![]() ![]() But, as they tend to say in time-travel films, that sort of thing just ends in trouble. Now I find myself in the strangely poignant position of being able to read that letter 10 years further down the line, in 2014.Īnd, yeah, I'd really like to knock some sense into that kid in 1994. After I saw the film in 1994, I wrote an open letter, published in another newspaper, to the 2004 version of Max Walker. Time travel films are poignant because they fulfil that ultimate fantasy: to go back and do things differently second time around. Why the scene in which he beats off a couple of taser-wielding baddies in his underpants hasn't gone down in cinema history is beyond me.īut Timecop has another special resonance for me. He makes a pretty good fist of playing two versions of himself 10 years apart, delivering a performance that is rather charming. I really love Van Damme here, and I especially love the way nobody tries to explain why a burnt-out cop has a Belgian accent and some seriously crazy, kick-ass martial arts moves. The senator decides to go back in time to kill Walker before Walker can go back in time to stop the senator changing history (and possibly, as a bonus, save his wife). A corrupt senator, played by the late, great Ron Silver - in a scenery-chewing turn that is by far the best thing about the film - is trying to become the next president by changing history. 'The Legend Van Dam between the past and the present' is a retrospective look at the incredible career of one of the greatest action stars of all time, Jean. But you can go back … it's like throwing a stone in a lake and there are ripples, except they are ripples in time." (You sense the makers are rather pleased with the sophistication of what they're serving up.)Īnyway, we dwell in 1994 long enough to see see Walker's wife murdered before jumping forward to 2004 to find him a grizzled, morose time cop still obsessing over old videos of his late wife (at this point, incidentally, we have voice-controlled driverless cars - nice prediction, guys). As one wonk explains at the beginning: "You can't go into the future because it hasn't happened yet. Max Walker (everyone should have their name appropriated for a Hollywood blockbuster hero), is drafted into a top-secret US government agency with the job of going back in time to catch baddies who are trying to change history to their own advantage. We open in 1994 (the year of the film's release). I think there's something oddly poignant about his performance, especially when we know where his career went afterwards. Richardson also served as executive producer. Everybody involved, from the director down, is clearly phoning it in. Timecop is a 1994 American science fiction action film directed by Peter Hyams and co-written by Mike Richardson and Mark Verheiden. The time machine is basically a rocket-powered Go-kart. There's also a rather sad, lowish-budget feel about the whole thing. Pumped-up European star with funny accent who can't really act? Check time travel? Yup? Lots and lots of gratuitous violence? You got it. Which he does, a lot.) And, yes, this was clearly focus-grouped from the start by people looking for the next Schwarzenegger. ("Van Damme is compelling only when he takes his clothes off," was another's verdict. When all's said and done Timecop is basically "a low-rent Terminator", as one critic put it. At the same time, Walker hopes to rescue his wife, and he learns that the attack on his home was ordered by McComb to stop Walker from foiling his plans.Our hero in Timecop is poor old Jean-Claude van Damme at the high-water mark of his career, when some studio execs thought he might be going somewhere. ![]() ![]() Walker travels back in time to stop McComb from murdering his former partner. The film was followed by a short-lived television series in 1997, and a sequel, Timecop 2: The Berlin Decision, in 2003. Walker learns that the corrupt Senator McComb (Ron Silver), who helped establish the agency, is exploiting it for personal gain, trying to establish a monopoly on time travel so that he can enrich himself in the stock market. Having earned 101.6 million during its theatrical run, Timecop is Van Damme’s second highest-grossing film worldwide, after 2012’s The Expendables 2. The commission's role is to prevent time travel to protect U.S. government learned that time travel technology is feasible. Ten years later, Walker remains an employee of the Time Enforcement Commission, a federal agency which was set up in 1994 after the U.S. Walker is shot and beaten and lies helplessly on his lawn while he sees their home and his wife blown up by the killers. In 1994, Walker's wife Melissa (Mia Sara) is about to tell him that she is expecting their first child when they are attacked by a group of criminals. Based on a comic book story, this futuristic film follows the time-travel exploits of policeman Max Walker (Claude Van Damme). ![]()
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