The Expendables (2010)

Director: Sylvester Stallone

Writer: Sylvester Stallone

Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Stratham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Terry Crews, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin

IMDB Page

I was excited about this one. It looked awesome on every level. Lots of action, and tons of famous action stars. I was never a huge fan of Stallone, but Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger  were supposed to be in it, right? I was expecting pure awesome out of this movie, but instead I got.....

Gross

The Expendables, the action movie that was supposed to be a throw back to the action movie glory days of the 1980's. It failed to deliver. Miserably. On almost every front. The film follows a team of over the top badass mercenaries that do mercenary stuff. You know, shoot some stuff, work out, beat up folks on a basketball court, and play darts. That is pretty much how deep how deep the story goes. There's something about a moral change of heart and righting wrongs in there too.

But mostly this

So, on to the characters. Stallone and Jason Stratham are the two lead characters in the film. They head up a group of mercenaries known as the "Expendables". Other cast members include Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Terry Crews, and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. All of the acting is incredibly hollow, and a lot of lines just don't sound right. Its hard to understand the motivations of some characters, and others are incredibly simple. Jet Li is the best actor in this film. Not because he out acted the others, its because he only spoke about 3 words in the entire film. There is a hot chick in here somewhere, but then you realize halfway through the movie she kind of looks like a frog and stops being hot. And rumor has it that Jean Claude Van Damme turned down a role in this film, simply because he didn't like the script.

Litmus test: When this man says "no" to your screenplay, consider a re-write

 It seems like a lot of the characters were written in simply to add names to the credits, to trick people into seeing this piece of trash. You know how Willis and Schwarzenegger were supposed to be major stars in this movie?  They appear in one 90 second scene. Willis says "fuck" a couple of times and Schwarzenegger doesn't do much other than chomp on a cigar and smirk awkwardly. That's it. The biggest ripoff in film history. Hey, who's the asshole who wrote this script anyways? 

Oh, right

Everything about the Expendables is way too over the top. I'm a huge fan of action films, and this was just too much for me. Michael Bay could have made a tuned down version of The Expendables. The action is so over the top its almost plain silly. The effects don't help out much either, most of them look like they were taken straight out of a last generation video game. There are some pretty impressive explosions, but that is far from enough to save this movie. 

I don't know of any extras on the DVD, because I refuse to spend another cent on this film. I imagine they are as pointless and stupid as the rest of the movie. And maybe some more of a 65 year old Stallone deciding to take his shirt off. 

Bottom Line: 2/10: One point is because I didn't fall asleep in the theater, the other is because I had enough points on my Regal Cinemas card for a free popcorn.