Until Death (2007)

This is living proof that movie companies' hired staff are promoting god awful movies by providing reviews to movies so you'd believe this is Oscar winning stuff....The acting was subpar, the plot had holes big enough to build a parking lot in it and the cinematography is so choppy and clichefilled that it became hard to watch.We know and love JCVD for the action hero he was and forgave him for his acting because we know what to expect when you hire someone who came from the karate circuit instead of drama school, but to take him seriously in this movie is ludicrous.The stark raving mad reviews that usually top the first few pages of any movie which are submitted before most movies are even released is a dead giveaway that the promotion teams are boasting out full on propaganda...

"Until Death" is a very entertaining action\drama.The plot: Anthony Stowe (Van Damme) is a heroin-addicted, strung out cop who's trying to find his old partner Callaghan (Rea) who's turned dirty. When a sting goes awry, Stowe is shot and put into a coma. He wakes up and tries to right all the wrongs he's done.Van Damme is fantastic in the role. He puts a lot of effort into it and it shows. Rea plays a good bad guy, he goes a little over-the-top near the end though. The action scenes are limited, but they work well. There are a couple surprises with the characters I didn't expect. This is on par with "Replicant" and "Wake Of Death" in the Van Damme canon.Overall, "Until Death" was way better than I imagined, and I was excited to see it at the time.For more insanity, please visit: comeuppancereviews.com

I was really impressed with how this movie was done considering the budget for it. Van Damme's lines are short and sweet as usual but his overall acting in this film is not typical of his earlier works in the early nineties. The fact that the film was done on a low budget is very obvious (most of Van Damme's work these days is straight to video) but for what the director had to work with, I really feel that he did a great job. There is so much more drama in this film compared to other Van Damme films that I was really surprised, sometimes an actors departure from their usual works isn't such a bad thing and I feel this film is proof of that. I would recommend Until Death to anyone who can tolerate low budget films, as well as anyone who appreciates Van Damage in all his greatness, and a little bit of a genre twist added in. Good stuff in my opinion.

Growing up in the 90's it was almost routine to watch a Van Damme movie where he jump kicks everyone into oblivion and does a split in the process. This movie is quite different for he plays the vigilante crooked cop for once, maybe its either his age or the role but it was far from what I've gotten used to....and may I say this is for the better.In this caper, Van Damme plays a down on his luck crooked cop who is gunned down by his former partner and put into a coma. When he comes out of it he realizes the error of his ways and vows to take out the man who put him in this position.As the film progresses its unnerving to see Van Damme in a role that hit so close to home with his real life drug addiction, but still its quite a difference from his pretty boy savate kick days of the 90's.Stephen Rea rocks the role he plays, but the real star was Van Damme for once. As he gets older his days of diving through windows and taking on Bolo Yeung are over, so roles like this should become more common.The movie itself is a decent flick if you're into the darker cop genre so its worth a look 6 out of 10