JCVD (2008)

User Rating:

7.5/10   

Director:

Mabrouk El Mechri

Writers:

Mabrouk El Mechri (scenario)
Frédéric Benudis (collaboration)

Release Date:

4 June 2008 (France)

Genre:

Crime | Drama

Tagline:

Be Aware

Plot:

Between his tax problems and his legal battle with his wife for the custody of his daughter, these are...

Plot Keywords:

Movie Star | Criminal | Belgium | Shot In The Head | Police

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Jean-Claude Van Damme	...	J.C.V.D.
François Damiens	...	Bruges
Zinedine Soualem	...	L'homme au bonnet
Karim Belkhadra	...	Le vigile
Jean-François Wolff	...	Le trentenaire
Anne Paulicevich	...	La guichetière
Liliane Becker	...	Mère JCVD
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
François Beukelaers	...	Père JCVD
John Flanders	...	Prosecuting attorney
Saskia Flanders	...	J.C.V.D.'s daughter
Dean Gregory	...	Realisateur de Tobey Wood
Kim Hermans	...	Prisoner in kickboxing outfit
Janine Horsburgh	...	JCVD assistant
Vincent Lecuyer
Raphaëlle Lubansu
Steve Preston	...	Accessoiriste JCVD
Paul Rockenbrod	...	Tobey Wood
Alan Rossett	...	Bernstein
Norbert Rutili
Jesse Joe Walsh	...	Jeff
Leslie Woodhall	...	Prison visitor
Mourade Zeguendi

Also Known As:

Codename: JCVD (USA)
JCVD - The Movie (USA)
Le rois des Belges (Belgium: French title)
Project: JCVD (USA)
Van Dammage (USA)

MPAA:

Rated R for language and some violence.

Runtime:

97 min

Country:

Belgium | Luxembourg | France

Language:

French | English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Switzerland:10 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:10 (canton of Geneva) | France:U | USA:R | Argentina:16 | Australia:M | UK:15 | Finland:K-15 | Netherlands:12 | Sweden:11 | Singapore:NC-16 | New Zealand:M

Filming Locations:

Brussels, Belgium

Company:

Samsa Film

Trivia:

In the opening intro scene, Jean-Claude Van Damme's comment about not being able to film in one shot was his own ad-lib, partly in response to Mabrouk El Mechri actually wanting to shoot the scene in one shot.

Goofs:

Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): In the court room the attorney says, "How does this actor play Death? Let me count the ways: mangled under the wheels of a truck, strangulation, fracturing the skull, taking out the tibula..." There is no anatomic structure named tibula. The lower leg is made of two bones, the tibia and fibula. It is a common mistake of people who do not know anatomy to say tibula.

Quotes:

Policier: Central to Unit 27. Jean-Claude Van Damme's robbing a post office. I need back-up.

Movie Connections:

References Citizen Kane (1941)

Soundtrack:

Hard Times

"Shooting pigeons . . ."

"He'd still be shooting pigeons in Hong Kong," says one of the players In JCVD about director John Woo's debt to action star Jean-Claude Van Damme for their 1993 collaboration, Hard Target. Making that film may have been JCVD's greatest contribution to modern cinema although the current film with his initials in the title is more interesting than any previous kick-butt martial arts flick of his I can remember.

The story's framing device is Van Damme's fictional character of the same name unwittingly becoming a hostage in a bank robbery where his inability to extricate himself and the other hostages is a commentary on the impotence in real life of the mythical hero on the screen. The gritty, de-saturated look inside and outside the bank reminds me of the urban realism of Sidney Lumet's bank-heist Dog Day Afternoon. There's even a stringy-haired thug, but Van Damme is no Dustin Hoffman.

In this satire of his mercurial career as an action star, Van Damme ironically manages a mini-Mickey Rourke comeback by expressing feelings for his daughter and for the lost glamorous life of the Muscles from Brussels. His taciturn, expressionless persona is exactly what the satire needs to move it from a comedy about celebrity to a serious attempt to throw his identity into the existential arena. Indeed one long take in which he tearfully philosophizes about his troubled life is either ludicrous or a rather nice reflection on the vagaries of fame, albeit low rent. The other long take during the titles shows the aging hero fighting his way through a gauntlet of bad guys in a current movie. It's not bad given how bad Stallone could be in the same situation.

Van Damme has had real-life difficulties getting custody of his daughter and righting his tax problems, so JCVD is an apt imagining of his troubles. At some moments he does quite well taking his acting where it has never gone before. That he recently lost a role to Stephen Seagal, who agreed to cut his pony tail for the part, is less an indictment of Jean-Claude than it is a commentary on the vagaries of showbiz heroism.

"Sic transit gloria mundi."