As Good As It Gets

Absolutely brilliant

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Austrian secret agent Jean-Claude Van Damme (as Jacques Kristoff) must find tough but sexy Laura Harring (as Galina Konstantin) and bring her back to officials by train. She is the woman stealing something in the opening minutes. It's smallpox virus. Nasty foreign agent Tomas Arana (as Mason Cole) wants to derail the mission. Having vials of smallpox on a train with secret agents and terrorists means danger for the passengers. Also on board is Mr. Van Damme's wife Susan Gibney (as Madeline). Van Damme's real-life son Kristopher Van Varenberg plays his movie son and shows off a couple of martial arts kicks..."Derailed" should have been a better action thriller. There is a great deal of action, some of it standard and some of it substandard. We should expect that these were the best takes, edited together to make the best possible film. Still, the production looks sloppy. It appears as if editing errors were not taken care of, at some point. Writers weren't alerted to the fact that, if an infected woman was tossed off the train, the world is contaminated. Granted, details may not have been considered important. Probably, the goal was to get the Damme film out to exhibitors and make as much money as possible before word got out.*** Derailed (5/19/02) Bob Misiorowski ~ Jean-Claude Van Damme, Tomas Arana, Laura Harring, Susan Gibney

NATO operative Kristoff is summoned into action, to track down Galina Konstantin, who has stolen an extremely dangerous top-secret cargo.Finding her doesn't take long, and he must wrap up the mission by returning her and the contraband to his superiors by train.Galina's ill-gotten gain is three vials of SP-43, an ultra-virulent strain of smallpox, that contains several other pathogens.A group of terrorists, led by Mason Cole, intend to hijack the train and steal the virus for their own ends....Even though the film is silly and defies belief, it really doesn't deserve the poor rating it holds on here. The effects are bad, and the models look like models, but it's Van Damme, and he always delivers.It's basically Under Siege 2 with the flu and a very stereotypical cowboy and Brit, but it entertains.The bad guys are ridiculous, especially Coles lead henchman, who just sneers throughout the film and looks like Seal.Van Damme himself has been better, but he's bee worse, and if you want a typical straight to DVD film with Van damme, you know what to expect.all in all, not great, but a fun little movie.

If you're all set for a BAD-MOVIE night then you can't go wrong with "Derailed". Sort of cross between the-not-so-good "Cassandra Crossing" and the very enjoyable "Under Siege 2" but failing miserably in comparison. The Muscles from Brussels shows new lows with bad acting, but to his credit he's no worse than anyone else here.Screenwriters Adam Gierasch and Jace Anderson have a lot be ashamed of. Not only penning this trash but they were also responsible for Tobe Hooper's "Crocodile" and for the absurd dialogue that graced maestro Dario Argento's disappointing final third in his Three Mothers Trilogy; "Mother of Tears". Here, not only keeping up with their horrible dialogue, they also concoct a story so full of holes and completely devoid of any logic that it's nearly offensive.But a terrible script can be bettered if the action and special effects don't disappoint. No such luck here. Granted, this flick may have had a low budget but the special effects here are so bad you have to go back to Spanish or Italian films about superheroes (with that in mind; check out "Supersonic Man" for a great-bad-film) made in the late 70's to get a just comparison. As for the action; it's badly staged and executed with nonsensical editing to finish the job off completely. Half the time you don't know what's going on.Last but not least; the actors. Van Damme is terrible here. True, the guy has never been great but when armed with a solid script he did manage to not screw things up and he's an OK action dude when working with competent people behind the scenes. Thomas Arana, the main villain, actually had better lines to work with in "The Church" and those Italian horror flicks aren't exactly known for their choice dialogue. As for Laura Harring, who was decent in "Mulholland Drive", she fails miserably as a world class spy.Know what you're in for and you might not be all that angry with "Derailed". Expect the worst and it will live up to it.

If you saw this movie and enjoyed it, I can only feel sorry for you. This review does include information pertaining to the plot because I want to point out obvious plot holes. So watch your step, here we go. The movie starts out with a burglary of a bio-weapons lab. Jean-Claude Van Damme plays, Kristoff, a spy-dad who gets the assignment to escort the thief played by Laura Harring on a slow train out of the country. The fight scenes are all poorly choreographed from a fight sequence in a theater with wire harnesses in blurred effects to armed soldiers that just stand in line waiting to be punched by the hero. About 13 to 16 minutes into this movie 90 percent of the special effects budget was spent. The rest was done using old toy models from the Godzilla movies.After horsing around with secondary characters the first plot hole shows up about 30 minutes into the movie. Mrs. Kristoff and kids show up on the train unexpected to wish dad a happy birthday. Even if Mrs. Kristoff knew the train he was going to be riding, how did she find his room? That's right, he had it switched when he got on board as a precaution. Now the "bad guys" show up and hijack the train. I guess you need an army to remove one person from a train heading down a track from point A to point B. In pure "evil genius" fashion the utterance of this man's name Mason Cole just sends shivers down everyone's spines. I was thinking, who? Yes, and Mr. Cole needs to hijack an entire train, with an army of men, and helicopter to retrieve just one person.After more secondary and unknown actors are killed. The bio-weapon, a fast-acting air-born virus is released on the train. Which leads us to plot hole number two. Any first year med student would tell you that if the virus is air-born it is floating off the train contaminating the country side as well. But as the vile breaks the evil Mason Cole says, "We can make a cure with the remainder.". Excuse me? Does he hold a degree in biotechnology? Sometimes cures are not always easy to come by and this is a bio-weapon, they make them to kill people not cure them.Some more pointless dialogging, shooting, and Mrs. Kristoff tending the sick people on the train, we have the infected Mr. Kristoff jump off the train on a motorcycle and Mason Cole is informed that Kristoff is no longer on the train. Kristoff catches up to the train and jumps back on unknown to all. Meanwhile Mason Cole finds out that Mrs. Kristoff and Mr. Kristoff are related and announces over the PA that he will kill his family unless he surrenders. This plot hole makes Mason Cole look very psychic.During hostage negotiations there is another train piloted by a drunk, right down to a bottle in his hand, on a collision course for their train. The wreck is terrible the two trains fly apart and yet somehow they continue down the tracks unabated. The men in the control room says, "It must have just clip the tail.". Not from what I saw. Both miniature trains flew off the tracks. Oh wait! That was the models not real trains. Now we come to the part where the hero disconnects the train from the engine. We see a clear gap between the two sections as they slow the train cars. But as the model train comes into view the gap is gone and the whole train proceeds across the bridge. There is absolutely no gaps in the model yet it continues to exist in the shots of the three men as they turn the handbrake.I don't expect Hitchcock or James Cameron quality from an action flick. However I do expect action which this movie didn't have. This was a serious low budget turkey that wasn't worth the time to view. It will put you to sleep with its lack of action.