लायन हार्ट

Lionheart is clealry one of the best movies Van Damme made in his early days. The film had good fight scenes and a nice plot. Harrison Page as Van Damme's boy provides a lot of good one-liners and Van Damme kicks a lot of ass. I give it *** out of ****.

Lionheart is yet another Van Damme-movie with a lame story and great fight-scenes. Van Damme escapes from the French foreign-legion to find the people who killed his brother. When he comes to America he starts fighting for money, which he gives to his family. As said before, the story isn`t that good, but it is head and shoulders above the terrible "Black Eagle". Lionheart is a great B-movie that is worth renting. 8/10

Van Damme is at his best here, it's a good film that moves at a steady pace and is almost like a Rocky/Street Fighter type film. The characters are played well and the right actors and actresses are picked for the right roles. Van Damme's trainer is great and the silent Van Damme is defiantly the best. The plot also unwinds at the right times and at the right pace. You should give this film a go.

I know this movie as "A.W.O.L Absent Without Leave" but I have also seen it called Wrong Bet and Lionheart. This was one of the first movies I saw in 1990 knowing who Jean Claude Van Damme was, after previously seeing "Blood Sport" and "Kickboxer". Along with those two this helped set him on the road to stardom. Watching it today, I still think it is one of his best performances and best movies in general. Sure it's cheaply made and some of the acting is a bit dodgy but it's a lot of fun.

Plot In A Paragraph: Leon Gaultier is a deserter from the Foreign Legion arriving in New York . He finds his brother at death's door in L.A and his sister-in-law without the money needed to pay for medical care for her husband and to maintain her child. To earn the money needed, Gaultier decides to take part in some very dangerous under ground fights.

Whilst Van Damme is the star, Harrison Page steals the show as his friend/manager Joshua, I think he is fantastic. Having previously starred opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sly Stallone, Brian Thompson stars opposite the new action star in the block (at the time) Deborah Rennard does a fine job as Cynthia.

When i saw this film i was just 15 and it touched me how Leon wanted to fight for his brothers wife and kid.The films fight scenes are well staged and when i watched the film again recently i was surprised by how much i enjoyed it.Thats the thing,its a really enjoyable film,you can harp on all day about how Van Damme isn't the worlds best actor,how the sound mix is wobbly and the film looks as though it has been churned out for TV but its a good story well executed and that is the long and short of it.Van Damme has gone on to make many a film in a similar vein but i felt it was on this production that he came off best.The trainer played by Harrison Page helps lift the film too. 8/10