The Expendables

To say “The Expendables” was one of the worst films I have ever seen would be doing all those other bad films a serious disservice. At least those movies tried to give you something interesting while missing on some front along the way. Maybe they dedicated far too much time in character development on a character you could care less about or maybe they gave you too much action and no character development at all. There were those movies that gave you no story line or decent kind of plot at all and had you scratching your head as to what the hell was going on but the acting was pretty good or the cinematography was amazing. There was pretty much always something you could hang your hat on in those bad films that could almost justify the price of admission, almost. With “The Expendables”, there is no hook of any kind and no justifying the cost of the ticket.

If this movie came out when Arnold was fighting aliens with faces that looked like crabs and Bruce was fighting foreign thieves in Nakatomi and Mel and Danny were still the most entertaining form of ebony and ivory on the big screen then MAYBE this movie wouldn’t have been so bad. Sadly that isn’t the case. This movie is instead populated by action movie stars, wrestling stars, and MMA stars well past their prime (the budget on makeup alone must have been enormous). Sloppily directed by the heavy handed and ridiculously predictable Sylvester Stallone, this movie does everything it can to insult your intelligence and if you’ve seen his “John Rambo” opus then you’ve seen this movie already. This time though, instead of bringing along a bunch of no names like he did in “John Rambo” he decided to bring along every out of work action star from fifteen years ago hoping to get that dollar out of your pocket. I mean how could you NOT want to see that scene with Arnold, Bruce, and Stallone finally in the same room at the same time?

The dialogue was a joke and the plot is just utterly ridiculous but you didn’t buy your ticket for Shakespeare. You brought that ticket to see things blow up and old white men fight and flirt with women at least half their age and in that case you wouldn’t be disappointed at all. The explosions are many and grow in intensity as the movie goes on. The fights are numerous and border on the ludicrous and the three women in this movie I doubt will ever be using this film to pad their resume. The editing, much like the story is all over the place and apparently Sly has fallen in love with CG blood. He used it in “John” but he’s taken it to the next level by supposedly using guns so powerful that they can blow heads clean off bodies and cut bodies completely in half.

The story (and I use that word VERY lightly) follows a merry band of high paid mercenaries that get hired by the CIA (yawn) to assassinate a ruthless Latin American dictator that’s backed by a rogue ex CIA agent (yawn). There are the subplots of domestic abuse, substance abuse, and guilt for past deeds that took place in some jungle while bathed in blood. In the hands of real actors this may have been believable but for guys who only know how to squint and pump iron it all comes across as fake. The score by Brian Tyler was completely over the top like everything else in this movie. I usually really like his scores but this one, not so much. The music tried to add emotion where the actors failed too and went bombastic during the action sequences in the attempt to get that adrenaline rushing.

If you like and missed seeing Sly, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Randy Couture, Terry Crews, Eric Roberts, and Jason Statham and you don’t mind the unabashedly simplistic plot then you just may enjoy this movie. A movie that should have been released at least fifteen maybe twenty years ago.