Even the action hero greats can't save this crap.

Rating: 1/10 (10 September 2010)

The Expendables trailer advertised specifically what it was meant to in the movie. Just trashy fun with lots of explosions and a hot woman. With total disregards to story and character development and even a cheesy script I wouldn't have minded as certain actors in films most notably Jason Patric as the main villain who was entertaining in The Losers and The A-Team film with Liam Nesson and Sharlto Copley etc hamming it up and taking the script for what it was.
Now some people have said that other reviewers don't get this movie and that it advertises honestly what it says on the tin, action oh yes that is all well and good but it's impossible to enjoy the action if the camera angles change so quickly as the editing is so frenetic with the camera constantly jerking up and down so much so all I saw was things and people flying across the screen not knowing who or what it was coming from which direction. For example the scene at the start where Jet Li, Stallone and Statham are standing on the deck of the ship looking down at the bad guys. Then suddenly they're standing on level with them even though the drop is fifty feet. Now one assumes as they are ex military, that they climbed down using ropes but we never saw them get it out, so it's as though they just jumped down and didn't injure themselves. Such an amendment in the script of adding a simple prop to enhance realism makes this film reek of laziness. Another scene is when Stallone and Li are in a grey pick up truck being chased. One minute they are ahead of the red truck, which contains more bad guys shooting at them and then next the red truck is in front. Presumably it drove past but the camera switches and turns so quickly and constantly it's impossible to keep track of anything happening on screen. so it's as though by magic it disappeared and reappeared like a magic trick. Unfortunately Stallone seems to have developed the annoying trait of Michael Bay of not being able to shoot an action scene (just watch the terrible Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen to know what I'm getting at). I could go on with several other examples but I think you get the point.
Mentioning earlier of the failure to add a simple prop of a rope to show how the leads jumped from the deck of a ship to the bottom. The script is of course awful and unimaginative and yes it is cheesy though, but it contains little laughs. The only scene I did like was with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis which was funny but too short. Stallone apparently drafted the script hundred times before he settled for the one to put into production. I hate to imagine what the first ninety nine were like. In terms of the characters, yes they are cardboard with no depth to them but they never come to life, not like in The A-Team where they actors look like they are enjoying themselves and as a result the audience enjoy it more too. This had the opposite but inevitable effect, the actors looked bored so do we and don't even get me started with the acting. Stallone just mumbles his lines and on some extreme close up shots looks more and more like his mother (and I don't mean that as a compliment). He just looked grizzled and washed out and maybe a sure sign it's about time he retired from acting and directing. Jet Li and Jason Statham don't figure any better and Micky Rourke is at his worst again from Iron Man 2. The only actors I did like were Bruce Willis and Arnie. But they were only in that one scene for about a minute so why did they get advertised as having main parts in the movie? It's beyond me.
Now as I said there are a few good moments with the comedy scene in the church and even I did enjoy one fight scene where Statham beat up some guys in the park, but really this was just boring, unimaginative tripe with even the violence being tasteless. All I really did enjoy was the fact I didn't pay to see this (though I certainly wasted my time) and when I walked out when the film ended. Do yourself a favour and see another action film like Salt or the ones I mentioned The Losers or The A-Team, they are much better, not this overblown and overrated trash, a 7.1 on the IMDb ratings! What a joke! Unfortunately alas it's not. This is one movie I won't watch again. The only place it belongs is in the garbage.