A simplistic but effective early film from Van Damme, his fourth starring role after BLOODSPORT, CYBORG, and KICKBOXER. While some of the scenes and music appear to have been ripped off from ROCKY, this is still engaging viewing, with interesting acting and some great fight scenes to break up the rather soppy melodrama of the plot.

Van Damme is definitely in his prime in this film, and it shows as he kicks, punches and elbows his way through a series of increasingly sadistic baddies in the ring. While his accent may be thick and his words not always in the right order, Van Damme still manages to inject some charm and charisma in the scenes he shares with his brother's family. Harrison Page is also surprisingly effective in a role as a down at heel, crippled fight veteran, and the viewer really warms to him by the end of the film. The female villain is nicely villainous, while Brian Thompson puts in another loathsome performance and gets a well-deserved kick to the face at the end of the film.

The fights themselves are fun and outlandish, with plenty of martial arts moves and agile stunts. Beginning underneath a bridge, they move to a car park, a deserted warehouse, a squash court, and even a half-filled swimming pool. The enemies themselves are hilarious parodies, including an animalistic Scotsman who jabs his finger into Van Damme's eyes.

However it's the final fight which really delivers the groceries, as it were. Van Damme, who has a broken rib, is forced to take on Attila, a maniac who feels no pain and toys with his opponents before breaking them in half. He's also virtually indestructible. We witness Van Damme being beaten to a pulp (Page tells him "he's gonna kill your ass, man, he's gonna kill your ass!") over and over again, until the audience begin to clap, the music builds and he literally kicks the living daylights out of Attila at the end, as everyone cheers and claps. This final bit is really great and worth waiting for, just like the final fight in KICKBOXER. Thus A.W.O.L. is something of a crowd-pleaser. I'm not ashamed to say that it's the only Van Damme that makes me cry, right at the end, and I'm no sentimentalist; something about Page's character in particular is completely moving.

The movie begins with a drug deal going bad...and the dealer knows that the buyer is a cop. So, he douses him with gas and lights him ablaze. The burned man has a brother, Lyon (Jean Claude Van Damme) who is in the Foreign Legion. He wants to go on leave to see his brother in the hospital...the commander is a jerk and refuses. Soon Lyon goes AWOL and is out to investigate what happened to his poor brother. What follows is a whole lotta punching, kicking and pain as Lyon engages in underground fights in order to earn enough to get to Los Angeles...and when he arrives, his sister-in-law's reaction is bizarre to say the least. I was kind of hoping that Lyon would then beat her up as well...or at least the writers for making her character so dopey. What's next? See the film.

"Lionheart" was a huge hit here in the States...earning more than eight times its cost! I think that the quality of Van Damme's martial arts skills accounts for most of this....his fights are impressive to watch. However, one fight with a gang was pretty silly. Several of them had guns...but never used them...choosing instead to use their fists against this fighting fool!! This is actually a weakness in many martial arts movies, as I don't care if you're Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan or Steven Seagal...you won't win a battle against a gun!

So, I liked the quality of the fights--excellent though I could done with less slo-mo and repetitive scenes (they often would show the SAME punch or kick 3-4 times in a row). As for the rest of the film, it's a mixed bag. As usual with a film like this, the leading man's emotional range is pretty slim and a few of the other characters made little sense. You don't watch a movie like this because it makes a lot of sense or has Oscar-caliber acting!! Plus, while the movie was just okay, if you ever wanted to see Van Damme naked, he is naked in this one...and had an incredible body. I'm very straight...but was still very impressed.

Foreign Legionnaire Lyon Gaultier (Jean-Claude Van Damme) in Djibouti receives news of his dying brother. His heartless commander punishes him and he battles his way out of the base. He's a deserter hunted by the French government. He's a stowaway on a ship to America. He is surprised to find himself in NY. Joshua introduces him to underground fighting to pay for the trip to his brother's family in LA. By the time he reaches LA, his brother is already dead. His sister-in-law and her daughter are left with large medical bills. Cynthia runs the fights and he returns to the fights.

The story is pretty clunky. The writing is at a high school level. The dialog is pretty bad. The acting is pretty bad, too. Van Damme may actually be one of the better actors in this thing. Ashley Johnson gets her debut movie role and she's probably the best actor in the whole movie. This needs to kill it in the fights but they don't stand out. There is a fun one with a Scot in a kilt but it's not really enough. The fights are mostly edited poorly and lacks excitement or fun. The final fight could be good but it's put together weakly.