The Curator of Schlock #274 by Jeff Shuster

Second in Command

Bullet hell. 

We’re on week four of Jean-Claude Van Damme Month, a time when I usually start to question the month’s theme, wondering if I can take another made-for-DVD movie with an aging action star. The Plague of the Zombiesis out on Blu-ray. That has nothing to do with Jean-Claude Van Damme. I just like Hammer Horror movies. They’re pretty neat.

Yup.

Pretty neat.

I guess I should get on to the review.

Tonight’s movie is 2006’s Second in Command from director Simon Fellows. It’s…umm…it’s there.

Oh, man.

This is going to be painful.

We’ll get through this.

Jean-Claude Van Damme plays Colonel Sam Keenan, a Navy Seal who’s sent to the American Embassy in Moldova. I had to look this up, but Moldova actually exists. Who knew? I like their flag. Blue, yellow, and red. Just like Superman, but remember, Moldovans, Superman is an American. I don’t want to her any of this “citizen of the world” garbage.  He’ll save your citizens if there’s an earthquake, but only if he has time.

But Moldova doesn’t need Superman when you’ve got Colonel Keenan to save the day. What is Colonel Keenan saving the Moldovans from? From themselves, of course. Seems there’s a civil war going on in Moldova. Basically, the communists don’t like democracy and want to go back to communism. This means President Yuri Amerev (Serban Celea) has to die. There’s a riot outside the Presidential palace, one of Amerev’s guards shoots one of the protestors, and all hell breaks loose.

Truth is I’m having a hard time remembering the details of this movie even though I watched it a couple of hours ago. First thing that comes back memory is that every building in this movie is a dull beige color. It’s like a sea of beige. I can’t imagine every building in the country looks like this.  I guess it’s better than the buildings being painted red. That might induce angry feelings in the populace, feelings that might cause them to riot against their newly elected president.

I’m not sure how many bullets get fired in this movie, but it must be close to two million. Guns are going off every five minutes in this movie. Sometimes insurgents get shot and sometimes members of the United States embassy get shot. All this carnage is to protect the Moldovan president. The Moldovan president says he would turn himself over to the communists if he thought it would stop the violence, but he knows it won’t.

I’ve got nothing.

Van Damme kills a bunch of the bad guys, has a one-on-one match with the main evil communist general and kills him. I think the United States Marine Corps shows up and stops the rest of the insurgents. Van Damme has a reporter girlfriend and she manages to shoot a couple of the insurgents.

You have to be careful when looking for the free movies on Prime Streaming.

Not everything is as creative as Universal Soldier.

One more Van Damme movie to go.

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Jeffrey Shuster (episode 47, episode 102, episode 124, episode 131, and episode 284) is an MFA graduate from the University of Central Florida.