a look at the links within the article. There are 6 people mentioned, all with links to the actors pages. Two places – Brooklyn and… a neighborhood in Brooklyn. One reverse definition, Omerta. 2 The final 4 links in the article are to things: NYPD, crack, Chevy Caprice. And corkscrew. As in the tool used to remove corks from bottles.
To recap: We have an action packed movie about a cop cleaning up Brooklyn and avenging his partner's death. He takes on the mob, the institution and NYC-Italian stereotypes. And the relevant links are deemed to be the neighborhood the movie takes place in, the main character's employer, the car he drives, the drug the antagonist likes, and the corkscrew that Seagal uses to kill the villain.
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Background
This post has been rotting in my drafts folder for a couple months (I wonder why?), and then Dan Previte posted a link to the most amazing Seagal animated gif ever.
It's a 3MB animated GIF, so be patient waiting for the magic.
Prior to his transition to straight-to-DVD releases [back]
Seagal liked to be seen as a tough neighborhood Italian guy (his mother was Irish and his father Jewish), so they crammed as many stereotypical Italian references into the movies as possible. [back]
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It's not important how I arrived there, but I stumbled across an entry on Joshua Topolsky's personal site (as opposed to Engadget) titled "
