Aylmer to Zazzoo and Beyond: The Expendables 2

Friday, August 17, 2012

The Expendables 2 - Review

The Expendables 2
Action / Adventure
102 Min.

Rated: R Intense Bloody Violence
Grade: C-

Director: Simon West
Writers: Richard Wenk (screenplay), Sylvester Stallone (screenplay), and 4 more credits »

Stars: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Liam Hemsworth and Randy Couture | See full cast and crew

The Expendables are back and this time it's personal... Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone), Lee Christmas (Jason Statham), Yin Yang (Jet Li), Gunnar Jensen (Dolph Lundgren),Toll Road (Randy Couture) and Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) -- with newest members Billy the Kid (Liam Hemsworth) and Maggie (Yu Nan) aboard -- are reunited when Mr. Church (Bruce Willis) enlists the Expendables to take on a seemingly simple job. The task looks like an easy paycheck for Barney and his band of old-school mercenaries. But when things go wrong and one of their own is viciously killed, the Expendables are compelled to seek revenge in hostile territory where the odds are stacked against them. -- (C) Lionsgate

I saw The Expendables 2 with four - teen/early 20s - males seated directly behind me (Just the market this film is aimed at.). It was very distracting. From the opening scene, replete with various means of violent killings including blowing bodies to bits, beheadings by various means, exploding heads with lots of blood and gore flying and flowing everywhere except for where it was designed to flow, in the veins, these young men laughed, cheered each death and voiced their thrilled approval for each act of carnage with every profanity imaginable. It made me wonder if I was on an aircraft carrier.

Now of course the prevailing 'wisdom' is that films, TV and music don't affect behavior - yet at the same time, those same 'wise' men and women would tell you the classical music, art and theater (including films) inspire greatness and enlightenment, and then again pornography promotes violence against women. How very convenient it is for out intellectual wise men to have it both ways. I found myself thinking while watching this film, What are the values being taught here?

Fresh off their last mission, Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone) and his expendable team of mercenaries are yanked back in the fray by Mr. Church (Bruce Willis) who presents them with a new assignment. It shouldn't be too big a deal for them to fly into Albania and retrieve a briefcase full of blueprints to a plutonium mine. But just minutes into the film their newest, youngest, most innocent recruit (and most capable actor), Bill (Liam Hemsworth, the soon to be Mr. Miley Cyrus or is that off again), is killed on the eve of leaving the business, Barney can think of nothing but revenge.

This sequel, to a film that took a much more serious tone, plays it for humor this time around. Sad thing is that it is humor-free. I don't recall laughing one single time during its 1 hour and 42 minuets. To me an action film that relies on guns, explosions, unbelievable hand to hand fistfights, sprays of blood and gore, and one-liners dredged up from the actors previous films and a formulaic plot instead of real action scenes that lies somewhere in the realm of realism and plausibility, acting and an actual screenplay devolves into nothing more than a lame, violent video game.

The soundtrack and score were annoying, the visuals were annoying, the script was annoying (for example: when trying to stop the villain's (Jean-Claude Van Damme named Jean Vilain, get it? Got it? Good!) convoy of plutonium laden trucks they empty their guns shooting at the trucks which manage to continue on - so why not just soot out those big over sized balloon-like tires?), the one-liners were annoying and surprisingly unfunny, in fact this entire film did little more than annoy me.

The writing credits go to Richard Wenk (2006's "16 Blocks") and Sylvester Stallone and it consists almost entirely of murmurs, mumbles, and one-liners interspersed between the bloodletting chaos swirling around them. These unclever one-liners are the sort that make you want to put your hands want to put hands over your ears and sing "la la la la la" and pretend you aren't hearing this groan-worthy tripe (no offense to anyone who likes Menudo). In one scene, after blowing to bits his latest victim, Barney tells him to, "Rest in pieces." If that's not bad enough, how about this exchange between Trench (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and Mr. Church (Bruce Willis): "I'll be back," says Trench. "You've been back enough," Mr. Church replies. "I'll be back." "Yippee-kay-ay," Trench retorts. Even just retelling it makes my face ache.

No doubt fans of the this blood drenched, mind numbing, sophomoric genre will more likely than not enjoy it. It's sure to earn a bundle. The Expendables sounded like a can't-miss proposition, an explosive, literally, joining-together of the most iconic action stars of the '80s, '90s, and today. The idea was in the end more fun and exciting and fun than the film that was delivered to theaters, by a factor of 10. Talent was squandered by cardboard characterizations, an unoriginal formulaic plot, and spars no action aside from the opening sequence and the overblown finale. The film completely missed sense of humor it should have had about itself and regrettably has almost no entertainment value, except to the afore mentioned teen boys.

It will make a bundle at the box-office but this movie like its predecessor, for better or worse, was sold on the names above the title alone. The sequel tacking one even more action heavies, like newcomers Jean-Claude Van Damme, Chuck Norris and Liam Hemsworth, plus Arnold Schwarzenegger. Team leader Sylvester Stallone (2008's "Rambo") has stepped aside as director in favor of Simon West (2011's "The Mechanic"). West has contributed little more than a seven-figure budget seemingly used solely for dust and fog wrangling. Maybe its purpose was to mask the increasingly weathered faces of these 'seasoned' actors, most of the film is viewed through a thick, layer of dust or haze.

The Expendables 2 has action the first Expendables had, but if viewers are expecting tension, excitement and ingenuity they'd better look somewhere else. All this film offers up is punishing loud, ultra-chaotic pandemonium, loosely served up on a conveyer belt of shots involving death, carnage, explosions and fiery destruction. Using everything from motorcycles to hummers to jet skis to planes, these musclebound, pumped-up figures on the screen (calling them characters would not be entirely accurate) strut around while machine gunning, stabbing and missile launching anything and anyone who happens to get in their line of sight (of course, sometimes they don't even have to see the enemy they merely sense them). Then at the end of the day when their hard work of killing is done, they hang out and joke around while listening to classic rock, oblivious and unaffected by the countless string of torn-apart bodies they have left behind

This film is ignorantly unaware of how soulless it is, The Expendables 2 is a silly popcorn picture where things go boom a lot. If that is what you want that's fine, except that the violence is presented with such blood-thirsty relish that it really negates the heroes from coming off as, well, you know...heroic. There are no consequences for their actions and no legitimacy in the roles to play. There is no humanity and nothing about anyone except for maybe Liam Hemsworth's (2012's "The Hunger Games") Bill, who truly outacts all of his elder. This film is a an empty-souled vessel where legendary action heroes assemble on the same set and then stand around with nothing of interest to say or do with each other. It is very much a talent, money and time. From the previews The Expendables 2 promised to be a big ole blast, so why then isn't it...Oh, right. I just told you.