Jean-Claude Camille Francois Van Varenberg, known to us as Jean-Claude Van Damme, was a famous and sought-after actor in the late 80s and first half of the 90s. We watched cult action films like Kickboxer, Bloodsport, AWOL and Universal Soldier until they were worn out. But Van Damme was not destined to remain at the peak of popularity for long, unlike his colleagues in the industry, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone and Bruce Willis.
So today I suggest you read about how Jean Claude Van Damme’s successful career developed, what films influenced his popularity, and also how the failure and further death of his career began. It will be interesting.
Career take-off
Jean-Claude’s parents decided to enroll their son in karate when he was only 10 years old, and since then he simply could not be torn away from martial arts (not counting ballet, to which he also devoted five whole years).
At the age of 16, Van Damme became European Champion as part of the Belgian national team, receiving his black belt. But this was not the only achievement, because during his sports career he won many championships, and even received the title of “Mr. Belgium”. In total, Van Damme had 55 fights, 53 of which ended in his victory.
Jean-Claude Van Damme first appeared in the film “Woman Between Dog and Wolf” (1979) in a small role as a spectator in a cinema.
And after that he was so “on fire” to become an actor that in between jobs he was constantly running around to various castings. That’s how he got into the films “Monaco Forever” (1984) and “Breakdance” (1984). But these films did not bring him success and Van Damme remained unnoticed.
By the will of fate, Jean-Claude met Chuck Norris, who became his sparring partner. And it was old Chuck who decided to help the Belgian settle in the US, giving him a job in his bar, and then inviting him to the film “Missing in Action” as a stuntman and extra. True, Jean-Claude himself was not even listed in the credits, and it would be very difficult to find him there.
But suddenly Van Damme got a really worthy role, which he agreed to. Yes, we are talking about the film “Predator” (1987) with Arnold Schwarzenegger, where Van Damme was supposed to play the Predator himself. But in the end, something did not work out and Van Damme left the set. The most popular version says that he simply did not like the fact that he would be filming in a mask and no one would see his face.
The Belgian’s most notable appearance in cinema was his role as a villain (namely the Russian karate fighter Ivan Krashinsky) in No Retreat, No Surrender (1986). During the filming of this movie, old Van Damme had a blast.
He wanted to show off as much of his fighting skills as possible (even though the script didn’t require it) so that he would be noticed and remembered. It even got to the point where he would just beat up his colleagues.
The film “No Retreat, No Surrender” did not become mega-popular, but the actor achieved his goal. He was really noticed. It was thanks to this film that he was invited to the film “Bloodsport” (1988). True, the film was not released immediately due to the failure of test screenings, so there was no talk of achieving popularity yet.
Nevertheless, thanks to “Bloodsport” Jean-Claude was invited to the film “Black Eagle” , where he again played another evil Russian. However, the actor himself did not like his role in this film, and especially the death of his character at the end of the film.
It was then that he decided that he needed to somehow make sure that Bloodsport saw the light of day. He personally went to the studio and asked for the footage. He ended up putting together a coherent film from the footage that satisfied the studio bosses, and in 1988 the film was finally released in theaters.
The film was a huge success in cinemas. With a budget of $1.5 million, the film grossed almost $12 million in the US alone, and it grossed another 1.5 times more in the rest of the world. It was with this film that Jean-Claude Van Damme’s career began to take off.
After that, Van Damme starred in the not very popular film “Cyborg” , which, fortunately, did not affect his career. Well, then one of the main events in the actor’s film career happened. We are talking, of course, about the film “Kickboxer” (1989), where Van Damme played the main role.
With the same budget of $1.5 million, Kickboxer grossed around $40 million worldwide. After the success of this cult film, Van Damme’s career took off even higher.
Stellar period
Jean-Claude Van Damme was at the peak of his popularity. He managed to star in the film “Death Warrant” , after which he got into another hit “AWOL”. Moreover, he did not intend to star in this film at all, but he was bound by a long-standing contract to star in two films by the studio “Imperial Intertainment”. Moreover, according to the terms of the contract, he had to come up with the plot and write the script for the film himself, which he actually did.
In the end, with a budget of $6 million, the film collected more than $24 million in the American box office alone. The actor’s career took off again.
Well, then came the cult action movie “Double Impact” (1991), where Van Damme this time played two roles, namely two twin brothers with different characters. Jean-Claude simply needed this film to prove to everyone that he is not just a karate fighter, but a truly versatile actor. The film “Double Impact” was also successful, collecting an impressive amount in cinemas.
The actor was simply at the peak of his popularity, and subsequent films with his participation also enjoyed great success among viewers. It is enough to recall such cult films as “Universal Soldier” , “Hard Target” , “Nowhere to Run”, etc. And the film “Timecop” (1994) became the highest-grossing film in the career of Jean-Claude Van Damme, having collected more than 100 million dollars at the box office.
Failures
In the mid-90s, Jean-Claude Van Damme was offered the role of Johnny Cage in the film Mortal Kombat, which was based on the cult game of the same name. But Van Damme turned down the role in favor of the film adaptation of another cult fighting game, Street Fighter , where he played a military man named Guile.
The film was not particularly popular with the general public, and in the end, the film adaptation of the game “Street fighter” collected only 33 million dollars in the American box office with a budget of 35 million. Only thanks to box office receipts in the rest of the world, the budget was somehow recouped. But the film “Mortal Kombat”, in which the actor refused to star, with a budget of 18 million dollars, collected 122 million in the world box office. Do you feel the difference?
Well, then Van Damme took part in the film “Sudden Death” , which even due to the worldwide distribution was not able to break even. But Van Damme himself received as much as 5 million dollars for his role in this film.
Subsequent films with the actor’s participation also stopped paying off. Because of this, the studio “Universal” even terminated the contract with the actor. This also affected Van Damme himself. He began to drink more and even indulge in illegal substances.
Subsequent films with the actor were worse and worse. Such films of the second half of the 90s as “Maximum Risk”, “Colony” and “The Detonator” failed miserably at the box office, which is why the following films “Legionnaire” and “Inferno” simply bypassed cinemas, coming out directly on video. This was definitely the sunset of the actor’s career.
Death of a career
The situation only worsened further. Such films as “The Secret of the Order”, “Replicant”, “Derailed”, etc. also bypassed theatrical distribution. The sequel to “Universal Soldier”, released in 1999, did not save the situation. The film also “flew” straight to video media.
The 00s were a completely disastrous period for the actor. The films did not make it to cinemas, and they did not enjoy much interest from viewers either. Van Damme made another attempt to “revive” the Universal Soldier franchise, but the third part also turned out to be a fierce and useless slog.
Only in 2012 Van Damme could be seen again on the big screen in the film “The Expendables 2” , but it was not his merit, but the merit of Sylvester Stallone, who invited him and other “old men” to this film. Van Damme himself played the main villain here. However, his appearance in this film did not save his career and everything went to the unconditional death of the actor’s career.
Films with Van Damme continued to come out with enviable regularity in the 2010s (several a year), but no one needed them anymore, and hardly any of you remember such films as “Close Enemies”, “Heat”, “Pound of Flesh”, “Black Waters”, etc.
Jean-Claude Van Damme, in desperation, decided to revive another of his cult films, Kickboxer. In it, he played Master Duran, who helps the main character, training him for a fight with Tong Po. The film was even released on the big screens, but with a budget of $10 million, it collected a laughable $273,000.
Films with Van Damme continue to be released to this day, but I don’t think that the 63-year-old actor’s career will be able to grow even a little, especially since these films are unlikely to be able to count on big views.
Well, that’s all for today. I hope you enjoyed the article. I’d be glad if you liked it and subscribed to the channel so as not to miss the release of new nostalgic articles about cult films of the past. Thanks for watching.
