Double Impact is another absurd action movie starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, and also stars Geoffrey Lewis, Alona Shaw, Alan Scarfe, Corinna Everson, Philip Chang, and Bolo Leung.
The Wagners (Alan Armstrong and Sarah-Jane Varley) are brutally murdered on the night of the opening of the Victoria Harbour Tunnel. Their bodyguard Frankie (Lewis) rescues one of their twin sons (Chad), while a nanny (Wu Fong Lung) rescues the other (Alex). Chad grows up in France with Frankie, and Alex grows up with French nuns in Hong Kong, so fortunately their Belgian accents are explained in context (ah, close enough).
Van Damme plays both twins, and god love him, he really does do his best to make them separate characters. Chad is pampered and privileged (but still a karate badass, obvs), while Alex is smuggler and running games on the streets of Hong Kong (but still a karate badass, obvs). They meet up 25 years later when...you know I'm actually not clear on what spurs Frankie to take Chad back to Hong Kong? But it's framed as a "reclaim your birthright, which is this tunnel" kind of situation, and the Triad boss Zhang (Chang) and the evil smarmy British bastard Griffin (Scarfe) are running drugs and gangs and they're the ones that had the Wagners shot, so...I don't know.
Anyway, Alex' girlfriend Danielle (Shaw) mistakes Chad for him and grabs his dick, which kicks off the main conflict between the brothers and culminates in Alex getting very drunk, imagining his brother banging Danielle in entirely too much detail (one assumes it was to have a sex scene between Van Damme and Shaw), smacks both of them around, and that little detail is just completely overlooked when they all reconcile after gunning down a bunch of Triad in the climax on a boat.
We also get a nice rematch between Van Damme and Leung (he played main evil guy Chong Li in Bloodsport), and hey, even an evil lesbian (Everson)! This movie has something for everyone!
Look, it's not all bad. I joke about them both being karate badasses, but the Wagner brothers' fighting styles are actually pretty distinct - Chad's is more classic Van Damme, very kicky, while Alex is more of a street fighter and much more willing to use guns. The camera work to have them both in the same room is pretty smooth, for the most part (which unfortunately makes the scene where they're sitting next to each other really jarring in how bad it looks). The plot doesn't make a great deal of sense - why on Earth did Frankie not go to the American or British embassy after the murders? Why did he never try to find Alex? If he did, why did that not get even a single line of dialog? But whatever, twice the Van Damme!
The supporting cast is...actually pretty weak. Lewis yells a lot. Shaw meekly follows orders. Everson is all the wrong kinds of queer-coded. The one who has the most chemistry with Van Damme is really Leung, and that makes sense, they have some history together.
As far as one actor playing twins goes, this doesn't really measure up to Twin Dragons (or The Social Network, for that matter), but it has a few moments.
My Grade: D+
Rewatch Value: Medium-low
Next up: John Wick Chapter 4
No comments:
Post a Comment