The Quest (1996)

Directed by Jean-Claude Van Damme. Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, Roger Moore, Jack McGee, James Remar, Jack McGee, Aki Aleong, Chang Ching Peng Chaplin, Abdel Qissi. [PG-13]

Jean-Claude Van Damme directs himself as a clown-faced crook who looks after street rat orphans in 1920s New York City. After running away from gangsters and the police, he ends up in the company of an English pirate (Moore) who takes him to be trained in Muy Thai fighting before exploiting him into representing the U.S. in an international martial arts tournament held in Tibet. Stilted, supremely earnest fight film lurches haphazardly through a patchwork narrative that doesn’t bother to develop its characters at all. After about an hour of lumpy adventure movie plotting, almost all of the mano a mano action is reserved for the final act, and those fight scenes are predominantly unimaginative and brief, punctuated by comical stereotyping (the African fighter does a tribal dance, the Scottish one wears a kilt, etc.). Slightly better than a similar film from earlier in the star’s career (Bloodsport), but just as unnecessary for anyone besides his most forgiving faithful. Van Damme also gets story credit (alongside Frank Dux, who had to sue to get his).

37/100