Jean-Claude Van Damme wrote and directed his passion project Frenchy, but nearly after 14 years in development hell will it ever get released? Van Damme (AKA “The Muscles from Brussels”) rose up from low-budget martial arts films like Kickboxer to become a genuine movie star during the 1990s. Van Damme’s action movies like Hard Target, Timecop and Sudden Death were all hits, but as the decade wore on, he appeared in a string of critical and commercial duds. His various personal issues became tabloid fodder too, and by the 2000s most of his work was heading straight to DVD.
Even then, he starred in some solid action movies, including the Universal Soldier sequels helmed by John Hyams. Certain themes and motifs reappear throughout Van Damme’s work, including playing twins or even himself. The most acclaimed example of this is 2008’s JCVD, where he played a washed-up action star caught up in a heist. Van Damme was praised for his performance, especially for a devastatingly raw, one-take monologue he performs towards the movie’s end.
JCVD wasn’t a box office smash, but the film attracted attention for its star’s work. In the aftermath, Van Damme turned down The Expendables in favor of pursuing projects that weren’t just about action. To that end, Van Damme wrote, directed and self-financed Frenchy, where he plays a former soldier haunted by his past. To save a woman named Sophia (Claudia Bassols) from some gangsters, he calls in help from his old comrades.
By all accounts, Frenchy (which shot under the title The Eagle Path) is a very personal project to its leading man. Various edits of the film have been assembled over the years, with Frenchy being described as a blend of a traditional Van Damme action flick and an arthouse movie. However, 14 years on from the movie’s first screening in Cannes, it appears no closer to release.
Frenchy was shot back in 2008, so it feels strange that a low-budget action movie starring a genre icon can’t find a distributor. There are several factors behind this, dating back to its first screening at Cannes in 2010. This Cannes Eagle Path screening was said to be nothing short of a disaster (via The Wrap), with distributors being baffled by Van Damme’s pet project. There was also the issue of the star pulling out of promotional duties for JCVD in America two years prior, which was cited as a reason it didn’t perform better.
Stung by the movie’s reception, Frenchy underwent reshoots in 2012 to beef up the action, with this new footage supposedly inspired by The Raid. Around this point, Van Damme’s film underwent several title changes, from The Eagle Path to Full Love and then Soldiers. During that time, Van Damme showed new edits to distributors and even returned to Cannes with the film once again in 2018.
The movie’s present title is Frenchy, named after Van Damme’s protagonist. Outside of distributor woes, the star is said to be protective of the film and its philosophical underpinnings, so perhaps an unwillingness to water down its message is behind its various release delays. Even so, it’s not a great look for any films to have sat on the shelf for over a decade with no signs of release.
2024 is shaping up to be the year of auteur filmmakers’ self-financing wildly ambitious passion projects. Francis Ford Coppola sank $120 million of his fortune into Megalopolis, while Kevin Costner put his money into Horizon: An American Saga – Parts 1 & 2. Of course, neither Coppola nor Costner’s projects are guaranteed box office earners, but both men were willing to bet on themselves. Van Damme’s Frenchy cost a fraction of the above movies, but the intentions are similar; an artist putting their own money into telling a personal story and not willing to compromise their intentions.
Frenchy will almost certainly see release someday, since an action movie starring Jean-Claude Van Damme is guaranteed to attract fans of the actor and genre. After years of release delays and re-edits, it’s hard to say when exactly Frenchy will arrive. According to a 2023 feature from City on Fire, the movie was available for worldwide release at the 2023 Berlin International Film Festival. Again, there is no sign it was picked up for distribution, but after a 14-year wait for Van Damme devotees, a few more years won’t hurt.
Source: The Wrap, City on Fire, Rodin Entertainment