My Newfound Love for Mr. Lundgren!

[algren]

I have always been a follower of Dolph, being aware of his movies that are coming out and mainly just looking at them at laughing at them for being so low budget and looking awful. My brother included. It become a running joke between both of us. In our eyes he was always lower than Van Damme and Seagal in terms of DTV-ness. We had obviously seen him in Rocky IV many moons ago, but as this was one of his first roles and he didn't headline the film, we don't consider this a true Dolph film, although he is absolutely amazing in it, he doesn't even seem like Dolph, thats how good he was.

So, after knowing of him in the fourth Rocky movie, we then began to watch his others...some were good, some were very very bad. More were bad than good, namely Red Scorpion, Cover Up and Pentathlon, but some were instant gems, like Army of One (JoshuaTree), The Punisher and Dark Angel. Despite his good films, we still always seemed to view Dolph in a bad light, to this day i do not know why, because he even did Universal Soldier, which me and my brother absolutely adore! Maybe we deemed this more of a Van Damme picture than a Dolph one, i'm not sure.

After this group of films, we kind of lost track of his movies. We never watched Men of War, thought it was pointless to see Johnny Mnemonic and thought The Minion looked really bad. He was still in the group of five or so stars that appealed to us, though. We saw The Shooter in a video shop one day and we bought it for maybe £2, well, it was the best two pounds we had ever spent!!!! So, we were back on the Dolph trail again...only to our dissapointment: All his movies looked really bad, but we rented a few regardless, like Jill Rips, The Minion and The Peacekeeper, all of which were very, very poor by Shooter's standards.

So, we were back on the dolph offensive again. We had an on-off relationship with Dolph throughout the whole of the nineties. So one night on Channel 5, its a kind of low budget channel for showing all the DTV movies, they showed Blackjack, we watched it and thought it was pretty cool (infact, i taped it and still got it), but this didn't redeem him from the previous failures. The next Dolph movie we caught was a few years later and it was called Agent Red, we thought we would give him one last shot at entertaining us again........well, you guys know exactly what happened. We decided to never watch a Dolph movie ever again, we both decided in our heads that he was finished. And to our suprise, a few years later we heard a rumour that he announced his retirement from movies. Needless to say that we were very happy to hear this, i think our reaction was something like "well, he won't be missed", which seems harsh now, but at the time we were so fed up with his lame action movies that we didn't care.

Summer 2009: A fair few years had passed by now, maybe 6 or 7 years. I was on the stallonezone website and it came up about Dolph movies, so i went on ranting about how bad he was until one day a little member called Jox replied to one of my messages. He wasn't confrontational, he wasn't arrogant, he was just down to earth and really enthusiastic and realistic about Dolph's movies of late. He basically said that i should really try and watch them instead of being negative about something that i have not seen. Therefore, having always had a soft spot for Dolph (otherwise i wouldn't have always went back for more), i decided to give Dolph another chance: best thing i have done in a long, long while!

I started to buy all the films that i had missed, so from about 2001 to the present. I got them all from eBay, quite cheaply, because i thought that if they were bad then i wouldn't have wasted that much money on them. I started with The Mechanik (in a supermarket bargain bin), then went for Diamond Dogs, Missionary Man, Detention, Sweepers, Peacekeeper (to remind myself), The Defender, Direct Action and finally i watched Direct Contact online from a Chinese website offering free movies. So, i had all these Dolph movies ready to watch, not knowing if i had wasted some money or bought pure excellence.

First one i watched was Direct Contact online, i tried to be positive about it because i wanted to start liking Dolph again and his other movies, but truthfully; it's not good. Then i watched the rest in no particular order, they were fair to poor. It wasn't until i got to Missionary Man that i realised what a great director he is and what a greater director he could be. So, my love for Dolph had blossomed ten-fold. His creativeness made me a fan again. I've already told about 6 people that the film was great. This got me excited to watch his other directed films, so i did and the rest you know. I love The Mechanik. I thought The Defender was a solid film, too. Now i only have two film ready to watch (from the one's that i bought), which are Detention and Diamond Dogs and i am expecting the latter to be better out of the two. Even if they are awful, it doesn't matter because i have come out of this little experiment with a better understanding of Dolph's movies and i am a better movie fan for watching some of the hidden gems that he has produced.

So that brings us to now. I am a Dolph fan now. I have no shame in saying that at all. Of course i will always have the odd joke at some of his early works and some of his crap movies that he has made, like Agent Red, but thats life, we all do things that we regret and we don't like, i'm sure he is the same. I am a realistic fan, i will not love everything he makes, i won't always even like everything he does, but i will watch it tentatively because i know that somewhere, someday...he will make a great movie again, like the 3 he directed that i have already seen.

I am really looking forward to The Expendables, not only because of Sly, but i like to think now thats its partly because of Dolph. When i see his seen in the bootleg trailer, i can really see that he is trying to make that role the best that he possibly can, and THATS what i love about him. When he has the correct team around him (or his own team) he can really do something special. I am not looking forward to Command Performance tha much, the style of the movie just doesn't slide with me at all. I've seen pictures and the teaser trailer and i'm just not into that whole rock star thing, i think it makes Dolph look lazy. But, i will see it when the opportunity arises. I am really looking forward to Icarus, i have seen the trailer, and it looks very, very good!!! i like Dolph to try new things and do roles like this that are clean cut and precise. He looks great and the action looks great. Universal Soldier 3 hasn't really left its makr on me just yet, but thats because i haven't seen much in terms of marketing for it just yet, but i'm sure that when i do, it will be in my 'movies to see' just like Icarus is.

So, sorry for the long message, but i just wanted to get it down that i have been a Dolph fan for longer than many of you may think, but i just took a big break in the middle. He has made some classic movies (and continues to do so), but he has made some real stinkers. For this, i feel he will always have a reputation as that action man that never quite lived up to the expectation of a career to mirror that of Stallone and Schwarzenegger. But, his true fans will love him, no matter what. And hopefully, he will acquire more since he is directing movies now, we can hope.

Just to let you know how highly i regard him, i have created a little list of actors that i follow, in order of how much i like them:

1. Stallone
2. Van Damme
3. Dolph
4. Jackie Chan
5. Schwarzenegger (when he gets back into movies he might overtake Dolph)

[dolphage]

I like this post. It's honest.

I'm glad you found your way to the forum.

And I agree, because DL has starred in so many movies, that had nothing going for them EXCEPT his participation, there comes a time when you have to, actively, DECIDE to be a Dolph fan. And accept the good with the bad.

Also, I believe, there already is a "List your top five action stars" in the off topic somewhere. I listed Dolph five times (because I'm obnoxious) but they mostly consist of the same ten guys.

Do you love Dolph the way Mosquito loves Dolph or the way I love Dolph? (the "two ways of loving the Dolph")

[Jox]

Great post algren and it's cool to hear that only my efforts to get people give Dolph a little more credit pay off but it did affect someone who was rather suspicious and resistant I remember!

And thanks for saying:

He wasn't confrontational, he wasn't arrogant, he was just down to earth and really enthusiastic and realistic about Dolph's movies of late.

because that's not easy to pull off (especially on these online boards)... and I don't wanna sound like a blind preacher either but I've spent enough time reflecting on Dolph's career (I even wrote my masters thesis about his movies at university haha!) to talk about it in a fair way and not saying "Dolph is the best" like a kid.

And even though I like to always acknowledge the positive points in each of his films, I'm not crazy about a lot of them, have been disappointed many times in 20 years but the passion and support was always coming from supporting the man for himself and who he is and knowing, unlike most people, that he was intelligent, had-working, full of good will, could and deserved to do better. And his directorial debuts have now started to prove me right and it's great to see that happening!

Also if you browse the site a little you could find (or I can tell you) some stories about stuff that happened before or during production of certain movies like how he signed on a movie and arrived on a set with half the budget promised or another script than the one he signed for etc

And yeah Dolph is the first one to laugh about it and admit he made bad choices and bad movies (have any regrets? a dozen!) or like when I asked him if he saw DIRECT CONTACT he was cracking up and say "I don't want to!"

Dolphage you forgot the third way of loving the Dolph like Jox does (the nerdy way?)!

[Moltisanti]

Cool post, welcome to the wild world of being a Dolph fan. Did you get around to MEN OF WAR yet? If not then that might be a good one to track down next. The bulk of the action is in the second half but it has a fun cast and an exotic location and isn't the typical mercenary flick.

There's no denying that Lundgren has made his fair share of bad movies, especially in the really dry 2000-2004 period. I don't hold them against him because he always seemed like he was trying and wanted to do better. Thankfully in recent years he has. He still turns out some clunkers, like DIAMOND DOGS, but that's just the nature of being in DTV action movies. Heck, it's tough for action stars working with theatrical budgets to avoid making bad movies as evidenced by Statham (love the guy, but he's made a lot of junk) and Diesel.

[Tom]

Great post Algren. As a fellow UK resident, it can be difficult sometimes to get your hands on Dolph products easily. Most of the times, the Internet is where I get my Dolph flicks. Often I have to get from another region (though in many occasions, because I was too impatient to wait for the UK release!). Having a multi-region player has been essential really, as I guess you must have.

I'm glad you've been turned around though, it's good to hear. I don't think I'm alone in having enjoyed your reviews appearing with such frequency in such a short time.

The one thing about Dolph is how likeable he comes accross in real life. I think that kind of translates itself on screen. As well as, like the other top action, he commands the screen. He's a real presence, and badass. Those top action guys get so much stick from critics for their acting skills, but never the credit for the sort of presence they can give. Commando with Al Pacino? I think not!

[Jox]

He still turns out some clunkers, like DIAMOND DOGS, but that's just the nature of being in DTV action movies.

Yeah and it's even more sad when you know it wasn't a bad choice as a project since the initial screenplay was really good so it you can't blame him for signing up, just unfortunately not only it didn't get the necessary fonds but the production got totally out of control once they were in Mongolia...

Yeah Algren I forgot to mention it but check out MEN OF WAR it's a very little known and underrated gem that's stands as on of Dolph's best movies in every department! It's like PREDATOR without a monster meets THE THIN RED LINE, great script (from indie John Sayles), great characters and acting, great action, great locations, great production value and great cinematography, what else can you ask for?!

[Mosquito]

Yeah Algren I forgot to mention it but check out MEN OF WAR it's a very little known and underrated gem that's stands as on of Dolph's best movies in every department!

Absolutely! It's easily among his top 5 movies also with a bunch of other really good cast members, good story, great location and one of his best hand-to-hand fights.

And for dolphage and Jox I like to point out that I'm a Dolph fan for many reasons, not for the obvious one you guys always think of when it comes to female Dolph followers.

[algren]

Cool post, welcome to the wild world of being a Dolph fan. Did you get around to MEN OF WAR yet? .

I haven't yet. I seem to be having trouble finding it on eBay. I don't want to pay like £17 for a film made in 1994. I will wait...

[algren]

Do you love Dolph the way Mosquito loves Dolph or the way I love Dolph? (the "two ways of loving the Dolph")

Ummmmmm, i dunno. I like him for his courage, persistance and his style.

[algren]

Great post Algren. As a fellow UK resident, it can be difficult sometimes to get your hands on Dolph products easily. Most of the times, the Internet is where I get my Dolph flicks. Often I have to get from another region (though in many occasions, because I was too impatient to wait for the UK release!). Having a multi-region player has been essential really, as I guess you must have.

Yes, i have that problem. It is quite annoying. I have got Direct Action on a Dutch release and i don't like it, especially as i want the collection to look good. I don't have a multi-regional player, maybe i should consider buying one of them. I would like to buy The Last Patrol and Retrograde, but they only seem to be available on Korean release or Dutch.

[Moltisanti]

Have you seen LAST PATROL or RETROGRADE yet? If not then don't invest much in tracking them down. Easily two of his worst. It's too bad Lundgren couldn't have done a film with Sheldon Lettich back in the early-mid 90's. I can't blame Lettich for all of THE LAST PATROL'S problems though, he had no budget to work with.

[algren]

I haven't seen them yet. Shall i not bother?

I do want to complete his collection, though.

[Moltisanti]

I know how it feels to want to see all of the man's films. Just don't spend much on those two. I believe THE LAST PATROL was just put out on Region 2 DVD so maybe you could rent that one. Just be prepared for two really bad films. I'm sure Lundgren would like to forget both of them, and I know Lettich would like to forget THE LAST PATROL.

[algren]

Retrograde looks terrible, but The Last Patrol looks quite good. I suppose it has further to fall. Shame, because it has a great cover.