Jean-Claude Van Damme has signed up to play the lead role in a new Canadian Independent film directed by Ernie Barbarash.
According to the Hollywood Reporter , the movie, called “Pound of Flesh” , will be shot on location in China. Barbarash is not new to action movies, having achieved success with 6 Bullets and Assassination Games , amongst others. His crew includes veteran fight choreographer John Salvitti.
Shooting is scheduled to start in March 2014. Van Damme’s character portrays a man who rescues a woman in distress one night, only to wake up the next morning in a blood-soaked hotel bathtub without a kidney.
Pound of Flesh is a co-production from Ace Studio and Odyssey Media with a script written by Joshua James who wrote the story for the video Alien Uprising, released in 2008.
Jean-Claude Van Damme issued a statement saying:
“I’m looking forward to sinking my teeth into Pound of Flesh because it’s exactly the kind of character-driven action thriller I and my fans love best — a movie that delivers nonstop hardcore action that’s fueled by a really surprising story and real people you care about from the moment you meet them on screen.”
Without putting too fine a point upon it, those words sound like something only a PR company could dream up. “sinking my teeth into Pound of Flesh” – Really!
Unfortunately, since Shakespeare referred to a “Pound of Flesh” in his play, “The Merchant of Venice” the term has come to have very negative connotations in relation to Jews.
While the producers of this movie might have thought this to be a clever use of words of a universally recognized phrase, and a good marketing ploy, there may well be a negative backlash.
J ean-Claude Van Damme must be prepared to deal with the possible fallout.
