JCVD

I had a lot of heroes growing up; the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Batman, and other great people along those lines. At one point of my childhood, Jean-Claude Van Damme sat at the top of that stack. Aside from the accent, he was everything a boy could ever dream to be. He beat the crap out of the man-monster from Enter the Dragon. My love for him and his movies fell by the wayside as I grew older though. It came down to the fact that he was never in any real blockbusters and his few noteworthy pictures were successful in spite of themselves. I moved on, but he didn't. He couldn't. And that's what this movie is about.

"B" action movie star, Jean-Claude Van Damme, has fallen on hard times. Or rather, he's stuck in hard times. He can't find a way out of the "straight-to-video" realm of cinema that has defined him. His greedy agent isn't helping matters. He's fighting a losing battle for custody of his daughter and is hemmorhaging his limited funds in the process. And last but not least, he has just been caught up in the mayhem of a post office robbery in his homecountry.

The chronology of the story is fragmented for dramatic effect but as one may expect, it overly complicates matters at times. We are given snippets of Van Damme's "life" difficulties as we also see him try to deal with the unique circumstance he has been thrown into as an international superstar being held hostage by softcore hoodlums. These flashbacks are not just used as storytelling devices though; they also serve as a means of stripping away the mystique that enshrouds our idea of Jean-Claude Van Damme. The people he meets on the street during the film are immediately overwhelmed by his presence. They only know him as seen on tv, but the movie fights hard to make sure we know him better.

In focusing so intently on the main character, the filmmakers let certain details of the picture wander off-course. Most apparent of these issues is the pacing, which drags its feet on a regular occasion. This has less to do with the manner of storytelling and more to do with the lackluster dialogue. Worth mentioning though, some of the conversations brought about by Jean-Claude's starstruck fans are just too funny for words. The world class tactlessness it must take to request someone to kick a cigarette out of another person's mouth...

There are a lot of adjectives you could use to describe most Jean-Claude Van Damme movies. One word you won't find on that list is "touching", but I'll be damned if a monologue delivered by JCVD, himself, in the film's closing chapter doesn't tug at the heartstrings. Now, I am not totally blinded by the man's awesomeness. JCVD, the movie, is far from perfect, but I think enough goodness is salvaged here for a recommendation.