Really Surprised!

A Brilliant Conflict

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Knock Off deserves a spot as one of Jean Claude Van Damme's worst movies that he has had the misfortune to appear in. For some reason, it disappeared without a trace from cinemas, then made a quiet entry on home video. Needless to say when I hired this out, I found myself dismayed at how forgettable this garbage was as well as a waste of time and money.Hong Kong based fashion designers Marcus Ray (Jean Claude Van Damme, Universal Soldier) and Tommy Hendricks (Rob Schneider, Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo) are involved in a fashion line of knock offs of major label merchandise including shoes and jeans being their popular items on the market. Their boss, Karen Leigh (Lela Rochon, Waiting to Exhale), who is also a CIA agent sent to find the mole in their operation, is threatening them with a jail term if they do not cooperate after they have been busted. Spearheading the CIA operation in Hong Kong is Harry Johannson (Paul Sorvino, Goodfellas), who also has a very shady agenda.The cast is wasted in a pathetic movie which was also penned by Steven E. de Souza who was also the brains behind such action classics including 48 Hrs. (1982), Commando, (1985), The Running Man (1987), Die Hard (1988) and Die Hard 2 (1990). It seems here that his idea reached its expiry date and became stale very fast.Don't get ripped off with Knock Off.1/10.

*SPOILERS* Knock Off (1998) is very forgettable Hong Kong action movie. I still don't know what the hell this movie is about? This film is completely a Jackie Chan Movie. Van Damme moves like Jackie Chan. Mostly action scenes seems to be dubbed from Jackie Chan and Stanley Tong's movies that they work on them together. The action in here is good, but not that good. If they were playing an Chinese Action movie, they could came up with Van Damme action style movie flick, or better script and better storyline, but no! I realized that Sammo Hung was the second director for Van Damme's scenes, that is why they made this movie like a Jackie Chan movie. It is sort of a good-bad action movie. I don't hate the movie, but I don't like Knock Off either, but in my opinion Double Team is just way much better movie than this. I still like that this movie is made in the late 90's in Hong Kong and I think Van Damme did a solid job in here.Jean-Claude Van Damme, Rob Schneider and Michael Wong trio action stars on the ship did a terrific outstanding job, but I would replaced three or two actors in this movie, in the Van Damme support team. I would replaced Rob Schneider with Hong Kong action star Donnie Yen, he would be much better choice for play Marcus Ray's (Van Damme) partner. I would replaced Lela Rochon with Cynthia Khan, because Lela is black and can not act or kicking ass. I would rather put Cynthia Khan in this movie. Donnie Yen and Cynthia Khan worked together with Michael Wong in my favorite Hong Kong martial arts action film In the Line of Duty IV (1989) one of the best Hong Kong action martial arts movie, I have ever seen. Donnie Yen and Cynthia Khan did return one year later in another action film Tiger Cage II (1990), this time Donnie Yen was the lead star in that movie and Cynthia was only a support co star, who was only in a few scenes, because her character was telling her own side of her story. That is why I liked about those Hong Kong movies.I liked Van Damme and his martial arts, when Van Damme in the factory put a chain around his knuckles and kicks those triads ass, trying to kill him, that was awesome. Asian cinema was coming strong like Jackie Chan and Jet Li so Van Damme teams up with Tsui Hark an Asian director marking their second collaboration together (the other was "Double Team"). It was something new for JCVD cause you had comedy with Rob Schnieder co-starring made the movie a decent action comedy, but I recommend the "Rush Hour" trilogy over this one. This is one of the strange movies , and the storyline is all over the place , its quite funny though , it's crazy in parts. I mean I never heard about counterfeit jeans? I thought this movie is more about smuggling Heroine, or cocaine. In the opening scene you see Michael Wong chasing someone, than some explosions and you see a lot of dolls in the water. I thought in the dolls where hiding drugs in it, now I know they weren't. What did Michael Wong chase at all? This movie to me, makes no sense I don't know what the hell the CIA was doing in this movie at all?, what they try to do with the story line? I blame Steven E. de Souza for this flick, It is his fault for making a terrible script, Van Damme has not even one good line in this movie at all! Other Chinese actors voices where dubbed. Why was an Afro-American Woman in this Chinese movie? Why? If Tsui Hark would have replaced Steven E. de Souza with Chi-Sing Cheung, Wing-Fai Wong and Kwong Kim Yip who made a script and storyline for In The Line of Duty IV (1989), this movie would not be a disaster! I don't like this movie for what it is, and it is not my Van Damme favorite film and I keep forgetting what this movie is about at all? Btw the acting from the cast and crew is terrible and laughably bad, the dialog is really dull and pretty stupid! Rob Schnieder is not an action star, stop putting him in an action movies guys! Anyway this movie get's by me a 4, because I liked the action scenes, but the explosions where bad CGI's. I like Van Damme a lot in this movie, he did a great job, but I will not seeing this anytime soon again.Knock Off is a 1998 Hong Kong action crime film starring Jean-Claude Van Damme as a sales representative who deals in counterfeit jeans who along with his partner find themselves mixed up in a conspiracy involving Russian mafia, terrorists, and the CIA. Knock Off was the second film collaboration between director Tsui Hark (A Better Tomorrow III) and Jean-Claude Van Damme, following 1997's Double Team.2/10 Grade: E- Studio: TriStar Pictures, MDP Worldwide Film Workshop Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Rob Schneider, Lela Rochon, Michael Wong, Paul Sorvino, Wyman Wong, Carman Lee, Glen Chin Director: Tsui Hark Producer: Nansun Shi Screenplay: Steven E. de Souza Rated: R Running Time: 1 Hr. 31 Mins. Budget: $35.000.000 Box Office: $44,000,000

I have liked Jean-Claude VanDamme over the years but I really haven't seen much of him in the last decade. Maybe it was because of films like this, which totally turned me off. I guess I figured (I might be wrong) that VanDamme's career had gone down the dumper, if this was any indication. However, you can discredit all of the people involved in the film for its failings, not just Jean- Claude. It was a team effort. For instance, this film had some of the dumbest dialog and worst acting I've ever seen.It also had a convoluted plot. Can anyone make sense of this story? Would anybody want to? It looks like a cheapie Hong Kong flick imitation but one that is trying to be intellectual at the same time. It's all way too much. Actually, it is a Hong Kong flick, with director Hark Tsui in charge, but filmed in Hollywood. One look at the plot line listed here on the IMDb home page should tell you something: "fashion designer....joins forces with CIA....to stop terrorism." Yeah, right!!! What's next? Oleg Cassini playing "Rambo?"Actor Rob Schneider ("Tommy Hendricks") once again shows he was smart enough to switch from villain roles like in here to comedy where he has done far better. Not everything is bad. Some of the camera-work was interesting; some of the action scenes decent, but of those categories also were overdone. How many zoom shots can you do? Some of it is inventive but not when it's done repeatedly in the same film. Also, isn't a 20-minute action scene at the end overdoing it just a little bit?

Knock Off is set in Hong Kong during June 1997 as it is returned to Chinese rule after over a century of British rule, as the festivities are about to start V-Six Jeans executives Marcus Ray (Jean-Claude Van Damme) & Tommy Hendricks (Rob Schneider) are paid a visit by V-Six Jeans American corporate executive Karen Lee (Lela Rochon) who says that half of their last shipment they sent to the States were knock off's. They get the local police involved & decide to raid a factory belonging to Eddie Wang (Wyman Wong) who was storing the consignment before shipment, it turns out that the Russian mafia have counterfeited V-Six Jeans with small bomb devices in the buttons which can be detonated at any time by remote control & intend to black mail the Government with the threat of blowing millions of innocent jean wearing Americans up after flooding the States with the knock off's...This Aruban, Hong Kong & American co-production was directed by Hark Tsui who had made the awful Double Team (1997) with JCVD but one year earlier & I have to say that I quite liked Knock Off, it's no masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination but it's fun if nothing else & much, much better than the aforementioned Double Team. The script by Steven E. de Souza definitely doesn't take itself too seriously with many comical & light hearted moments, both during the action scenes & the dialogue. There are some neat one-liners as various character's trade insults, argue with each other & try to be sarcastic, Knock Off might make you smile on a few occasions which is probably a good thing since you can't take it seriously at all. There's plenty of action although it's rather silly at times but one could say that's more down to director Tsui than Souza's script, it moves along at a nice enough pace but it can also be a frustrating film. The storyline is weak & the disjointed plot is a pretty poorly strung together excuse for various oddball action set-pieces. Most of the character's are very underdeveloped, the Russian mafia angle in particular seems almost like an afterthought, the various twists are a bit underwhelming too & the main bad guy at the end just comes from nowhere & has little or no motivation. Having said that JCVD & Schneider's character's are likable & Rochon's feisty CIA agent with attitude is memorable.Director Tsui does a decent job here, he certainly injects the films action scenes with a degree of energy & visual flair. From high camera angles he has the camera spiral towards the ground to focus on JCVD, from placing a camera actually inside knock off trainers to see the glue & steams tear apart to various other cool little tricks & camera positions Knock Off looks pretty good & has had a fair amount of imagination put into it's visuals. The action scenes are undoubtedly silly, from JCVD holding off an entire mob of machete wielding thugs to a scene when he drives a car out of a second storey car park window which then hits a metal container, flips over & JCVD them drives off! The fights are OK but maybe not violent or bloody enough, all this comedy stuff is fine but when it comes down to it I'd have liked to have seen some proper action violence. There are many scenes which don't really work, many scenes which look silly, in reality wouldn't be possible & really do stretch the films already very thin credibility.With a supposed budget of about $35,000,000 Knock Off is well made & has good production values & stunts although the green CGI computer explosions look awful. Mostly shot on location in Hong Kong while the 2nd unit stuff was shot in the Philippines. The acting is alright, JCVD is up to his usual standards, Schneider is OK as the comic relief while Lela Rochon steals every scene she's in.Knock Off is a decent & fun action flick from JCVD, it's better than a lot of his recent output & much better than Double Team but it's maybe a bit too silly & the story is rather weak for it to become any sort of classic. Good harmless if forgettable & very far fetched fun.