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 et me preface my review of Jean-Claude Van Damme's new
movie, The Order, by saying that I hate chases that takes place in
movies. I generally don't like car chases, people chases, or even spaceship or
airplane chases. Why? I don't know, I just find myself very bored while watching
them. Maybe it's because I've seen so many chases, of every variety, that after
a while it becomes hard to feel any excitement to seeing yet another [insert
mode of transportation] chase.
That having been said, The Order is a
direct-to-video movie in the States, which means the film has no theatrical run
and goes directly to video or cable. It could be different in your part of the
world, depending on the current star status of Van Damme. Now let me also say
that a movie that goes direct-to-video isn't necessary a bad film in and of
itself. There are plenty of good movies that never make it to the theaters. Then
again, as The Order proves, there are plenty of bad ones that deserve to
be shunned from the theaters.
The Order stars Jean-Claude Van Damme, the Muscles
from Brussels, as Rudy, a professional thief who is the son of a well-known
archaeologist studying and writing a book on a secret sect formed during the
Crusades called The Order. Rudy is something of a disappointment to dad, since
dad spends his time writing and researching history while son spends his nights,
well, stealing from people.
When daddy goes missing, Rudy tracks him down to
Israel, where Rudy finds himself being followed and then being chased by the
Israeli police and other assorted shadowy characters. It turns out Rudy's father
has been abducted by the present-day version of the Order, and they want to use
Rudy's father to help them start World War III and bring about an ancient
prophecy. Will Rudy reach his father in time? Will Brian Thompson overact again?
Better yet, will we see Van Damme without his shirt on and doing slow motion
jump kicks? The answer is yes to all of the above.
To be fair, The Order is not that bad of a movie.
It's just not, well, all that good of a movie, either. For one, the film relies
on way too much action, and it's the kind of boring, repetitious action that
makes your eyelids heavy and allows your brain to wonder about that girl in High
School that got away. If you've seen as many Van Damme movies as I have, you
will know to expect quite a few things from his movies, and one of them is
over-reaction.
What I mean by this is that Van Damme tends to over-sell all of
his emotions. Take his fight scenes (from any movie, it doesn't matter) and wait
until Van Damme's character gets hit. He'll let out an "Earrrggh"-like
grunt, make a contorted face, and roll over. A better actor wouldn't bother with
the grunt and the face and just go down because that's what happens when you get
hit. You don't let out an unnatural sound from deep in your throat and make
faces. The thing is, I saw a noticeable improvement in Van Damme's acting. He
actually sells his role very well except for a few spots when the
"old" Van Damme re-emerges.
Of course, Van Damme isn't all to blame for The Order's
boring nature. Director Sheldon Lettich tries to make up for uninteresting
direction with fast cuts during Rudy's action scenes, particularly in the
beginning. It reminds me of a music video. A bad music video. Although Lettich
does improve once the crew is in Israel and the action does get much better, not
to mention more fluid in movement. At least when it comes to the fights. The
chases, on the other hand, are another thing entirely. Which brings me to my
original beef with the film: It has way too many chase scenes.
Once Rudy arrives
in Israel, it's one chase scene after another. I counted two car chases, four
running-in-the-street chases, one airport chase, and the finale consists of a
chase through a series of catacombs. Now do you understand why I hate movie
chases? The worst part about all these chases is that they're not all that
exciting. Then again, as previously mentioned, it takes a lot to execute an
exciting chase nowadays, and the majority of filmmakers fail. I can't really
blame director Lettich for the uninspired chases, but I do blame him and writer
Les Weldon for giving us so many of them.
By the time all the running, chasing, and driving is done,
the movie has just 25 minutes or so to wrap up its plot. Before now, there has
been very little mention of the plot or storyline, and indeed the villain, Cyrus
(Brian Thompson) shows up briefly in the Second Act, kills his mentor, and
disappears again until the Third Act. By the time the movie's A-plot kicks back
into gear, it's way too late to have any sense of urgency, and the result is the
audience isn't invested in rather Rudy stops the plot or not. And then there's
the catacomb chase scene...
Although I don't recommend The Order to anyone with
tastes, I should still point out once again that Van Damme's acting has
noticeably gotten better. This isn't saying much, of course, since the man was
never that good in front of a camera to begin with. But improvement is
improvement, so he should get some credit. Old reliable Charlton Heston shows up
as a professor for about 5 minutes before he's killed off. While he was onscreen
Heston was easily the best actor in the whole movie and seemed to be relishing
his brief cameo.
Sofia Milos (Dalia) is Rudy's obligatory love interest, a
beautiful Israeli cop with smothering good looks who was once a member of the
Order. For whatever reason, she decides to risk her career and life to help Rudy
escape the police and other factions, just hours after having met the man. I
suppose you could chalk it up to love at first sight, but I call it
"ludicrous character motivation."
If you like movie chases, you'll love The Order. If
you're like me and is tired of movie chases, then you might not like The
Order all that much, since more than half of the movie's running time is
devoted to some sort of chase or another.
Run, Jean-Claude, run!
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