This is one of those films that have been hyped to all hell, and I must admit that I have not experienced immunity to it. As a fan of action films and the icons within the genre, I found myself
anticipating this film heavily, particularly because of its promise to
be a tribute to everything we love about action movies. The giant explosions, extreme martial arts, comic badassery, and some one-liners
thrown in for good measure is exactly what this trailer seemed to
promise and we hoped for. On an individual level, I just hoped for the
film to deliver in ways movies like Last Action Hero should
have done. All that expectation and hype being said, I did go see the
film with a huge crowd and a packed theater, though it was quite unlike when I
saw films like Inception in similar fashion. Quiet and
contemplative were the two words farthest from the truth in terms of
describing the audience: they yelled and oohed at this film throughout
the whole thing, especially the ending. I went right along with them
throughout, although I must admit a large tinge of disappointment. It
wasn’t bad, it was actually pretty good, but the film failed to measure up
to the hype and least of all my expectations.

The Expendables follows a titular group of mercenaries led by Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone) and consisting of former SAS soldier Lee Christmas (Jason Statham), martial artist Yin yang (Jet
Li), weapons specialist Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) and demolitions
expert Toll Road (Randy Coutre). After finishing off a mission in
Somalia, Ross is contacted by a mysterious contact named Mr. Church
(Bruce Willis), who offers him and his team a $5 million contract to
take out a dictator in Vilena named General Garza (David Zayas). Taking
the job and infiltrating the country, the team soon realize that there
is more going on there than meets the eye, as Garza is being aided by
an ex-CIA agent named Monroe (Eric Roberts) and his two lackeys: Paine
(Steve Austin) and Brit (Gary Daniels). Initially not wanting to get
further involved, the team changes their mind when Garza’s daughter
gets kidnapped and endangered, and reboot back into action to take down
Monroe once and for all.

From the get go, The Expendables tries to throw all of its gusto and assets into the audience’s face from the very beginning, with somewhat mixed results throughout. On the positive end of things, the
movie does work on a level of pure enjoyment, as there is so much to
get you excited. The action of the film, particularly in the last
twenty minutes, are all pulse-pounding and are greatly variable to draw
in every action fan’s preferences. Explosions, gun fights,
knife-fights, wrestling matches; you name it, it’s in there to some
capacity and on a consistently high level of quality. They are
well-placed within the story itself and are able to keep you at the
edge of your seat without wearing out their welcome. The characters are
solidly serviceable and work decently enough to keep things moving and
the audience engaged. Jason Statham (as always) is amazing to watch,
Austin and the other supporting roles are quite epic within their
respective roles, and Mickey Rourke has an amazing cameo within the
film that shows just how strong of an actor he really is. The action
and the characters also combine quite often through the film to create
sources of humor for the audience, which were frequently hilarious and
filled with the one-liners, explosions, and action cliches we love.

As stated before however, the film missed the mark for a variety of reasons and each of the positive elements were host to some of them. While the action was quite entertaining and fun to watch, the visuals
of this film were cheesy and terrible, bringing in the most fake blood,
laser-sights, and planes I have ever seen in a theatrical big budget
release. These effects were so bad, the 1980s would have laughed at it,
if that provides any insight into how bad they were. The generally
entertaining characters were little beyond caricatures of themselves,
as the focus of the film is entirely on Statham and Stallone. Other
than them, the characters are either under-utilized or watered down
from what they really were. This was especially true for Jet Li, who
was annoyingly transformed into an incompetent wimp within the film
when in real life, he would be the most badass out of any of the cast
members. Finally, the humor and fun of the overall film was hampered
quite effectively by the script, which was just downright horrible. The
dialogue was terrible, making me wish that I was watching Avatar,
the pacing lulled at certain points, and overall the film really didn’t
carry much emotional weight outside of Jason Statham’s side story.
Combined, this would be enough to derail any film and turn it into an
unentertaining mess.

I have to admit though, the film worked through it. There was something about it that made it work just on a sheer entertainment level that kept me from being bored and actually kept me excited
through a lot of it. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not as good as The A-Team and doesn’t hold a candle to movies like Iron Man 2 or Inception, but it was pretty good and fun. Stupid, but fun.