The Quest

1996

Action / Adventure / Drama / Thriller

52
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 36% · 21 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Spilled 36% · 10K ratings
IMDb Rating 5.6/10 10 29796 29.8K

himalaya new york city island martial arts himalaya mountain range bare knuckle boxing

Plot summary

Ghang-gheng, the ancient winner-take-all competition in which the deadliest fighters from around the world employ the most spectacular feats of martial arts skills ever displayed in order to win the prized Golden Dragon. But fighting prowess alone will not be enough for Chris to triumph over such daunting foes.

Director

Jean-Claude Van Damme Photo
Jean-Claude Van Damme

Top cast

Jean-Claude Van Damme Photo
Jean-Claude Van Damme as Christopher Dubois
Ryan Cutrona Photo
Ryan Cutrona as Officer O'Keefe
Jason Cavalier Photo
Jason Cavalier as Youth #1
Janet Gunn Photo
Janet Gunn as Carrie Newton
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
798.32 MB
1280*544
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 35 min
Seeds 8
1.51 GB
1920*816
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 35 min
Seeds 39

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by Edge49 7 / 10

Underrated JCVD gem

My main issue with the film is the plot. We have seen this many many times with his films. No name guy goes to fighting tournament as an underdog and surprises everyone and wins it. Very common with his film from the late 80's to early 90's.I loved roger moores character. He has a funny sense of humor that we also get to see in most of his James Bond films.The scenery was beautiful. Thailand is a gorgeous country.A lot of stereotypes with the fighters. Every time they announced a country to fight, you could tell what the fighter would look like, Japan sumo, Scotland kilt, etc.A truly underrated gem in the JCVD catalog.
Reviewed by Okonh0wp 5 / 10

2 1/2 Stars out of 4

The Quest is a surprisingly decent Jean Claude Van-Damme movie.Quest is a period piece, and a pretty well-done one at that. Taking place shortly after World War I, Van Damme plays Chris Dubois, a humble indentured servant figure with Rocky-like ambitions to become a big fighting champion. Dubois has set his sights on some very elite and secret tournament in some mystical forbidden city, to which only the best fighter in every country of the world gets an invitation.To get into the tournament, Dubois enlists the help of a mischievous figure, Lord Dobbs. In one of the many parts of the plot I was unable to follow, Lord Dobbs owes him some unknown favor so he buys his freedom and makes arrangements to get the kid to Beijing, with the aide of an attractive blonde newspaper editor, Carrie Newton (Gunn).Dobbs is played by seven-time James Bond alumni Roger Moore, who I'm so used to seeing as Bond that I half-expected him to, at a crucial point in the movie, bag the attractive news lady, beat someone up, or use some cool gadget. Sadly, Moore only accomplishes one of these three things (uses a cool gadget) and fails miserably at it. However, Moore does carry one James Bond-like trait to this part which is being a smooth talker which gets Dubois in trouble in the first place. Apparently, Dubois was never really entered into the tournament, so he must win over the guy who's slated to fight for the U.S. and get his invitation, which raises the question, isn't Dubois French?Anyway, there's no reason to fret over little things like that, because considering the plot is secondary to the action, it's pretty well-thought out, and besides the action doesn't disappoint.The tournament where most of the actions scenes come from is probably my favorite thing about the movie because the single elimination bracketed format has the same thrill as watching something like NCAA's March Madness. The only difference is that except for rooting for your favorite colleges, you root for Industrial Era superpowers. The other plus of this was that the clashing of such a diverse array of fighting styles (sumo wrestling, Scottish fist fighting, Brazillian street fighting, and the like) led to some great action scenes.My main complaint about the action is that Van Damme's fight scenes attempt to create suspense by him being knocked down and then supposedly against our expectations, getting back up and winning. This just becomes predictable, and besides, because the Master of Ceremonies usually hits the gong after a guy gets knocked down, Dubois would have realistically been out in the second round after getting the crap beat out of him by the Spaniard. Even if he did get back up, he wouldn't have been able to overpower the other guy after having taken so many hits. If he is such a skillful fighter, why doesn't he just win the fight efficiently without all the drama? He reminds me of the present-day LA Lakers who slack off the entire regular season, knowing that they only really have to work during the playoffs.This gag would have been an effective if it was restricted to only happening in the film's climatic finale. Instead, to top the earlier fights, the tournament's final match really got to be a disappointment. The master of ceremonies was incredibly generous with the gong, deciding to let the fight continue even after Dubois got knocked down twice and kicked out of the ring, where he is beaten up some more and magically throws in a couple kicks at the right moment and walks away with the medallion.Anyway, the film is a decently played out story that has its moments.
Read more IMDb reviews

7 Comments

Be the first to leave a comment