THE EXPENDABLES

The Expendables promises to answer the burning question ‘What ever happened to all those 80’s action heroes?’ but ends up leaving us wanting to know ‘What the f**k happened to Sylvester Stallone’s face?’

The Expendables is writer/director Sly Stallone’s love letter to excessive action films of the late 80’s/early 90’s when men were men and the action was bloody, gory and over the top. The plot, or what passes for it, follows a rag tag bunch of mercenaries, led by Stallone’s Barney Ross, as they try and overthrow ruthless South American dictator General Garza (David Zayas) or rather the rogue CIA agent James Monroe (Eric Roberts) behind the dictator.

But let’s face it, you aren’t going to see The Expendables for the plot, it is for the cast and cast alone, and in that respect Sly has excelled. Stallone mashes actors from the old guard, Dolph Lundgren, Jet Li and Mickey Rourke with stars of today, Steve Austin, Terry Crewes, Randy Couture and Jason Statham; and a menacing but underused Eric Roberts as the villain of the piece.

Oh and lets not forget cameos from action legends Bruce Willis and Arnold ‘The Governator’ Schwarzenegger. That’s right the Holy Trinity of action heroes assembled together at last! Pity then that this undercooked tongue-in-cheek-less script fails to do the pop culture moment justice. A throwaway ‘president’ joke raises a laugh sure, but can’t we do better?

I’ll admit I wasn’t expecting much going into this movie, I hoped for a tongue-in-cheek True Lies style action romp. Instead, at 100 minutes, The Expendables is a bloated mess, things happen for no reason, characters motivations change on a whim and the action is at times so furious you end up having no idea what the hell is going on. It’s a real shame that Sly and co felt that aside from an ‘all star’ cast everything else like plot, story and character was…wait for it…expendable.

1.5 of 5 Stars