Review - The Expendables is an action movie lover's dream come true...

Now this is how you make an action film. Sylvester Stallone has assembled an action lover's dream cast with him, Jason Statham, Mickey Rourke, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Terry Crews, Randy Coture, Eric Roberts and throws in for good measure a cameo by Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzengger. The plot has Stallone's team of mercenaries called The Expendables who are recruited for a suicide mission to take down a power mad South American dictator. That's a plot right out of an 80's action flick, but hey it's good enough for me. The opening scene has our guys rescuing some hostages from Somali pirates that sets the tone for the movie. These guys are good as they rip through the bad guys with ease. But Lundgren's character Gunnar goes a little too gung ho and ends up being kicked off the team. Back stateside the team meet up with an ex-member who handles their assignment and his name is Tool (played by Rourke). Him and Barney (Stallone's character) reminisce about the old days before Tool sends him to meet Mr. Church (a wicked Bruce Willis). Church is CIA and wants Barney's team to take down this dictator but not before he agrees to the conditions of the job. Schwarzenegger is a rival mercenary who tries to get the job as well. This scene between the three action legends is one of the best scenes in the movie. As Sly and Arnie trade jabs at one another the whole time and Bruce has to step in to referee.

In the meantime Lee (played by Statham) has girlfriend troubles and has to beat down a rival to his girl in a kick ass fight scene between him and six other guys. Lee also is very deadly with knives as he gets to show several times during the movie. Jet Li gets some action later on as he has to tangle with a whacked out Lundgren that begins with an exciting car chase sequence. Lundgren is perfect as the off kilter Gunnar, who just wants to kill. Period. Barney and Lee fly down to South America for a little recon and meet Sandra, their contact and have a memorable shoot-out and fight sequence with some bad guys. After coming home, Barney does some soul searching with Tool and decides to take the mission.

Once the team gets down to South America to take on the bad guys, we learn that the true villian behind the scenes is Eric Roberts, who once again plays a smarmy ass-hole like no one else can. The last half hour of this film is non-stop action as our boys take on an entire army. Times have definitely changed...Sly used to do this kinda stuff back in the day by himself as Rambo, but now needs all the help he can get. His fight scene with Austin is brutal and he pretty much gets his ass handed to him. Crews has a killer scene where he unloads with this awesome gun that just rips through the bad guys like tissue. Like I said The Expendables gets the job done. If you want to see an old school action fest with stuff being blown up and the good guys being bad asses on bikes and getting into a shoot out or fight every 5 minutes, then this is the movie to see. When we watched it today, there was just as many women as men there and while the women in the film don't get to do too much, they aren't reduced to being just eye candy neither. There is plenty of humor and the entire cast clicks together like seasoned pros. I believe this could start a whole new series of Expendable movies because this was very entertaining and I think it will be a pretty big hit.
B+