Jean-Claude Van Damme

craner

Beast of Burden
My dad took me to the cinema to see Masters of the Universe when it first came out (1987). During the opening credits he burst into hysterical laughter at the name 'Dolph Lundgren'. He then spent the rest of the film sarcastically repeating the name 'Dolph Lundgren' and laughing hysterically whenever Dolph came on screen. I was furious.
 

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I've been slowly working my way through Cyborg. Looks great at times, but you can predict everything that's going to happen. They've basically mashed together Mad Max, Conan the Barbarian and The Terminator. It's also surprisingly unpleasant. The villain puts Van Damme and his adopted family through something similar to what Henry Fonda does to Charles Bronson in Once Upon A Time in the West and later crucifies him on a shipwreck.
 

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The villain sounds like Nick Land,

"First there was the collapse of civilization: anarchy, genocide, starvation. Then when it seemed things couldn't get any worse, we got the plague. The Living Death, quickly closing its fist over the entire planet. Then we heard the rumors: that the last scientists were working on a cure that would end the plague and restore the world. Restore it? Why? I like the death! I like the misery! I like this world!"
 

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He spends the first half of the film looking like Lou Reed,

94847_full.jpg
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
The villain sounds like Nick Land,

"First there was the collapse of civilization: anarchy, genocide, starvation. Then when it seemed things couldn't get any worse, we got the plague. The Living Death, quickly closing its fist over the entire planet. Then we heard the rumors: that the last scientists were working on a cure that would end the plague and restore the world. Restore it? Why? I like the death! I like the misery! I like this world!"
With shades of Mrs Doyle in the penultimate sentence.
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
you can predict everything that's going to happen
what JCVD, or indeed, action movie in general, is this not the case for, tho? I guess it depends on what you're judging

by the standards of low-budget 80s action - Road Warrior ripoff subdivision - it's pretty good

there's some level of thought gone into the overall look and even kind of a plot, which is more than you can say for most such things

compared to actually good or innovative films, sure it's laughably bad. the haircuts alone are insane.

"surprisingly unpleasant" I can see. there's a nastiness jarringly at odds with the lighthearted touches, like everyone being named after guitars.

the guy who plays the villain is a surfer the director randomly saw surfing and thought he looked the part, which you'd have to say he does.

he went to memorably play the leader of the first gang in Point Break that Keanu + Busey raid mistakenly

"back off Warchild, seriously"
 

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I might have to watch this,

Jean-Claude van Johnson is an American action comedy-drama web television series produced by Amazon Studios. It premiered on August 19, 2016. On January 18, 2018, the series was cancelled after one season.

The story centers around retired martial arts and action movie star Jean-Claude Van Damme playing himself. It is revealed that the movie career and personal history of Jean-Claude Van Damme is all a cover story. He is actually a secret agent known as Jean-Claude Van Johnson, aided by his personal assistant and make-up specialist who are themselves covert operatives as well, being his handler and weapons master respectively. After being out of the spy business for five years, Jean-Claude runs into his former handler Vanessa (Kat Foster) and realizes how much he misses both their work together (which made him feel like a hero) and the relationship they had. He decides to go back into action, tracking down a major drug lord only to later realize he has found a larger threat, that of terrorists who possess a weather control machine.
 
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