Knowingly silly and delighted with its regular winks at its star’s past exploits on screen, The Last Mercenary (Netflix) gives Jean-Claude Van Damme, now a fit 60, a chance to flex much more than his muscles, though those famous pecs and pins do see some action. Mostly, though, he’s on a fun, self-aware tip throughout this enjoyable French action-comedy.
The Gist! Richard Brumere (Jean-Claude Van Damme) was once known only as The Mist, and his special ops work for the French government made him a legend in his own time. Nowadays, though, he’s past his prime, and while he’s more than capable in his work as an action hero for hire, Brumere’s still pissed about how the government gave him up when a mission went bad way back in the 1990’s. In the fallout from “Operation Cup-And-Ball,” Brumere disappeared — they didn’t call him The Mist for nothing — and left his baby son in the care of a trusted friend. Archibald (Samir Decazza), now 25, gets a rude awakening about his
estranged father’s past when his identity is lifted by a showboat foreign national with a Scarface complex named Simyon (Nassim Si Ahmed), and the black ops forces who were determined to keep The Mist disappeared awaken his wrath when they target his son.
As Brumere tries to establish a rapport with his son, he’s also unraveling a mess of shady government flunkies, illegal arms deals, and lasting grudges from his days on the spy payroll. Father and son enlist the aid of Dalila (Assa Sylla) and her brother Momo, and stay one step ahead of the mercs trying to kill them as they fight to restore Archie’s good name and hopefully quash Simyon’s
dastardly plot to undermine the French Republic. Along the way there are car chases — The Mist is adept at operating a motor vehicle at high speeds from the passenger seat — a few fist fights, including a particularly thrilling sequence set inside a shower room at a ritzy spa, and plenty of opportunities for Van Damme to willingly engage in humorous wig wearing and cross-dressing on the road to getting his man and saving his son.
What Movies Will It Remind You Of? A few flashbacks to The Mist’s secret operations of old put Van Damme in a John Rambo-style wig, surrounded by KIAs; they work as a cheeky mirror on the very films the actor regularly made for over a decade. There’s also a sense of the madcap action-comedy at play in something like The Hitman’s Bodyguard — bullets flying and bones cracking, but the lot of it played for broad laughs.
Performance Worth Watching: “Mr. Secret Agent, when do I get a gun?” As Momo, Archie’s happy-go-lucky stoner buddy pressed
into service as a wheelman, Djimo is sweet, funny, and more than happy to adjust to black ops life, casually calling it “our operation” and channelling Michael Pena as Luis in the Ant-Man films. Memorable Dialogue: A government flunkie seems confused. “Who sends a fax with a code from 25 years ago?” he asks his commanding officer. But the crusty veteran spy knows exactly what it means. “A guy last seen 25 years ago.” The Mist, The Mist — The Mist is back.