BEFORE: From soldiers to mercenaries - and linking from "The Thin Red Line", John Travolta was also in "Staying Alive", in which director Sylvester Stallone (last seen in "Rocky Balboa") had a cameo.
THE PLOT: A CIA operative hires a team of mercenaries to eliminate a Latin dictator and a renegade CIA agent.
AFTER: Maybe I'm suffering from movie burnout, it's sort of that time of year. 12 more films after this one, then I'm going on break until Christmastime. Maybe it's the 180-degree turn of going from a realistic war film like "The Thin Red Line" to a cartoonish action movie is at fault, but I just didn't get this one at all.
First off, the film's poster was very misleading, depicting all of the big action stars standing together, united in a row, as if they're all on the same team, and we're going to see these 9 huge stars working against some common foe, and this turned out to be factually incorrect. The team really consists of only 4 of 5 members, including one who's sort of an adviser/elder statesman, and the rest are either working for the villains, or as their CIA contact, but not actively part of the team. (and two of those stars are each in the film for under 3 minutes each - what a rip-off to feature them so prominently in the advertising campaign!)
The team is commissioned to take out the dictator on a small Latin American island - but since it's for the CIA, we never really learn the real reason for doing so - convenient, because this way nobody has to bother writing one. It's got something to do with drugs? I couldn't really be bothered to care, if they're not going to bother to tell me. But are they doing this to get paid, or because it's "the right thing" to do? Motives were very unclear.
With so many punches being punched, knives being thrown, and bullets flying, with an edit every half-second, most of the time it was also difficult to tell what was happening. Are the good guys winning? Honestly I don't know, but I'll let you know as soon as the seizures stop. This was a very popular film, but it's like a jumbo hot dog - big and meaty, but with no nutritional value whatsoever. No character development, no big message or meaning - sure, you might feel full but you can't eat like this all the time.
It's a shame, I spent a lot of time looking for this one to appear on premium cable, and finally paid $1.99 to get it from OnDemand, and now I'm thinking I could have waited. I'll consider giving "Expendables 2" a chance, but my expectations for it will be much lower. The only real value here came from the inside jokes, since we all have a memory of Stallone facing Lundgren in "Rocky IV", or a secret desire to see Stallone and Schwarzenegger face off - too bad their conflict here was only verbal. This MIGHT have worked as a comedy if there were more nods in that direction, but without that I can't take it seriously at all.
Also starring Jason Statham (last seen in "Collateral"), Jet Li (last seen in "Lethal Weapon 4"), Dolph Lundgren (last seen in "A View to a Kill"), Randy Couture, Steve Austin (last seen in "The Longest Yard"), Terry Crews (last seen in "Bridesmaids"), Mickey Rourke (last seen in "Heaven's Gate"), Eric Roberts, David Zayas, with cameos from Arnold Schwarzenegger (last seen in "Total Recall"), Bruce Willis (last seen in "Looper").
RATING: 3 out of 10 aliases
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