Between 1989 and 1991, Jean-Claude Van Damme had the simplest recipe in action cinema: grunts, splits, and kicks. Sprinkle in some sentimentality and a nondescript villain, and you had yourself a hit. Double Impact was the moment Columbia Pictures decided to find out if the Muscles from Brussels could open a real studio picture, planting it in a late-summer release slot and giving Van Damme not one role but two. Made for $15 million, the gamble paid off well enough when the film made twice that amount at the box office. Now, 88 Films’ new Blu-ray gives this cheerfully excessive actioner the physical media treatment it’s been missing.

The setup is pure early-nineties pulp. In 1966 Hong Kong, business partners Paul Wagner and Nigel Griffith (Alan Scarfe) celebrate the opening of the Victoria Harbour Tunnel. That night, a Triad hit squad murders Paul and his wife, orphaning their infant twin sons. Bodyguard Frank Avery (Geoffrey Lewis ) escapes with one baby, Chad, and raises him in Los Angeles, where the kid grows up running a karate dojo and dressing like a DayGlo-drenched California surfer. The other twin, Alex, grows up on the streets of Hong Kong, heavily moussed, cigar-chomping, and permanently suspicious of everyone. When Frank finally reunites the brothers twenty-five years later, they reluctantly join forces to reclaim their father’s stolen fortune and take down Griffith’s criminal empire.

Van Damme (Minions: The Rise of Gru) takes co-producing, co-story, co-writing, choreography, and starring credits here, and the film is fiercely determined to showcase every one of his assets. There’s a moment where Chad demonstrates his gymnastic flexibility for a crowd of thrilled gym patrons that the camera captures in lurid detail, possibly confusing the target demographic. It’s ridiculous and undeniably impressive.

Co-writer/director Sheldon Lettich, who would go on to work with Van Damme repeatedly in what might generously be called a Scorsese-De Niro dynamic for the bottom-shelf generation, runs a relatively tight ship. The action choreography is heated and well-staged, the Hong Kong locations are sweltering and atmospheric, and the twin gimmick provides more entertainment than it has any right to, largely because Van Damme commits fully to making Chad and Alex distinct personalities.

Geoffrey Lewis is dependably rubbery in the straight-man role, refereeing the brothers’ bickering with weary professionalism. Six-time Ms. Olympia Cory Everson makes an intimidating impression as the henchwoman of the main villain.  Only Alonna Shaw seems a bit out of sorts, trying to make more of her role than was required.

88 Films’ Blu-ray presents the film in 1080p at its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio with DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. The extras package is surprisingly robust: a commentary from critics Kim Newman and Sean Hogan, new interviews with stunt coordinator Vic Armstrong and director Lettich, a two-part making-of documentary, deleted and extended scenes, behind-the-scenes footage, cast and crew interviews, and the original trailer. For a Van Damme picture from 1991, that’s a remarkably comprehensive set.

It’s not high art, and it never pretends to be. But Double Impact is practically The Godfather: Part II by Van Damme standards, and this Blu-ray gives it the kind of attention that makes physical media collecting worthwhile even at the guilty-pleasure end of the shelf.