Jean-Claude Van Damme returns with Alain Moussi to take on Dave Bautista.
Depending on your point of view, Kickboxer: Vengeance is either a flimsy knock-off of a cult classic so popular it spawned four sequels or a fitting homage to an unoriginal, overtly racist martial arts exploitation flick.
Actually, it’s both.
The story opens in Thailand where Kurt Sloane (Alain Moussi) is trying to gain admission to a remote temple/fortress to train under the great muay thai master Tong Po (Dave Bautista). Of course he first has to fight a few guys to prove he’s worthy or whatever. After that he’s allowed to stay at what is basically a summer camp for shirtless, off-duty stuntmen to gather in the spirit of friendly competition, share cheerful camaraderie, and causally murder one another for the amusement of their hulking teacher.
Dave Bautista as Tong Po in Kickboxer: Vengeance
But wait! A twist! Sloane, as anyone who has even heard of the original Kickboxer will guess, isn’t really there to worship Tong Po and his sweet topknot braid like the others. No, as the movie’s title would suggest, he’s there to get vengeance. Seeing as it’s the beginning of the story and Bautista is the main bad guy, Kurt’s attempted assassination unsurprisingly does not work out.
Flash back a bit and we learn why Sloane is all mad at Tong Po. I won’t give anything away (see trailer below for that) but suffice it to say it’s shamelessly close to the setup from the original film. Back in the present Tong Po decides to call the cops on Sloane instead of killing him, despite the fact that moments ago he was party to a murder and will later take credit for killing more than 30 men for sport. Undeterred, Sloane seeks out yet another legendary muay thai master, Durand (Jean-Claude Van Damme), so he can slog through some cross-fit training montages and attain the skills necessary to beat Tong Po at his own game.
The issue isn’t so much that Kickboxer: Vengance is a bad movie (though it certainly is) or that it's basically just a string of '80s and '90s action movie clichés. Its real problems are that it lacks an engaging star and features dated, dancey fight choreography. The original 1989 version was pretty awful itself and, like the new one, traded heavily on derogatory Asian stereotypes, but it at least had Jean-Claude Van Damme in his prime and some exquisite fight scenes.
(Some will no doubt protest that Kickboxer was a great movie. Those folks may want to revisit it before committing to that position. At best it’s an extra-violent repackaging of one or more Karate Kid movies draped over the bones of Van Damme’s first hit, the far superior Bloodsport.)
On paper, the new Kickboxer sounds great. Moussi, an uber-athletic stuntman, is just as pretty as Van Damme with a similarly impressive physique and similarly impressive high kicks. Bautista, taking a break between Marvel blockbusters, adds wattage and makes for a perfectly monstrous antagonist. Former MMA stars Georges St. Pierre and Gina Carano bring MMA cred to the proceedings. And occupying the mentor role previously played by Dennis Chan is none other than JCVD himself. But an intriguing cast means very little if the goal, as it appears to be here, is just to launch a string of hastily conceived VOD sequels. (The already-announced Kickboxer: Retaliation featuring Game of Thrones’ Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson, Mike Tyson and Ronaldinho is slated for 2017.)
The one, the only, Jean-Claude Van Damme
First off Moussi is no Van Damme but, then again, no one is. Van Damme’s action movie skill set was truly singular when he was at his peak. He brought model looks, rippling muscles, extreme flexibility, and aerial skills unmatched in western martial arts movies at the time. Despite not being the greatest actor even by karate movie standards, the camera simply loved him. He had and still has an undeniable charisma. He is perhaps the only actor in history with enough genuine intensity to get away with his signature wide-eyed, slow-motion screams.
Moussi, on the other hand, comes off as an earnest but thoroughly confused slab of beef. He’s not just an untrained actor -- forgivable in such a gifted athlete -- he’s also a bland and forgettable presence on screen. It doesn’t help that the elaborate choreography feels more like dancing than fighting. Blows that cause combatants to go flying into the air feel hollow, like they’re barely making contact. In a world in which movies like The Raid have elevated fight scenes to hyperkinetic poetry written with bloody knuckles and broken glass, watching two guys take turns delivering an elbow here and a leg kick there before taking long pauses between rounds feels downright lethargic.
Most likely due to budget constraints there are an abundance of distracting continuity and editing gaffes. Moussi and St. Pierre both at first refer to Tong Po as Kru Po, before switching to the correct name in the next scene without any explanation. At one point St. Pierre’s character shows up at Durand’s supposedly secret compound. (Don’t worry about how he found Sloane’s hiding spot when the entire Thai police force couldn’t.) Though he finishes the ensuing buddy training sequence in perfect health, the next time we see St. Pierre he has a prominent broken arm that remains as unexplained as his inspiration for starting the famous “nak su kow” chant during the final battle. Also of note, that chant doesn’t appear anywhere else in the movie, meaning the non-Thai speaking Sloane would have no idea what it means. Not that any of this makes the story hard to follow because, really, beyond the premise and some half-hearted detours, there isn’t one.
Then there’s Van Damme’s atrocious voice dubbing. In most of his looped dialogue, of which there is a lot, it’s painfully obvious that a stand-in is being used rather than the man himself. It takes a while to notice but once you do it’s hard to hear anything else.
Kickboxer: Vengeance deserves some small amount of credit, however. Bautista is pretty fantastic as the taciturn, surprisingly meditative psychopath. The location settings are lush and plentiful, lending an air of authenticity. The Thai cast is laudably allowed to speak their native language rather than required to speak English to accommodate western audiences with subtitle allergies. That may seem like a small matter but in a movie like this it’s a daring, mature choice.
Perhaps the best moment in Kickboxer: Vengeance is a hilarious improvised end credits sequence. More so than any other aspect of the film, that moment pays appropriate tribute to the uneven but undeniably lasting legacy of the original Kickboxer. It’s just too bad you have to sit through the whole movie to see it.
The Verdict
Though Van Damme and Bautista are high points, Kickboxer: Vengeance feels dated and dull. The fights are more slow-paced than modern audiences expect. What little story it has is hampered by numerous technical glitches and a lackluster leading man.
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