I thought "The Quest" was the worst martial arts film of all time. When someone offered to give me the tape for free, I turned it down! Somehow someone still snuck it into my possession, so I unfortunately own a copy of it. I keep it just because the guy who did Capoeira in the film looked awesome, and I don't even like that art!
For the record, one of the reasons I dislike the film has to do with the producers/director deciding which martial artist would do which art and represent which country. As if mixing real styles with phony ones weren't bad enough, they had to embrace the most stigmatic stereotypes of each culture. Of course, if he's Spanish, his style must certainly resemble a Spanish dancer/bullfighter. Of course the German guy looks like the ultimate "new breed" Nazi warrior, blond hair and blue eyes and Nazi soldiers accompanying him. Of course Japan sends a player of Sumo--a sport rather than a martial art--instead of someone who does Judo, Aikido, or any of numerous other systems. And of course the Sumo player is ALWAYS pitted against the smallest Chinese kung-fu artist!
But what is really irritating about the film is like I began to say, they had artists of one style portray artists of different styles. The "Spanish guy" looked Spanish, so they had him play a Spanish fighter; in reality, the guy was French and was an expert at French Savate. The Kung-fu guy was really Korean, not Chinese, and practiced Tae Kwon Do rather than any Wushu in real life. The French guy was really a boxer! I believe the big bad guy in the end really had no training whatsoever!
Perhaps the one thing that put me over the edge on this film is the fact that Van Damme won. Come on! The final battle fell into being a simple slugfest, with terrible form using wide swings and trying to outmuscle each other. No martial arts at all. We're supposed to believe that an untrained street kid (wasn't he like thirty years too old to play a homeless teenager?) managed to win a worldwide contest against people who trained diligently in their respective styles all their lives? What kind of message does that send to people who want to take up martial arts?
Off the soap box. Sorry.