Jean-Claude Van Damme reflexiona sobre su vida durante un atraco a un banco con rehenes.Jean-Claude Van Damme reflexiona sobre su vida durante un atraco a un banco con rehenes.Jean-Claude Van Damme reflexiona sobre su vida durante un atraco a un banco con rehenes.
- Dirección
- Guionistas
- Elenco
- Premios
- 2 nominaciones en total
Opiniones destacadas
Directed and co-written by Mabrouk El Mechri, JCVD manages to capably straddle art house, action and comedy genres as it captivates the viewer by laying bare the soul of the star of such DVD fare as Bloodsport, Streetfighter, and Universal Soldier, to name only a few.
Largely based on his real life troubles, JCVD unfolds as Van Damme retreats to his native Belgium in the wake of a losing child custody battle in a Los Angeles court.
Mounting financial troubles have left our hero with over-maxed plastic and debit cards that no longer yield ATM withdrawals. Forced to tap into his savings reserves, he makes a pit stop at a post office/bank to arrange a money wire transfer to pay his lawyer, only to discover that the bank is in the process of being robbed and he's stuck in the midst of the drama.
To make matters worse, the manner in which things have unfolded has caused authorities and media alike to believe that Van Damme is the mastermind, orchestrating the heist and hostage taking to pay his legal bills.
Segmented into chapters and shown out of sequence, similar to Pulp Fiction, El Mechri manages to deftly juggle laughs and tension to deliver a film that uniquely straddles several genres, including breaking the "fourth wall" with an eight-minute long monologue in the film's third act that sees the muscle-bound Belgian recap, with painful tear-inducing pain, his life of cheesy movies, women and drugs.
Think of Dog Day Afternoon in which Pacino gets to speak to the audience and lay his soul bare and you've got an idea of what's in store with JCVD, which, if there's any justice, will do for Van Damme's career what Tarantino did for Travolta's. Especially now that we know JCVD can act.
From a direction/scriptwriting point of view, the movie is somewhat lacking focus. It's relying a bit too much on inside jokes and heist movie clichés, for better or worse. There are some truly great moments (the opening scene is hilarious - any scene using Baby Huey's "Hard Times" tune cannot be bad anyway; the court scenes are cleverly written and the very last shot finds a perfect balance of emotion without being overblown or tear-jerking) and the whole film deserves praise for being original and clever. However it stretches some scenes way too much, uses an awful bleached color scheme that could turn off some people (it's just a detail, but it annoyed me throughout the whole screening) and uses unnecessary flashbacks instead of sticking to a more tight storytelling, which could've benefited the movie in my humble opinion.
However, these little flaws are nothing compared to the enormous heart this movie displays. Jean Claude Van Damme may not be Daniel Day Lewis or Sean Penn, but he gives an astounding performance in this film. He's very comfortable in the comical scenes, but his acting chops really shine when the movie gets emotional. His long monologue, looking at the camera, and the audience (and perhaps even God) is nothing short of amazing. In his own words, he really begs for a second chance not only in his career, but in life. He's incredibly moving (acting in his native language helps a lot) and above all doesn't try to pretend he's something more than a washed up movie star, with a somewhat limited vocabulary. He just asks for one more chance, and judging by this flick he truly deserves it.
Overall, a nice surprise for those unfamiliar with "the Muscles from Brussels" and a refreshing comedy. Except a few complaints about the pace and the direction it's a highly recommended movie. And hopefully the beginning of a new career for JCVD.
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."
The rise from a simple Belgian boy to Hollywood movie star and the subsequent fall from grace turned the once naive young man into a wise old man. Having seen much of the world and lived both a life of poverty and pain as well as a life of luxury and hedonism, this man has seen it all and done it all. And now he's back with a vengeance.
Of course, the man I'm talking about is Jean-Claude van Damme. Disappointed about the rats and vultures that populate Hollywood, he decided to go back to his roots, pay respects to his homeland and hope he's still welcome there to attempt a new career in movies. And boy oh boy, his first attempt seems promising.
Jean-Claude van Damme showed the world he can actually act and he made sure that everyone watching this film understands why he was involved. His disgust towards the media and the Hollywood movie industry just radiate from this film, but not in arrogance but rather in all modesty and with regret, clinging on to the values and principles once taught to him by his parents and his Karate teacher when he was still a little boy living in Brussels. As a fellow Belgian, I pay respect to this man and hope his second movie career will be better than his first.
Bonne chance, Jean-Claude.
¿Sabías que…?
- TriviaIn 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.
- ErroresPolice chief Bruges tells Van Damme the decision to act was GIGN's move, not his. GIGN (Groupe d'Intervention de la Gendarmerie Nationale - French SWAT) exists in France but not in Belgium where the movie story takes place. In Belgium, police's tactical unit is called ESI (Escadron Special d'Intervention).
- Citas
JCVD: This movie is for me. There we are, you and me. Why did you do that? Or why did I do that? You made my dream come true. I asked for it. I promised you something in return and I haven't delivered yet. You win, I lose. Unless... the path you've set for me is full of hurdles where the answer comes before the question. Yeah, I do that. Now I know why. It's the cure, from what I've seen here. It all makes sense. It makes sense to those who understand. So... America, poverty, stealing to eat... stalking producers, actors, 'movie stars', going to clubs hoping to see a star, with my pictures, karate magazines. It's all I had. I didn't speak English. But I did 20 years of karate. 'Cause before I wasn't like that.
[points to flexed bicep]
JCVD: This... this is me today. I used to be small and scrawny. And I took up karate. Hence the Dojo, hence respect, thou shall believe people who say, "Oss!" It's Samurai code. It's honor, no lies. So this guy in the US, it's not the same thing. No one says "Oss" to you. Sometimes people in show business say, "We're gonna fuck em". I believed in people, in the Dojo. I was blessed and had a lot of 'wives'. I always believed in love. It's hard for a woman with three kids to say, "Which one do I love more?" A mother... If you have 5, 6, 7, or 10 wives in a lifetime, they've all got something special, but no one cares about that in the so-called media. What about drugs? When you got it all, you travel the world. When you've been in all the hotels, you're the prima donna of the penthouse. And in all hotels the world over, traveling, you want something more. And because of a woman... well, because of love, I tried something and I got hooked. Van-Damme, the beast, the tiger in a cage, the "Bloodsport" man got hooked. I was wasted mentally and physically. To the point that I got out of it. I got out of it. But... it's all there. It's all there. It was really tough. I saw people worse off than me. I went from poor to rich and thought, why aren't we all like me, why all the privileges? I'm just a regular guy. It makes me sick to see people... who don't have what I've got. Knowing that they have qualities, too. Much more than I do! It's not my fault if I was cut out to be a star. I asked for it. I asked for it, really believed in it. When you're 13, you believe in your dream. Well it came true for me. But I still ask myself today what I've done on this Earth. Nothing! I've done nothing! And I might just die in this post office, hoping to start all over here in Belgium, in my country, where my roots are. Start all over with my parents and get my health back, pick up again. So I really hope... nobody's gonna pull a trigger in this post office... It's so stupid to kill people. They're so beautiful! So, today, I pray to God. I truly believe it's not a movie. It's real life. Real life. I've seen so many things. I was born in Belgium, but I'm a citizen of the world. I've travelled a lot. It's hard for me to judge people and it's hard for them... not to judge me. Easier to blame me. Yeah, something like that.
- Créditos curiososThe Gaumont logo has an animated Jean-Claude Van Damme appear in the logo and deliver roundhouse kicks to the boy and the sunflower.
- Bandas sonorasHard Times
Written by Curtis Mayfield
Performed by Baby Huey & The Baby Sitters
© Warner-Tamerlane Publishing
With Permission from Warner Chappell Music France
(p) 1971 Rhino Entertainment Co. for the United States and WEA International for the world outside of the U.S.
Courtesy of Warner Music France, A Warner Music Group Company
Selecciones populares
- How long is JCVD?Con tecnología de Alexa
Detalles
- Fecha de lanzamiento
- Países de origen
- Sitios oficiales
- Idiomas
- También se conoce como
- Kod adı - JCVD
- Locaciones de filmación
- Productoras
- Ver más créditos de la compañía en IMDbPro
Taquilla
- Presupuesto
- EUR 10,000,000 (estimado)
- Total en EE. UU. y Canadá
- USD 470,691
- Fin de semana de estreno en EE. UU. y Canadá
- USD 20,119
- 9 nov 2008
- Total a nivel mundial
- USD 2,342,211
- Tiempo de ejecución1 hora 37 minutos
- Color
- Mezcla de sonido
- Relación de aspecto
- 2.35 : 1
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