First of all, because it's central idea is essentially flawed: bringing all these stars together is nothing like The Dream Team of Action Movies. Stallone is the major one to blame here, because he directed and wrote this abomination. Everybody needs a one-liner so badly, a signature kill, an awesome catchphrase, that this movie feels schizophrenic, crowded, and corny. Let's not even get started on the "writing". I haven't laughed out this loud since The Hangover, and that's not a good thing. It would be if The Expendables was thought out as a parody, or a deconstruction (try not to read that and laugh) of the genre, if it were a movie that's intentionally bad. I actually wonder how the actors said some of these lines with a straight face on, and let's not forget we're talking about people like Dolph Lundgren and Stallone here. Really, it's almost worth seeing just for the bad writing ( "Like bad Shakespeare", to quote it).
The plot is not worth mentioning, although it had promise (the entire movie had promise). Jet Li is the best of the bunch, he actually still feels dangerous at close to 50 years,while Terry Crews is funny in a scary sort of way. None of his lines are even close to funny, but his demeanor and exploits in this film will make me laugh forever (not a bad accomplishment actually). Eric Roberts is...I'm not even going to go there, Stallone is Stallone, Statham plays the same role he's played 10 movies running, and Mickey Rourke is here just to deliver cringe-worthy monologues about war and how it changes people.
I'm actually sorry for kids these days: I grew up watching these guys in good action movies, some of them in good movies period. The Expendables feels sacrilegious at times, and boring at others. In one scene, Dolph Lundgren fights Jet Li in hand to hand combat. Why did that not feel like something I want to watch over and over and over again? Why did the scene with The Trinity of Action Heroes make me want to puke instead of wanting to hit the gym? Why does The Expendables feel like the most disappointing movie ever?
All this bashing might lead to the conclusion that I had great expectations from The Expendables. I did not. I didn't expect The Godfather or Casablanca, I just wanted a blast from the past, that explodes really good for a few minutes, and then makes me want to see Die Hard again. Not a good movie, but an awesome movie. There's a difference, and I got neither. What I did get was a predictable and incoherent (as strange as that sounds) shamble of an excuse to make money at the box-office.
Maybe I'm too harsh. It's possible that by growing up, action movies no longer fill the same gap they did when I was young, and the old ones feel good by nostalgia value alone. So I decided to test that theory and watched one old movie with each of the poster boys. The ones that were not good, were awesome. Some were even both! So in the end, it's not me. I'll do myself a favor and forget The Expendables ever happened.
Here's a crazy thought: What if you gathered all the greatest action movie stars ever, put them in one mega-movie, with a ridiculous plot, a huge body count, kick-ass explosions, and a lethal dose of testosterone? What if you actually got Stallone, Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis on the screen at the same time? Wow, that's too awesome to exist, no use thinking about the impossible.
4/10 Stefan
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