Van Damme pulls off his riskiest stunt: An unflattering art house flick
During the late 1980s, I received a letter from action superstar Jean-Claude Van Damme after he read a review in which I praised him for taking his acting skills seriously.
"I have been working hard to improve myself as an actor," he wrote, "so your words were quite encouraging."
Of course, next to the emotionally inert Chuck Norris - the reigning martial arts action star at the time - the effusively boyish Van Damme looked positively Shakespearean.
Now, in his strange, challenging new movie "JCVD," Van Damme goes Shakespearean for real with a heart-ripping soliloquy kerplopped right in the middle of a bizarre Belgian bank robbery plot.
The background fades out. Van Damme is magically lifted up above the set. He looks directly into the camera and speaks to us. He talks about his life. His career. His choices. His success. His marriages. His drug use. His fall from grace. His crippled spirit. His hope.
It's a galvanizing performance delivered not from an ebullient young performer emanating excitement and possibility, but from a sad and weathered middle-aged man whose beaten, creviced face looks 20 years older than it should.
I cannot imagine seeing a more daring, riskier film this year than "JCVD." Van Damme puts his star status on the line to play himself in a fictionalized meta-movie that hardly casts the superstar in a flattering light.
It begins with an elaborate and protracted single-shot action sequence in which Van Damme goes through a village, shooting, punching, bombing and kicking generic villains while on an ill-defined military mission.
When a "wall" falls down and reveals itself to be a set flat, a bored director yells "Cut!" It's just a movie, a bad one - like many Van Damme projects - and "JCVD" director Mabrouk El Mechri reveals his film's thematic fascination for faulty perceptions.
"I'm 47," a weary Van Damme says to his uncaring director, explaining why he can't do what his younger incarnation could.
As the story unfolds, a broke Van Damme needs money to fight for custody of his young daughter (Saskia Flanders) and settle tax issues in the U.S. Worst of all, rival Steven Seagal has just snatched the movie role Van Damme wanted by agreeing to finally cut off his pretentious ponytail.
A dejected Van Damme returns to his hometown of Brussels where he walks into an office that apparently houses both a post office and a bank.
Minutes later, the police arrive - led by cop negotiator Bruges (Francois Damiens) - and prepare for a crisis. It appears the great Jean-Claude Van Damme has screwed up a simple bank robbery and is now trapped inside with hostages.
In no time, TV crews arrive along with throngs of Van Damme supporters, and the crisis mushrooms into an international media event.
But was Van Damme really desperate enough to rob a bank?
"JCVD"'s ambitious attempt to recreate a Tarantino-styled, chronologically shuffled narrative doesn't always succeed here. Witnessing the same events from different character perspectives gives us a firmer grasp on the elusive truth, yet it seems to be an unnecessarily complicated way to tell a rather simple story.
El Mechri's black-and-white, art house approach to "JCVD" instantly communicates this is not your parents' head-crushing Van Damme action epic. This surrealistic, stylized experiment in perception does more than break the action mold; it gives its star the chance to prove his acting chops can be as deadly as his karate ones.
So, Mr. Van Damme, if you're reading this, consider "JCVD" to be the epitome of your work as a movie actor.
This is your best performance on film. Strangely enough, you didn't have to move a single one of your muscles from Brussels for it.
<p class="factboxheadblack">"JCVD"</p> <p class="News">Three stars (out of four)</p> <p class="News"><b>Starring: </b>Jean-Claude Van Damme, Francois Damiens, Saskia Flanders</p> <p class="News"><b>Directed by:</b> Mabrouk El Mechri</p> <p class="News"><b>Other: </b>A Peace Arch Entertainment Group release. At the Pipers Alley Theaters, Chicago. Rated R (language, violence) 96 minutes</p>