Below Average
Summary
Everyone knows I’m a huge JCVD fan and he’s awesome in this doing what he does best, but everyone else in the cast is annoying and unfunny with Serge particularly irritating. There are some decent gory kills and several fight scenes but aside from that this is a tough watch and one of Van Damme’s weakest.
Plot: Serge holds a state secret. He, his family and gardener Leo appear on a government death list. They attempt to devise a plan to stay alive.
Review: We’ve had The Beekeeper, The Bricklayer, The Painter, The Baker and now Jean-Claude Van Damme is back as The Gardiner. It’s understandable why this hasn’t had a massive release as I think the humour wouldn’t appeal to an international audience.
JCVD is pretty much the only good thing about this film and he’s as awesome as ever, but it’s every other character that is extremely annoying especially in the English dubbed version. I would rather watch a 3 hour movie about Jar Jar Binks than put up with Serge Shister (Michaël Youn) who is just a blundering idiot for most of the runtime.
The tone is all over the place with lighthearted comedy one minute and graphic violence the next. The bodycount and JCVD are the only reasons to really watch this movie as it’s one of the worst action movies I’ve seen for some time and I love everything JCVD as you all know. Maybe the film is better in its native French language, but the English dubbing is painful, and I don’t see this one appealing to many outside of France.
The music score is swelling and epic sounding like it belongs in another better film, but it’s still one of the few highlights.
Van Damme’s body double is hard at work once again, but he does as least do some of the fight scenes.
Overall, le Jardinier AKA The Gardiner won’t have much appeal to an international audience as it has too many unfunny moments which are jarring in between the scenes of violence. Van Damme is awesome, but every other character is annoying making this one you can avoid.