Here is the wonderful thing about this movie. I have watched it twice, and I still don't know the main characters names or really what the movie was about.
The Expendables is exactly what you think it is, its a movie with a bunch of action movie stars thrown into a mixing pot of testosterone and gunplay. And the result... well.
The Expendables follows the story (pulling most of this from Wikipedia) of Barney Ross (played by Silvester Stallone and his band of mercenaries called the Expendables. This band includes names like Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolf Lundgren, Terry Crews, and Mickey Rourke. Together they pack a giant punch, taking down anything that comes in their way for the highest bidder.
Even as far as stereotypes go, the kinds you see in video games, the different members don't really have that much distinction to them. Jason Statham's character throws knives, Jet Li is a little bit better at martial arts. There's not much that really makes each character distinct. You could take any of these characters and switch them out and they'd pretty much be the same character.
And then when the movie tries to make these characters distinct from the other ones, the movie slows down... a lot!
But I'll get to that in a second.
Basically, they go in to recon the area, they get in a fight. Dolf Lundgren gets corrupted, they fight. They go back to Mexico, they fight some more, the bad guys get killed. Its really really a simple movie. Its basically a video game. It could have been really really simple to make just a mindless action movie. But no, they had to get bogged down with that pesky thing called a story.
To be fair, when the movie has an action scene, those action scenes are on point. They're brilliantly shot, they're exciting and just a fun time. These are the moments that, while these characters aren't really that distinct from each other throughout, they do shine forward and give some funny lines while they're shooting faceless bad guys.
Furthermore, it does seem like the movie tries to fast lane you to the action scenes, I don't think the movie was trying to be a really thought provoking movie.
However...
Frankly, I don't care if Randy Couture was made fun of because of his cauliflower ears. I don't care if Charisma Carpenter doesn't know what Jason Statham does for a living and cheats on him but he gets back together with her. I don't care if Jet Li is having struggles because he's small. When the movie tries to be more than it is, it slows down a lot and it just gets down right boring.
As far as individual performances go... I don't know, its the Expendables what do you expect?
Sylvester Stallone mumbles everything, Jason Statham has the same monotone not give a fuck british voice he always has, Jet Li is... well Jet Li and the others are just kind of vanilla and there. Bruce Willis was kind of fun but he was gone very quickly. Mickey Rourke... was just awful.
No doubt the best part of the film was Terry Crews with a shotgun.
And it really just puts the icing on the cake of what this movie is really about. Getting a bunch of action movie stars together, give them some guns and have them just go nuts. As long as that pesky story doesn't get in the way, the movie is actually kind of a fun ride. Is it good? Oh fuck no!
As long as you go into it with the expectation that the story is going to be shit, the action is going to be incredible and Sylvester Stallone is just going to mumble the entire time, you'll have a fun time with this movie. Who needs drama when you can just watch Terry Crews with a shotgun?
But those are my thoughts on The Expendables, what did you think? Is mindless action your thing or is it really not that great after all? Comment and discuss below in the comments.
I'll leave you with this. How else could I end a review like this if there was an Honest Trailer for it? Enjoy!
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