Old school violence no CGI, No pretencions for Oscars & Awards, just good old fashioned action !

Rating: 8/10 (31 August 2010)

So I finally got there in the end. Ever since last year when I first heard about this movie my blood's been pumping and the sheer mention of the words "expendables", "Stallone", "Jet Li" or "Couture" have sent a shiver down my spine and got the Goosebumps raised.
It was hard to keep a level head and not be excited for a 30 year old man who grew up on old school action movies like Rambo, Die Hard, Predator, Universal Soldier and more recently Crank & Transporter. All these movies have a common theme and ingredient. Non stop action centred around a hero or hero(s), women unable to defend themselves and a pretty flimsy plot. Usually the main character has little emotional background or epic dialogue sequences. But what these movies do deliver is pure unadulterated action in bucket loads. Ingredients of Guns, violence, blood, profanity and a little sprinkle of sex usually only provided by a screaming half dressed lady ! it's what I grew up on and that is all I expected & wanted from The Expendables. In a day and age when action movies have become about deeply enriching plots and complex characters like The Bourne series (which I love), Matrix Trilogy, Inception or even The Dark Knight we can all see the way the genre is going. So I think Stallone has gathered the best he can with the tools he has. Mickey Rourke supplies the wise old man role and has a small hand full of scenes, Jason Staham, Stallone & Jet Lie probably share the most screen time together (more so Statham & Stallone) and this makes sense as its Stallone's movie and Statham & Li are the biggest names in the movie that are current action stars with actual big roles. Both have integral roles, Statham is like Stallone's right hand man and conscious. Jet Li is the comedy relief unfortunately his height and Chinese background is the butt of most the jokes. Randy Couture has little to do but does it well as does Terry Crews. Steve Austin & Eric Roberts were born to play villains and again deliver the big baddie in bucket loads. The two female characters in the movie (Statham's girl & Stallone's love interest) have one task to do, look pretty and helpless and they both do that perfectly with a bit of cleavage thrown in for good measure. One of the biggest surprises has to be the 53 year old Dolph Lungren who plays one of the expendables who goes AWOL, Gunnar. To be honest one of the big major gripes with this movie is the incomprehensible dialogue delivered by most the actors. You have actors like Jet Li & Dolph Lungren given quite a bit of dialogue when English was never their first language and then you have other brutes who just grunt and groan their lines including Stallone, Rourke & Steve Austin. By now I'm sure most of you know the plot. Bunch of mercenaries are hired to liberate a South American country from its evil dictator who in turn is actually controlled by a more evil American villain (Eric Roberts). Initially the leader of the mercenaries, Barney Ross aka Sly Stallone does a little recon of the country and he is entranced by a rather good looking local woman probably half his age ! anyway Statham & Sly just escape the island before their recon is finished and decide against taking the suicidal job of liberating this country. That is until Sly has a little chat with an EX-Expendable (another 80's star) Mickey Rourke. Who convinces him you should never leave a women in distress. So after returning to the island with his full expendables crew to rescue the girl and save a nation. We are led from one boy hood playground dream debate to another. UFC Vs wrestling who would win? well Couture Vs Stone Cold Steve Austin puts an end to that. There are funny comedic moments like when Austin has Stallone held prisoner and is questioning him "Who sent You?" Stallone replies "Your hairdresser" no doubt to tease the fact Austin has no hair, oh Stallone we can clearly see you were in charge of the dialogue ! Of course we all know what happens at the end, Stallone & his gang obviously save the island and the damsel in distress. As for the much talked about and much hyped scene between Stallone & Willis with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger well I'll save that to say its well worth the ticket price alone and is cinema gold. Many reviews have said about the whole movie the storyline is weak, the acting terrible, character development poor and the dialogue just plain stupid. An action movie should never be about the dialogue or character development. You don't go into an ice cream parlour and judge it by the Hot Chocolate they serve so why judge an Action movie against the criteria you would judge an Intricate Thriller. The Expendables isn't pretending to be The godfather or Seven Samurai or even Gran Torino so don't judge it by it. It's an Action Movie judge it against other Action movies. I even read Stallone is doing a terrible job of trying to be Clint Eastwood in being an actor come director. Come on please! When people deserve to die he doesn't just pump them full of lead he makes sure they feel pain with a blade or some other form of long suffering death, exactly what you want from an action movie. So if you want old school violence no CGI, No pretencions for Oscars & Awards and probably no repeat viewing apart from needing subtitle switched on then this is the S**T for you, I would have given it 9 if Segal, Snipes had made it in the picture, if Van Damme was in it it would have got 10 for sure! BRING ON THE SEQUEL IS WHAT I SAY!