Desert Heat

Directed by Danny Mulroon, Desert Heat follows Jean-Claude Van Damme’s Eddie Lomax as he arrives in a small town after being left for dead by a trio of obnoxious thugs – with the far-from-fresh narrative detailing Eddie’s efforts at both getting revenge and ridding said town of its criminal element. It’s exceedingly familiar territory that’s employed to sporadically entertaining yet predominantly tedious effect by Mulroon, as the filmmaker, working from Tom O’Rourke’s screenplay, delivers a meandering, erratically-paced misfire that doesn’t contain a whole lot worth embracing or getting excited about – with the mostly arms-length atmosphere perpetuated by a narrative that seems to lurch from one interlude to the next (ie there’s exceedingly little in the way of forward momentum here). And although Mulroon has peppered the proceedings with a small handful of effective moments, especially Eddie’s quick and violent encounter with two villains shortly after arriving in town, Desert Heat builds towards an action-packed but palpably interminable climax that ensures it concludes on as underwhelming and tiresome a note as one could envision – with the end result a fairly disappointing trainwreck that squanders a predictably agreeable Van Damme performance.

*1/2 out of ****

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