Desert Heat (1999) User Reviews

Take it or Leave It.

[refinedsugar · 6/10 · 21 August 2001]

It's no secret Van Damme has lost much of what clout he once held at the box office when he's now reserved to doing leads in straight-to-video action flicks. I guess the hindsight is you could say that about any of the other big action stars. It's been awhile since Arnold really pulled in the audiences and even longer for the likes of Stallone, Norris and even good 'ol Steven Seagal.

So it wasn't the biggest surprise when Van Damme's latest 'Desert Heat' went straight to video. The strangest thing is it's leaps and bounds ahead of Universal Soldier 2 that got a theatrical release and Van Damme is actually pretty good when he's relaxed and having fun. With a few familiar faces in the supporting cast helping out.

This one finds Van Damme as a man at his emotional end. He believes he's got nothing to live for anymore and when we met up with him he's ready to commit suicide and end his life. What happens shortly after that is pretty basic, but fuels the rest of the story. A bunch of dirty people try to wax him and leave him for dead and he swears to make them pay in blood. So not entirely original. With more gunplay than there is martial arts - you have to decide if that's a good or bad thing for a Van Damme flick. It's a case of opinion and/or taste more than anything else. The atmosphere is light and everyone seems to be having fun. Which is great. This story couldn't have survived a single viewing if it took itself seriously.

I'm not recommending this outright, but I'm not saying stay away either. Love or hate Van Damme, this is a half-decent addition to his mixed slate of movies and if nothing else this movie contains one of the most unique sex scenes I've seen in an action movie in a really, really long while. It's both erotic and vaguely comical at the same time if you can believe that. You'll have to see the movie to know what I mean, but this all goes back to an earlier point. This movie never takes itself seriously and that's what keeps the movie enjoyable rather than being a pain to watch in the end.

Very Reasonable Adventure of Van Damme, In a Kind of Parody of Yojimbo

[claudio_carvalho · 5/10 · 6 September 2004]

In the middle of nowhere, a former killer is trying to find a reason to stay alive. When he is close to commit suicide, three bad guys hurt him and steal his Colt 45 and his motorcycle Indian 49. He is saved by his Indian friend Johnny and goes to a small town in the middle of the desert, where he protects the locals, fighting against two gangs of bad guys. I found this movie a very reasonable entertainment. There are some good jokes (the last one with UFOs is very creative and funny), good action and comical scenes, some beautiful women (the eyes of Gabrielle Fitzpatrick are amazingly beautiful) and reasonable performances. The movie makes a respectable joke with Yojimbo, inclusive in one of the last scenes, the bus driver invites the delicious Dottie Matthews (Jaime Pressly) to watch Yojimbo in a close town. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): 'Inferno'

The coyote was just too much.

[SamRag · 4/10 · 12 August 2002]

What was this all about? To start with, I like Jean-Claude Van Damme, and many of the user comments here praise this as one of his better film. I totally disagree. I like Jean-Claude for what he does best, which is kicking along with well scripted one liners. Jean-Claude has shown that with a good script and larger-then-live action sequences he can bring us pretty good films, with Hard Target being my favorite. Other average but watchable films are for example; Universal Soldiers, Nowhere to run and Timecop. But Inferno is an oddity to me. It is true that we have some good humor from the support cast and the idea behind the story is not all that bad. However, I was at loss as to Jean-Claude's character. Why did he want to kill himself, and what was this mysterious relationship he had with the Indian. The mixture of reality and some dream-Indian-coyote world was awkward, and the love story unbelievable (He meet the woman for 5min, and from that point they were like a couple???). So all in all, pretty sad effort, but OK due to good support cast. 4/10

Van Damme has a good rapport with the old folks.

[cleather · 9 February 2003]

Wow, this movie is almost like a Road House for the late 90's. In other words, this is a good, no, GRRRREAT bad movie. Van Damme effectively plays another dumb guy / bad ass/ good guy. JCVD arrives in a small desert community populated almost entirely by abrasive creeps. Abrasive is putting it mildly, these guys snort crank/coke and verbally abuse old folks/hot waitresses around the clock. Of course Van Damme must help out the old folks and hot waitresses, probably because he's on some spiritual journey, or maybe he just wants to get laid, or maybe because he was planning suicide anyway. Whatever, the case may be, 2 old indians (one a motorcycle, the other an actual human being) help him get it done. The mullet adorned red necks and bikers which he awkwardly incapacitates are worth the price of admission alone. For my money this belongs amongst the best of Van Damme's entertainingly stupid body of work. Don't miss it!

One of Van Damme's worst

[yellowstone · 1/10 · 9 March 2005]

Also known as 'DESERT HEAT' I caught this movie recently on cable. Van Damme's acting will never be mistaken for that of Humphrey Bogart but even Chuck Norris would have been embarrassed by this weak attempt of a beaten rebel biker flick. The dialog is deadly, the action scenes are hum drum at best and the plot is almost nonexistent. Pat Morita offers some mild comic relief but other than that the movie is a total bore. It's obvious Van Damme was just showing up for a paycheck on this one. If you must watch it wait for the scene where his good friend Johnny bites the dust and then Van Damme cries over his death. Truly acting at its worst!

Jean-Claude Van Damme Film Festival

[lastliberal · 5/10 · 26 March 2007]

I keep telling folks that it is not a good idea to remake Japanese movies. This is an attempt to do the 1962 film YOJIMBO again. It doesn't work, but that doesn't mean it not worth your time.

OK, so some very stupid yahoos decide to kick Van Damme around when he is severely depressed and suicidal and steal his gun and motorcycle. These boys are the local counterfeiters/drug dealers/village thugs. You can guess what comes next.

What sets this film apart is the inclusion of Pat Morita (154 films!), Danny Trejo (139 films, including the upcoming Grindhouse), and Trailer-Trash Queen Jaime Pressly.

It's really a very funny Van Damme movie and worth checking out. At least some passionate action returns.

One of the most stupid films that I've seen in my life

[bladerunner8910 · 2/10 · 23 July 2001]

Coyote Moon or Van Damme's Inferno(the title in Spain).Is one of the worst films that I've seen.The film doesn't have argument and the performance of Van Damme makes me laugh it's too bad.The film doesn't have more action or fights and the humorur is bad.The film is bored and the only thing good is Pat Morita perfomance,a good actor.

Pleasantly surprised

[doneil4 · 7/10 · 9 August 2020]

I originally didn't really have any intentions of watching Dessert Heat. As much as I love a Van Damme film, the fact this is one of his released straight to DVD films did put me off. I only ended up purchasing it because I happened to come across it in the 50 Pence section of a DVD and Games store we have in the UK. I thought for 50p why not. And to be fair, I really enjoyed it.

If you can prepare to watch a movie and not take it too seriously then it's worth a watch to let the time pass and entertain you. Don't get me wrong, it's not Universal Soldier or Sudden Death. But Van Damme kicks ass in this.

It took a killer cast and reduced it to this crud.

[tarbosh22000 · 2/10 · 21 October 2013]

Eddie Lomax (Van Damme) is a mysterious stranger who comes to a dusty ol' California town. When some local good old boys called the Hogan family, not to be confused with the delightful 80's sitcom, assault him and leave him for dead, Eddie's buddy, Johnny Six Toes (Trejo) nurses him back to health. Lomax then makes it his mission to get revenge on the Hogans, and one of his main methods of doing that is to pit a faction of other local no-good-niks against them. Lomax must be a big movie buff, because we've all seen that plan so many times before. He then enlists the help of Jubal Early (Morita), a nice man who annoyingly repeats all his sentences, the crotchety old man Eli Hamilton (Erwin) and the inexplicably Indian road house owner Singh (Schiavelli) to help him out. The owners of the local diner, the Reynolds family - Dottie, Rhonda, and the prerequisite Pop (Pressly, Fitzpatrick and Rainey, respectively) all love Eddie and get behind his mission quickly, and of course there's some predictable romance between Rhonda and Eddie. Will Lomax ever turn up the DESERT HEAT? At this point in his career, Van Damme was in a rut. After a long string of either good or successful movies, he went on to make the awful Universal Soldier: The Return (1999) and then Desert Heat, his first DTV effort after he was exiled from movie theaters. Despite a virtual all-star/all character actor cast, Desert Heat is a dud that's pretty hard to sit through. The plot is yet another tired run-through of Yojimbo (1961), or, if you prefer, A Fistful of Dollars (1964), or perhaps Django (1966), Savage Dawn (1985) or the more recently-released at the time Last Man Standing (1996), or any other possible options. This movie adds nothing whatsoever to the tale, it's just a tired rehash. At least similar DTV films like Steel Frontier (1995), Digital Man (1995), or Missionary Man (2007) tried to inject something different into the formula. Desert Heat - which based on its forebears should have been called "Desert Man" - does no such thing.

The whole outing starts on an irritating note and it's hard to recover. It's Van Damme spewing a bunch of nonsense as a "tilty-cam" swirls around him. It was the late 90's after all, so there had to be things like this, and the fact that the movie is annoyingly self-aware (a character asks Dottie if she wants to go see Yojimbo in the theater...groan) hurts the final product. Desert Heat is populated with underdeveloped characters you just don't care about, and, coupled with the movie's lack of any originality whatsoever, makes it lose any kind of force or interest for the viewer. After the intro, which will unfortunately remind viewers of Bloodmatch (1991) of all things, it never seems to gain much momentum and it's easy to see why director Avildsen took his name off the movie (even though it's still in the end credits anyway - just another facet of the shoddy nature of the film). From Rocky (1976) to Desert Heat? Interesting career trajectory...

As far as the baddies, there are some familiar names - Larry Drake, Jeff Kober, Paul Koslo and Gregory Scott Cummins, among others. That's one of the real shames of Desert Heat. It took a killer cast and reduced it to this crud. There are even a handful of potentially cool scenes - but if you don't care about the characters or their plight, they don't amount to much. Apparently, Van Damme's behind the scenes meddling caused the mess we see today. Just what he wanted to change, why he thought the version after the changes was better, or how he was allowed to have that much power over the final film remain unanswered questions. But the end result is, Desert Heat is a slog and one of the weakest Van Dammes.

Clap Clap

[raulfaust · 7/10 · 12 July 2011]

Yea, "Inferno" is a great movie. It's photography isn't big budget, it looks like an 80's film. But the rest is likable.

The mix of many genres, such as drama, action, thriller, comedy and even romance are very well balanced and deliver a good time. The actors are above average, there's no scene that you can say "Ooh they are acting". It's sad that the writer wanted to praise Van Damme as the nicest guy ever, it seems to be kind of egocentric, but it's not irritating enough to spoil the quality of this film. And the airplane scene in the last fight is lame, but I will just ignore that.

And in the end, we have a nice message of friendship. I really recommend this film for entertainment!

Avildsen´s worst yet...

[McBuff · 1/10 · 2 March 2001]

What did you expect, it´s another Van Damme vehicle, so I´m not gonna moan about him not changing his pace with this one (although his celebrated kicks take considerable back seat here), BUT...let me just take a minute to point your attention to director John G. Avildsen, who has made a handful of decent movies. This DTV clunker comes close to being his worst yet, with strong competition from Karate Kid III. The film does have its hilarious moments, of course, like JC attempting to act drunk, Danny Trejo footmassaging JC(!) and Pat Morita rehashing his old Mr. Miyagi act. The film bears more than passing resemblance to Road House, Last Man Standing and Yojimbo (screenwriter Tom O´Rourke even has the audacity to salute the latter near the end). If this is your idea of a great video experience, go right ahead. But there are much better offers out there on the dusty shelves.

A remake of "Yojimbo"? Not "For a Fistfull of Dollars"?

[Just_Some_Guy · 8/10 · 14 August 2006]

Anyway, you shouldn't compare this movie to either of the above. Although I haven't seen Yojimbo (pronounced Yo-Jimbo by one of the characters), but I'm sure it won't be fair to all of them.

This movie is an action movie, with Van Damme as the good guy, but it's not very serious. Sure, there are explosions and guns and kicks and a completely unnecessary sex scene and all that, but it seems like there are quite a lot comic relief moments and characters. Pat Morita and Bill Erwin reminded me of Statler and Waldorf from The Muppets, for one.

Van Damme plays an American, which meant that he talked very little and tried to talk in a raspy voice to disguise his accent. And you know what? It worked. The only thing that I couldn't let go is because I expected to hear his unique accent.

This movie is 95 minutes well spent. Don't go out of your way looking for it, but you don't have to avoid it either.

Good comeback movie

[jiggsmcgretzky · 7/10 · 17 May 2005]

I think this was a pretty good movie for Van Damme to make his come back from drugs in. It was the same formula as every single other Van Damme movie, but it was pretty entertaining, and Danny Trejelo (sp.?) was very good as his faithful friend Johnny Six-toes. I've certainly seen worse (the matrix, for example)! It's too bad that Van Damme has gone to straight-to-video movies now, since he is STILL a better action actor than a clown like Matt Damon in the "Bourne Mistake" or whatever! Damon is a puss, a bad actor, and a complete wienie! I had a hard time not LAUGHING at the thought of him as an action figure! Oh well.. I hope Jean-Claude Van Damme starts making better action movies again very soon, and gets one in the theater.

So bad it's bad .......

[merklekranz · 2/10 · 19 December 2020]

Everything about "Desert Heat" seems forced, and the actors play caricatures not characters, that you have seen before in hundreds of similar low budget action films. The shame is that some really good character actors are badly wasted. Throw in a mystical angle to further weaken an already weak screenplay, and you have a recipe for the disaster that "Desert Heat" becomes. People we know nothing about, doing pathetically stupid things, equals crap of epic proportions. Any resemblance drawn between this garbage and "Yojimbo" or "A Fistful of Dollars" is total nonsense. I give this two stars only because some of the supporting cast try to make something out of the nothing script. Avoid this and rewatch "A Fistful of Dollars". MERK

JCVD cleans out a desert snake-nest. Simple but funny. A treat.

[bobstein · 4 October 1999]

Hey, if you want art go to a museum. This thing is entertaining. Slow start but it makes up for that. Funny in understated ways. Vivid characters that weren't all made with cookie cutters. If the dialog had been witless the life would have drained out of this movie as easily as the bad guys die. But I'll wager the writer (Tom O'Rourke II) was awake and had some fun. I was too and I did too. Hats off to him.

We (viewers) made Hollywood (filmmakers) to have a steady source of diversionary schlock. This one delivers.

P.S. Should get an award for egregious miscasting: Vincent Schiavelli as a Sikh?

Remember Roadhouse?

[David C-2 · 3/10 · 21 August 1999]

As goofy a story line that "Roadhouse" had, why does Hollywood seem to regenerate the same laughable, inane plot? "Desert Heat" is a prime example - a big star (Van Damme) who is in desperate need of a new manager, "B" star Love Boat rejects from the 70's (Pat Morita, Vincent Schiavelli, etc) and lots of mindless shoot 'em up action - and you know, the audiences will love this stuff. Van Damme rides into town to bring a "gift" to one of his long lost friends; naturally, all outsiders in this desert community are evil and quickly the local rednecks dispense of our hero...or do they? Naturally, he rises like the phoenix from the ashes, kills many of the youngsters terrorizing the older folks, romances the local waitress and yes, has sex not with one, but two harlots he rescues from a local club. Oh, boy...the only saving grace is Van Damme is obviously enjoying the fact he is cashing a big paycheck for his role. Some humour punctuates the script, but the blood letting gets old and this is nothing different from a thousand other "revenge" flicks that are collecting dust on the bottom shelf of your local video store.

This film is improved by the number of excellent supporting character actors in the story, though they can't overcome bad writing.

[planktonrules · 2/10 · 19 February 2019]

This is the third Jean Claude Van Damme movie I have seen. One, "JCVD", was brilliant...believe it or not. Another, "Lionheart", was good. And then there was this one!!!

"Inferno" (also known as "Deset Heat") is a Van Damme movie that is assisted by a nice assembly of supporting character actors. Pat Morita, Danny Trejo, Vincent Schiavelli and many others are nice additions, though I especially liked Bill Erwin as a very goofy and funny old codger*! However, no matter how nice these actors are in the film, it really is NOT 'Yojimbo" which it's reported to be...."Yojimbo" was a brilliant Kurosawa film. You'll see little brilliance in this picture...mostly a lot of explosions, expletives and macho histrionics which defy common sense.

When the story begins, Eddie (Van Damme) is in the middle of the desest--tired of living and in a funk. However, a gang of thugs attack him, shoot him and leave him for dead...and give him a new sense of purpose...to kill them! However, unlike most of the actor's films, he mostly shoots or stabs folks to death...which is much smarter than taking on every single one hand to hand. Unfortunately, it also suffers because after the initial confrontation, bullets never hit him and he can drive a motorcycle through a crowd of these armed thugs without getting hurt. Additionally, Eddie's bullets seem to often hit their target AND often makes things inexplicably explode!! Intellectual fare, this is definitely not!

So do I recommend the film? Not really. It's ultra violent, ultra crude and it's almost criminal to say or imply it's a remake or reworking of "Yojimbo"! In fact, it's pretty dopey.

*The characters playing the two religious fanatics were not only offensive but amazingly stupid. See the film, you'll see what I mean.

A little more comedic than action packed to me.

[GOWBTW · 7/10 · 12 September 2005]

This Van Damme movie was a bit more of a renter than big screen material. Of course, this had some ad lib as well if you know what I mean. The cast have some well known stars. Pat Morita(The Karate Kid movies), Larry Drake(L.A. LAW, and Darkman 1&2), Danny Trejo(so many movies impossible to keep count) the same with others. A man left for dead, is typical, but when the heavy steal his wheels, that's grounds for seek and destroy! Eddie Lomax(Jean-Claude Van Damme) goes nuts in the desert, then his friend SixToes(Trejo) revives him. Going into town is where all the action and comedy starts and ends. Having slice of apple pie will definitely put a smile on anyone face. Because it's an all-American treat. My favorite part are the two Christian couple who give Lomax a room, and the old guy, had more concern about Lomax and the safety of others. Especially, when he got the two blondes out of the bar, and they got to shower and shave. It wasn't the blondes the couple should be worried about, Lomax got the thanks, he will never forget! In fact normally the woman wipes out the man during sex, in this case, he wiped out the blondes and Mrs. Reynolds felt confident that Lomax was a saint in his own way. Other than that, the movie was OK, after all. Good for fans of Van Damme, and I like the howling of the coyote in it as well. Rating 2.5 out of 5 stars.

So-so, yet amusing enough.

[Vomitron_G · 4/10 · 18 January 2013]

Oh well, why not wrap up a perfectly bad-movie-week in the company of the Muscles from Brussels? 'Inferno' (aka 'Desert Heat') wasn't exactly as bad as I hoped it would be. Loner-hero J.C. Van Damme, tormented by ghosts from the past, has a severe alcohol problem. Well, it's not really a problem, but actually a solution: Whenever he's drunk, he's not killing people. Naturally, he ends up killing a whole lot more of them in this movie. They even managed to cram Danny Trejo, Larry drake, Vincent Schiavelli and Pat Morita in this movie (well, actually, Morita ain't that big, so he fits in easily). Cutie-bonus goes to Jaime Pressly (who once again keeps her cloths on, *sigh* -- can anybody finally recommend me a movie were she does take something off?). Little bit of fighting, little bit of shooting, little bit of sex (loved those blond bimbos -- yes, there actually is female nudity in this flick), a little bit of killing... And all this in a movie that's got some sort of revenge-western vibe to it. Stupid attempts at humor, predictable 'til the last frame. Well maybe not exactly the last shots, because those kind of took me by surprise and really had me laughing, thinking "Sh!t, man, have I just been watching a ghost movie?". Oh well, JC might have seen better days, but I'm sure he's seen some worse too.

Desert Heat

[Scarecrow-88 · 6/10 · 20 January 2010]

An eclectic group of eccentrics living in a desert town in the middle of Nevada are greeted by, unbeknown to them, their savior(whose past regarding killing haunts his very soul)seeking after a motorcycle he intended to give to an old pal(an Indian portrayed by Danny Trejo) as a gift(wanting his permission to "go on a journey")stolen by a trio of degenerates, the Hogans, sons of a dictator-like drug dealer who demands money from those locals who run businesses or else risk his wrath. What in turn happens is that this stranger(played by Jean-Claude Van DAMME)initiates a minor feud between two foul families, the Hogans and the Heathens, who are in a partnership regarding the shipment of drugs. Ultimately, Eddie Lomax(Van DAMME)will assist the locals, engaging in a violent war with both parties, the small town a battleground.

Funny how this film instigates the developing action. A drunken Lomax firing off bullets from his Colt .45, grazing the vehicle of the loathsome Hogan boys, only increasing hostilities, as he's shot and left for dead. Perfect setting up for a revenge plot. However, what I found interesting was the direction the filmmakers take with this story-line. It becomes almost a complete comedy, a nice surprise is how "Desert Heat" has a spirited sense of humor and an amusing array of oddball characters. Van DAMME looks really relaxed with this cast, enjoying himself. Like all these kinds of movies, Van DAMME starts systematically eliminating each and every thug(..and there's a fresh supply of sweaty desert uglies for him to vanquish)until a truck load are dumped in a desert hole by "handyman" Pat Morita(..in an inspired bit of casting, awaiting the return of a departing love named Berta). You have Vincent Schiavelli as a bar owner who chastises Van DAMME for killing several of his customers, despite the fact that they were profane troublemakers. Larry Drake, as patriarch Ramsey Hogan, sadly, is underused and exits the movie far too soon. Gabrielle Fitzpatrick is Van DAMME's love interest, a waitress who runs her senile father's diner and yearns for more in life. David Fralick, as Matt Hogan, is a rather limp adversary for Van DAMME(Bolo Leung, he's not)and their confrontation at the end leaves much to be desired. Jaime Pressly has an early role as another waitress, Dottie, a very tasty looker who, along with her cook brother, passed by a fallen Lomax after he had been shot as they were driving to town. Bill Erwin has a hilarious role as a gunstore owner rescued by Lomax after his nephews chained him to his bed, waiting for him to die, operating his business! A running gag has Erwin dependent upon an oxygen tank, while puffing on a cigarette when he isn't sucking air! Priscilla Pointer as a religious kook who operates a ratty motel with her husband(..she has an affinity for snakes and is always seen downing flasks and bottles of liquor!). I couldn't help but grin at the idea that this was a remake of Yojimbo. There's plenty of entertaining(..if you enjoy low brow)exchanges between Van DAMME and the townsfolk who take a shine to him. Trejo's character remains enigmatic throughout. What Trejo's Johnny and Lomax were in the past is presented rather ambiguously with the viewer having to read between the lines.

Unusually awful

[bitbucketchip · 4/10 · 27 July 2021]

Let's be clear right up front: this is a lousy movie. From the acting to the action, dialog to music, it's all bad filmmaking. Yet there is something watchable about this slow motion train wreck.

JCVD can't act. Everyone else performs down to his level. If there was a director on the set, he wasn't directing.

The dialog is just bizarre. It sounds like one of those spaghetti western bad overdubs. Nothing anyone says makes the slightest sense.

Pacing is all over the place. Scenes plod along to no conclusion or race ahead to no conclusion, sometimes at the same time.

The actors are made of cardboard. Despite what the writers would have us believe, one dimensional weirdness is not a personality. The religious folks are only religious folks. The rednecks are only rednecks. The morons are only morons. The eye candy are only eye candy. And do on. You know what everyone is going to say and do before they do.

The closest films to this are the Golan Globus Chuck Norris cheapies. Those too are watchable, but if you stop and think about it you can't explain why.

Four stars.

Strange music from Pat Morita

[karastjepan · 10/10 · 18 April 2006]

Yes, it's a cheesy film, but it's marvelous and mysterious in its own way. Toward the end when Pat Morita is whistling a tune, the melody is THE INTERNATIONALE, anthem of international Communism. No explanation for this is offered, nor does one seem obvious. It's hard to imagine adding much new to the remaking of YOJIMBO with Van Damme in place of Eastwood or Mifune, though motorcycles and exploding fuel tanks can't hurt. Not every action film can match the classics. But this one beats the pants off ROADHOUSE with Patrick Swayze, with a similar landscape. Such is, at least, my own opinion. And it's better than AVENGER with Sam Elliott, who was also in ROADHOUSE. But I digress...

Decent Van Damme outing, tho a bit unusual

[bellino-angelo2014 · 6/10 · 22 February 2021]

I was curious for a while about this movie as apart from having Van Damme as the lead it has a lot of familiar supporting actors such as Vincent Schiavelli, Pat Morita, Bill Erwin and the always reliable Danny Trejo (who makes even bad movies look good) and also because from the poster it looked like an adventure movie.

In the beginning Eddie Lomax (Jean Claude Van Damme) drives all alone in the desert with his motorcycle and he is tired of living. After he has an allucination where he sees his friend Johnny Sixtoes (Trejo) some thugs attack him, leave him for dead and steal his bike. This gives Eddie a new sense in his life... to go after these thugs and kill them. When Eddie wakes up, he comes by a village that is used to the agressions by those delinquents and he tries everything he can to stop the bullies and get his bike back.

This is a very unusual movie for Van Damme as unlike in his most famous movies, he mostly shoots or stabs folks... as he usually kicks the bad guys in the groin. However most of his bullets at times hit the targets and often they make things inexplicably explode. And these scenes made me also laugh a bit.

Despite being very violent and a bit raunchy, this is a mildly enjoyable adventure movie that will please mostly people with low expectations or adventure movies' fans.

Promising start but burns out before the the end.

[axlrhodes · 5/10 · 5 May 2008]

I sat down to watch this film in the mood for some slam bang Van Damme action but was a little let down by the lack of action and the silly characters on show.The tone of the film was similar to Oliver Stones U-Turn but this was nowhere near as engaging or well directed.Jean Claudes best films are the ones where he plays a vulnerable character fighting for a meaningful cause such as AWOL where he's fighting for his dead brothers wife and kid,or Kickboxer for his paralysed brother.This film is a little wandering and off centre.I tries to be offbeat with its characters and humour but the film makers have obviously lost sight of what people who watch Van Damme films want.Action,action and more Damme action. I gave this film 5 out of 10 upon viewing but the more i think about it, i should have given it a 3.

So bad it's good

[Kai-14 · 26 June 2000]

I chanced upon this screen gem on USA as part of their Jean-Claude Van Damme summer movie marathon. Kind of a bizarre mix of "Mad Max", where a loner takes on thugs on motorcycles who are terrorizing the citizens of some out-of-the-way "town" ("town" as in five buildings and a law-abiding population of 12); "A Fistfull of Dollars"/"Yojimbo"/"Last Man Standing", where a loner pits two rival criminal organizations against each other; and gay porn (two sweaty men in their underwear massaging each other's feet!).

All of the supporting characters are campy caricatures and the interaction is comical. Gee, Rhonda's world famous apple pie was so good that JC took only one bite and left the rest... and apparently no one in the desert bats an eye at murder, or drinks water for that matter.

The action was OK for a DTV flick, but don't rent it if that's what you're looking for. Its real appeal is the campiness. "Desert Heat" is a good pick if you want something mindless and off-the-wall to kill a couple of hours.