The Quest

The Quest is an odd mix of martial arts and epic adventure. Its running time is too short for it to be deemed a true epic, but the panoramic worldwide locations hint that Van Damme was trying to give it the flavour of an epic.

It's a painfully simplistic story. Young American pickpocket Chris (Van Damme) has to flee from New York in the 1920s after a botched robbery. He ends up on a pirate ship headed for the Orient. Soon, he is rescued by another ship (another pirate vessel, this time captained by gentleman buccaneer Roger Moore). Moore drops him off on a Thai island where young men are trained as fighters, and before long young Chris is a very handy fighter indeed, with aspirations to win an ancient golden dragon in a fighting competition. The final third of the film is comprised entirely of fight sequences in which competitors from various nations combat each other in an effort to take the ultimate prize.

The film marked Van Damme's directorial debut, and he gives it a lovely sense of scale and period but can't wring much out of the thin and obvious story. The backdrops pictured in the film are beautiful. Some of the martial arts moments are well choreographed. Roger Moore gives a surprisingly thoughtful and moving performance. Beyond that, it's very childish and simple-minded and doesn't contain enough memorable moments to be anything other than a passable time filler.

It really get son my nerves when people criticize some films that are actually good. This film was great. It is in my opinion the best Vand Damme film ever. It has story/action/heart and mystery and the highlight of the film were the last battles which showed different fighters from the whole world (ala streetfighter 2) all showing off their capabilities. this movie also has an EPIC feel to it and I don't know what people mean by 'poor' movie cause this looked pretty expensive to me. Roger Moore was cool here too. SO was the babe. Give this a chance people.

The Quest is certainly one of JCVD's best. It has a quite good epic story and style which generally you cannot see in a martial arts movie. Come on people, this is action and so evaluate it in its genre. Emancipate yourselves from "film d'art" complexes. Give its right, this is an exquisite "film d'martial arts"..

My main issue with the film is the plot. We have seen this many many times with his films. No name guy goes to fighting tournament as an underdog and surprises everyone and wins it. Very common with his film from the late 80's to early 90's.

I loved roger moores character. He has a funny sense of humor that we also get to see in most of his James Bond films.

The scenery was beautiful. Thailand is a gorgeous country.

A lot of stereotypes with the fighters. Every time they announced a country to fight, you could tell what the fighter would look like, Japan sumo, Scotland kilt, etc.

A truly underrated gem in the JCVD catalog.

This film is Van Damme's first effort as director, and he is surprisingly good in his task!The Quest is, of course, a simple action film, but it has a lot of good intentions and the story, written by Van Damme, is good-hearted. The star plays Chris Dubois, a man who is saved by a group of mercenaries led by a smooth and charming thief (Roger Moore, who brings a little bit of comedy and softness to the story), and this guy takes Chris to the Lost City to fight in a highly dangerous tournament. The winner takes home a beautiful, enormous golden dragon. This isn't the best film of Van Damme's career, his best phase was with the Chinese directors (Hard Target, The Colony), but The Quest isn't a good film for those who want to see explosions, Van Damme blowing people's heads off and those kinds of thing. This is an adventure, the type of film that, if we were now ten years old, would love!you don't have violence, shootings and explosions, if you want to watch something like that rent Hellbound Hellraiser 2, this is a Raiders-of-the-Lost-Ark kind of film. If you want to give the movie a shot, try to forget your grown-up side and watch it as if you were ten years old again. Then you will love it!it's a simple, entertaining and very good movie!