Running from October 18 through October 26th, The Toronto After Dark Film Festival provides genre fans with the best horror, science fiction and cult films that the world has to offer all thrown into one fantastic week at the restored Bloor Cinema in the heart of the city.

With 20 films and 29 shorts being showcased at the event – and for many, it’s their World or Canadian premiere – we are going to spotlight a film each day giving you a glimpse into some of the action, the macabre and the bloodletting that will soak our screens until the closing night gala.

Today’s spotlight: Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning
Thanks to The Expendables franchise, both Dolph Lundgren and Jean Claude Van Damme have experienced a bit of late career resurgence. Not that either one of the two 90’s action stars ever went away. But it has been a while since either of the two actors contributed to a film that got a wide theatrical release in North America. That might change later this year when the two team up in Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning.

Lundgren and Van Damme starred in the original Universal Soldier back in 1992 and appeared together again in 2009’s Universal Soldier: Regeneration. John Hyams (Universal Solider: Regeneration) is back behind the camera directing a script he co-wrote with Doug Magnuson about a man (Scott Adkins) who awakens from a coma to learn that his wife and daughter were slaughtered in a home invasion by Luc Deveraux (Van Damme). As he attempts to avenge his family’s fate he learns of a genetically enhanced group of warriors that are lead by Andrew Scott (Lundgren) and he begins to learn more about himself which calls into question everything he believed to be true.

Director John Hyams describes the film as, “a mystery, action, physiological, thriller...an amnesia story. The film is based on the mythology of the Universal universe of all the Universal Soldier films and takes on a new approach by telling the story from the perspective of the Unisols. Universal Soldier: Regeneration ends Luc Deveraux’s disappearance and establishes the idea that Unisol technology has moved past reanimating dead soldiers to the use of cloning and genetic reengineering. With only those elements carrying over Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is self-contained and set in a Unisol world that is clearly in an advanced state.”

Jean Claude Van Damme in particular is riding a wave of public support. His self depreciating role in JCVD and his villainous turn in The Expendables 2 has him back on the minds of anyone over 30 years of age that remember when he was churning out great action fare such as Sudden Impact, Hard Target and his debut in Bloodsport. And his role in Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning should only further his rebuilt mythos.

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is playing at the Bloor Cinema as part of the Toronto After Dark Film Festival on Sunday, October 21st at 6:45PM. Tickets are still available through the TADFF Box Office found here http://torontoafterdark.com/2012/buy-tickets/