Jean-Claude Van Damme opens this hybrid action-art film by making his way down a long alley bristling with bad guys. Bones shatter, fireballs blossom. The prolonged shot is standard Van Damme mayhem. There’s a small measure of parody, which can be hard to gauge in a genre driven by over-the-top excess. Then we hear “cut,” see a camera crew, and notice an insolent “Asian Director” tossing darts at a board with the Hollywood sign. What sort of iconoclasm French director and co-writer Mabrouk El Mechri means is unclear. Playing himself in some senses, Van Damme (“Bloodsport,” “Universal Soldier,” “The Order”) gets a vanity turn in vulnerability. Here he’s a 47-year-old action star on the skids. His last check to his L.A. lawyer bounced, and he risks losing custody of his daughter in divorce proceedings. Back in his hometown of Brussels, Van Damme enters a neighborhood bank where robbers take him hostage. A media frenzy jams nearby streets. Van Damme gets an improbable prison term—and starts teaching karate to inmates—though it’s unlikely this role will break him out of his typecasting. Yet, his world-weary mien and a drama workshop-style monologue do suggest he can do more than kick and squint. 96m. (Bill Stamets)
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