VAN DAMME: A RETROSPECTIVE (25 Career Highlights Good & Bad) PART 2

Hey! How could you hate this guy? Continuing from part 1, part 2 is more of the OK era of Van Damme. You know, the kind of movies you watch at 3 am on USA but can't quite bring yourself to buying unless you want every JCVD movie in existence.

19) Knock Off

The late 90s were an odd time for our man Van Damme. His popularity was decreasing and he was barely holding on in theaters. Still, he was paired with some bigger stars unlike his more successful early films. Right after Rodman, we got "Deuce Bigalow" himself Rob Schneider who at least was a seasoned actor and comedian. Still, his "annoyingness" didn't help the overall quality of this picture. What we have here is a movie with some decent Hong Kong style action but an overall unmemorable movie.

18) Second In Command

For a straight to DVD movie, this isn't bad. The problem is JCVD has actually produces some high quality rental bin movies and this one just gets lost in the shuffle. The story itself isn't anything original, but it at least has some intrigue. This movie involves a lot of corruption and politics involved in a small eastern european country, but you can't help but think this could translate to America. The main problem here is that it has big ideas and probably could have benefitted from a big budget. The low grade CGI doesn't help when you are trying to take a terrorist situation seriously. Still, this was a step in the right direction in my opinion.

17) Sudden Death

There are moments of "Sudden Death" I truly like. The problem is Van Damme had already hit his peak in the 90s and he started to produce generic action flicks that didn't have the spark of his early films. He had just come off his big budget blockbusters and was now coming to a turning point in his career. This is obviously the beginning of the downfall, but all in all it isn't a horrible action flick. This is one of those movies you buy on VHS for 99 cents and get a quality viewing or two out of it for nostalgia's sake.

16) The Quest

Let's just come out and say it, "The Quest" is a huge "Bloodsport" rip off. We have the same basic plot line, but it tries to be an epic adventure story and the fight scenes take place in a different asian country. It even involves some of the same people that created the first film. I remember my dad taking me to see this in theaters back in 1996 and I couldn't have been more stoked. I remember the film dragging at points, but I remember some beautiful landscape images and some pretty solid fight scenes. The 2 main problems here are that this film tries to be too big for it's own good and if you had the choice between watching this and "Bloodsport"; my guess is 99.9% of the world would watch "Bloodsport". The movie takes too long in getting started with the meat and potatoes, which is the fight tournament. We have a lot of side plots involving travel and Van Damme taking care of street kids while dressing as a clown to rob the rich. Still there are some quality set designs, costumes, and actors involved in this picture. James Remar as an old school boxer is very memorable.

15) Legionnaire

For a straight to DVD release, this film has a pretty good look and style. The main problem with "Legionnaire" is that it doesn't know what kind of picture it wants to be. Is this an epic war story? Is this a 1920's romance? Is this an action flick starring JCVD? I like what some of this film tries to do, but it also suffers from some of "The Quest" syndrome in the sense that it tries to be an epic period piece. "Legionnaire" just doesn't have the time and budget to be that. We don't really understand the history of the war and we basically have JCVD being thrown into it because he works for a corrupt boxer. Still, I like the ending, some of the performances, and it was an early showing of Van Damme going outside the martial arts action picture box.

14) Nowhere To Run

Ah, the "emotional" Van Damme movie. I remember the marketing for this film was Jean Claude with a heart. Sadly, this just makes it a little more boring than his faster paced action movies, because lets be real, this was still JUST an action picture. The plot is pretty cliche when you think about it. The brooding hero Van Damme falls for the single mother who is trying to protect her home from evil developers backed by a corrupt sheriff. This was one of those movies you watched when your parents went to sleep because there were brief moments of nudity, but as far as violence goes it isn't as extreme as the other late 80s/early 90s JCVD pictures. This was smack dab in the middle of Van Damme popularity, but I feel it doesn't hold up to his other movies at the time.