He kicked his way back from the career doldrums with 2008’s self-spoofing effort JCVD, but since then Jean-Claude Van Damme hasn’t exactly capitalised on it, pumping out yet another entry in the increasingly irrelevant Universal Soldier franchise and writing/directing/producing/editing/starring in little-seen action pic The Eagle Path, which was filmed three years ago but will only finally limp direct-to-DVD this October. He’ll no doubt be hoping for better things from Six Bullets, which he’s just agreed to star in.
Ernie Barbarash, who recently worked with Van Damme on Assassination Games, is stepping behind the camera once more for the tale of a former mercenary kidnapping expert who is hired by a top martial arts champ to find his missing daughter. Shades of Taken, then, and the sort of plot that makes us wonder why the fist-jabbing fighter doesn’t strike out on his own to find his sprog. Still, we bet he’ll get involved somehow.
Chad and Evan Law, who wrote The Hit List, have scribbled the script, and Barbarash will start directing this August in Western Europe and the US.