JCVD

My lengthy ongoing bout with an ear infection caused me to miss nearly a week of moviegoing time. When you're trying to see all the releases in theaters, this is an eternity, especially when you're still playing catch-up after a long trip, and the holiday movie rush is just around the corner.

Now that I'm finally on my feet again, I realized that it had been over two weeks since I'd been brave enough to venture out to a complete new theater. Since one of my goals is to explore Massachusetts while my sister and her family still live here (they are planning to move back west in the spring), I felt like I needed to be a little daring again.

As it happened, I had no choice. The Lexington Flick (map), a two-screen downtown cinema in the town made famous in the Revolutionary War, was showing JCVD, the new French-language movie starring Jean-Claude Van Damme (hence the acronym of the title). It had come and gone in the Boston art houses last month without my being able to see it, and I felt a great joy at seeing it appear again in the listings, moreover with a much shorter drive.

Yes, I know what you're thinking. Jean-Claude Van Damme? Art house cinema? Huh? If you've heard of this movie, you know what I'm talking about, but for those that haven't, Jean Claude essentially plays himself in a movie about his own life. You still following me?

I figured it was only going to be in Lexington for a week, and this would probably be my own chance to see on the big screen. As such it went straight to the top of my must-see list this week.

I was psyched too that I was forced to venture into Lexington for the first time, especially to make a trip to a Main Street cinema instead of another boring multiplex. I chose Monday evening because I didn't give a damn about any of the tv shows on that night. I would have preferred daylight, for the reason that I always hate driving in the dark, especially when I'm sightseeing, but evening was my only choice.

The route on Google Maps seemed a cinch. I left the farmstead with a little under a hour to spare, thinking it would be plenty of time.

Of course it wasn't. I got off at the wrong Lexington exit and didn't discover the mistake until I was about a mile down the road. Figuring I had a good enough grasp of Lexington geography, and having memorized the main thoroughfare names, as well as the address of the theater, I kept heading in the same direction. At the first main street, I pulled over at a gas station.

Inside there were three men chatting. I asked one of them where I could find the movie theater. He gave me precise directions, then said, in a deadpan, "That'll be twenty bucks, please."

Well it sounded like a deadpan. With my clogged right ear, I've lost much of the ability to discern nuance in people's voices. Knowing it was a joke, I shot him a "you're the man" hand gesture and smile, then turned and left.

As I turned the key of my ignition, he came out of the little building. Seeing me, he said, almost gruffly, "Hey, where's my money?"

Cripes, I'm getting out of here. A few minutes later I was in what obviously had to be the center of town. I could tell this because Lexington turns out to be one of those chichi little burgs like the ones in the Hamptons. Lots of nice little shops all lit up for the holiday.

But not a damn place to park, and I was running out of time. I circled back around the shops and found a municipal lot, all of them with parking meters. I found one of the few remaining meters spaces in the lot and parked in it.

I'd forgotten about that little bit of New England wisdom---there are parking meters everywhere. Always always always always bring plenty of quarters, since most meters don't take any kind of change but that.

I had foolishly forgotten to bring my stash of change. But surely after dark no one would be checking the meters? I made a quick survey of the cars around me. Every single one of them had time left on the meter. None were expired. A bad sign, since these were probably locals who knew the score. Fortunately I dug up one quarter off the floor of my car and put it in. The meter went up to a hour. That would have to do.

The little Flick theater was on the other side of the street, its quaint old-fashioned marquee squeezed between several shops. After weaving through traffic to cross, I pulled open the glass door and found a young women at the spartan counter. Out of breath, I pulled out my debit card, since I was out of cash.

"Ooooh, I'm sorry. We only take cash." Fantastic.

"Any ATMs around here?"

"There's one across the street---Bank of America."

Dodging traffic again, I was standing in front of the bank, swiped my card and was inside. It really steamed me to be doing this, since for the very first time on my trip, I was using a non-free ATM. Up until this point I had very methodically taken out cash only at free ATMs, using the Allpoint network website. Now my streak was broken. But I had only myself to blame.

I went across traffic once again, this time using the zebra crosswalk with the big sign saying that state law mandates that cars must stop for pedestrians. As I did so, a car approaching the crosswalk, with plenty of time to stop, leaned on its horn. Fucking Massachusetts drivers will honk for anything that makes them even consider tapping on the brakes. Without breaking stride or turning, I flashed the driver the universal one-finger salute of appreciation.

Finally I got my ticket. It was one of those generic kinds, emerging with a mechanical thunk from the little metallic flap on the counter.

Of course I wanted to linger in the lobby and appreciate the aura of such an old theater, but it was already past showtime. I sprinted up the stairs to theater number two.

As everyone knows, features never start at the published showtime. There are always ads and trailers. Well, not at the Lexington Flick. They were very prompt, and to my extreme displeasure, I found I had missed the opening seconds of the opening credits. Above all else, I just detest not seeing every frame of the movie.

But at least I'm finally here. It's a tiny little box of theater with a low ceiling, wider than deep, and a strange configuration of the screen with a black ramp in front of the seats. Two other audience members besides me. The old seats were too loose. I moved twice to find a comfortable one. At last, it's you and me, Jean-Claude!

The movie is definitely in the genre of postmodern-breakdown movies that blur the line between "movie reality" and "reality reality." The ability to do this, and to comment meaningfully on the difference between the two, is one of the strengths of postmodern cinema as a whole, and movies like this automatically start out with a "plus one" in my book and go up from there, unless they are overly clever.

At the beginning, over the opening credits, we see a sepia tone Jean-Claude kicking and punching his way through scores of opponents, most of them armed, until finally---the fourth wall (within the movie) is broken and we see that, not surprisingly, we are on a movie set. The director, a disinterested young punk type who speaks in Mandarin through an interpreter, is haranguing Jean-Claude about his performance, overriding the veteran actor's advice. Jean-Claude complains he is too old for this type of scene.

"It's the purity of the character," the punk director says. "Purity," Jean-Claude mutters to himself obediently and earnestly. Like all good movies, this one is going to put its protagonist through some sort of obstacle-course hell.

In short order, Jean-Claude is in a court room in the United States, in a custody battle for his daughter. If you're a Jean-Claude hater, your case will made against him here. His wife's attorney proceeds to tear him apart, proclaiming him to be a hack actor and a bad parental influence through his choice of roles. He recites a litany of the methods of death in the actor's filmography: "Death by strangulation, death by neck-breaking, death by gunshot..." The list is so long we never hear the end of it, and it is too painful for the actor himself to listen to.

Then he's back in Belgium, in his hometown. At a small grocery, several fans recognize him and demand a photo, for which he complies. He states he has to run across the street to the bank. He'll be back in five minutes, he says, for autographs.

What proceeds after that is a cascading mystery plot involving a bank robbery gone wrong. The Sidney Lumet style of the story is buttressed by the uncanny resemblance of one of the heavies to John Cazale in Dog Day Afternoon (1975).

The mystery part of the plot involves initially around the question: is the robbery real? Is Jean-Claude Van Damme actually robbing a bank in his hometown? Police and swat teams arrive. Cheering crowds gather on the streets to support him.

Will Jean-Claude triumph? Will he restore his honor? Will he kick some ass? Will he be a hero in real life as in the movies? Will he get to see his daughter again? The story is propelled by the tension of these questions, and if you're aren't repulsed by the idea of seeing, well, a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie, you might actually enjoy it, as I certainly did.

For such a postmodern film, the story had a beautifully classical ending regarding honor and justice. At first what seems like injustice turns out to be, on further reflection, exactly how the movie needed to end.

At least that's what I concluded as I walked out the auditorium. Since I'd stayed to the end of the credits, as always, and was the last one in the theater, it was shuttered and dark, and the teenage employee had to unlock the front door for me. When I got back to my car, I found the entire municipal lot deserted, and my car standing alone at its meter. Time was expired, of course, but there was no ticket. Paying for the movie with cash had left me with two extra quarters in my pocket. I dropped one in the meter and twisted the knob, sending the arrow up to an hour, then immediately got in my car and headed home.