The Expendables: Manliest Movie Ever

Calling The Expendables awesome is like calling Monty Python and the Holy Grail mildly amusing. Simply put, this movie rocks in every possible sense.

Let’s start with the cast: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Randy Couture, Dolph Lundgren, Terry Crews, Steve Austin, Mickey Rourke, the list goes on and on. Even Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger have cameos in this movie. If that doesn’t grab your attention, nothing will. It’s probably easier to list the action giants this movie didn’t contain: Chuck Norris, Mr. T, Steven Seagal, and Jean-Claude van Damme.

Like the 80s action movies it salutes, this movie’s plot is pretty straightforward. The world’s greatest mercenary band gets a job to kill a South American dictator who is in cahoots with a drug lord. Fair enough. Then Stallone and Statham meet a woman who is trying to overthrow said dictator and refuses to leave the island. Any seasoned action moviegoer can smell a D-Day-scale fight coming at this point.

And this movie delivers. It has it all: car chases, explosions galore, he-man dialogue (Lundgren to Li: “What are you, a size three? Bring it, happy feet!”), gravity defying unarmed combat, gratuitous violence and guns. Lots of guns. I was able to identify MP-5s, MP-7s, HK-416s, 1911s, and even a AA-12 fully automatic shotgun in this movie. The latter weapon’s effects on the dictator’s army elicited laughs and cheers from the crowd when I saw this movie.

Best of all, unlike the CGI extravaganzas Hollywood seems to favor these days, this movie had plenty of real pyrotechnics in it. That’s not to say there isn’t any CGI, but there’s plenty of old-school stunt work in this one. It doesn’t turn into a glorified video game like some of today’s movies do. I’m looking at you, Star Wars Episodes I-III.

The Expendables is not without its faults. The plot, as I said earlier, is pretty standard action-movie fare. The girl’s role consists of the usual scream-and-cower. The actors also survive numerous injuries and situations that would have led to instant death in real life. But hey, it’s an action movie. It’s not supposed to be realistic or politically correct, and I didn’t pay eight dollars to see realism or political correctness. The only real complaint I have is a plot disconnect at the end. You’ll know it when you see it.

In short, if you like action movies, you will love The Expendables. But be warned: if you are a newcomer to the action movie genre, you’d better start off on something weaker. In fact, I wouldn’t recommend this movie to anyone who does not have several 80s action classics (such as Rambo: First Blood Part II or Commando) under their belt. In the first place, the amount of manliness in this movie is lethal. Period. In the second place, you will appreciate the cast much more if you know what they did in their prime. In the third place, those movies are required viewing in my book anyway. And in the fourth place, you can pick up on a few inside jokes in the dialogue referencing the actors’ previous movies.

I strongly recommend this movie to anyone who enjoys some goods old-fashioned shoot-em-up, beat-em-up, or talk-em-up. Stallone wanted this movie to be a tribute to the glory days of action movies, and I’d say he more than succeeded.