JCVD

I was never a Jean-Claude Van Damme fan. Actually, I was never much of an action film fan and my least favorite action film stars were always Steven Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme. Seagal because the couple of films I've seen sucked, Van Damme I always thought to be a guy that was beefed up because he suffered from short man syndrome.

But this, ladies and gentlemen, is genius.

Jean-Claude Van Damme stars as Jean-Claude Van Damme having a very bad day. He lost custody of his daughter, suffers from jet leg, all his bank and credit cards are maxed out, his career is stalling and the post office he walks into is being robbed. To everyone on the outside it looks like he is the robber barricading himself up with a group of hostages while the real bad guys use him as a deflection.

The film is drained of color and brilliantly hilarious with JCVD trying to save his own hide and keeping the hostages safe by building up a relationship with one of the robbers, who is a big fan (as is all of Belgium, apparently).

To add to all the weirdness, Van Damme holds a lengthy, tearful monologue about 1 hr into the film, for which he is lifted out of a scene.

Watch this!

8/10