With “The Expendables 4,” or “Expend4bles” as the studio cleverly calls it, about to be released, I wanted to reflect on its predecessor which came out nearly a decade ago. As disappointed as I was with “The Expendables 3” to where my opinion would be no different if it were rated R instead of PG-13, I still adore its teaser trailer which I still find myself watching quite often. It is short and sweet as we are introduced to the cast of the sequel to the tune of Malcolm Arnold’s theme to “The Bridge on the River Kwai.” There is something thrilling about seeing all these actors and movie stars coming together on the silver screen to this famous piece of film music, the same one the actors of “The Breakfast Club” whistled at one point while losing an entire Saturday for whatever it was they did wrong.
Like the teaser trailer for “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” this is a great one for a movie I really cannot stand. While I am happy to revisit “The Expendables” and “The Expendables 2,” “The Expendables 3” is one I would prefer to believe never existed in the first place. But yes, we always have this delightful teaser trailer to it.
I was really looking forward to the third “Expendables” movie ever since I saw the teaser trailer which was scored to the theme for “Bridge on the River Kwai.” None of the films in this franchise will ever be mistaken for high art, but they bring about a much-needed nostalgia workout which many of us have for the action movies from the 1980’s. Watching “The Expendables 3,” however, reminded me of how the third movie in a franchise is where everything falls apart due to a reliance on formula and clichés which don’t work the way they used to. While I have a hard time saying how the actors look tired here (and that’s because they don’t), the story gets boring quickly, the dialogue is cruddy and not even the action sequences could lift me out of my utter frustration with something that is not nostalgic enough nor exhilarating or adrenaline-pumping in the slightest.
“The Expendables 3” starts off with the team rescuing one of its long-lost members, Doctor Death (Wesley Snipes), from being sent to a military prison. The scene where he’s being rescued is cool, but the thrill we get from watching it feels a bit muted, and this becomes a sign that everything else following the movie’s opening will be equally exhilarating, which is to say not at all. Either that, or “The Raid 2” truly spoiled me to where no other action film being released these days can come even remotely close to that sequel’s brilliance.
After rescuing Doctor Death, the team heads off to Somalia to intercept a shipment of bombs being sent to a warlord, of course. In the process, they come face to face with former member and Expendables co-founder Conrad Stonebanks (Mel Gibson) who had betrayed the team by profiting off of illegal weapons dealings. When he shoots Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) to where he is left in a precarious medical state, Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone) gets all shaken up and decides to disband the veteran members of the Expendables as he feels they have all run their course, and they should all get out while they still have a pulse.
When Barney does this, I knew this sequel was going to be in serious trouble. Barney ends up recruiting a whole bunch of younger Expendables with the help of retired mercenary Bonaparte (Kelsey Grammer), but I knew from there that those “old guys” will eventually return to help save the day. Stallone, who has always been the major creative force behind the “Expendables” movies, always writes screenplays where the main character suffers a personal tragedy and seeks redemption in order to right what he did wrong, and he’s basically been writing the same damn screenplay since the original “Rocky.” Frankly, I think it’s time Stallone opens his eyes to see how this storyline is now as old as the Declaration of Independence.
Look, I don’t care how old Jason Statham, Wesley Snipes, Randy Couture and Dolph Lundgren are because they can all still kick ass after all these years, but putting them all on the back burner for this entry proves to be very foolish. You know that Barney will eventually realize he needs their help, and the movie takes way too long for him to reach this conclusion. Instead, it wastes a lot of time introducing us to a new generation of Expendables, and most of them are inescapably tame to where it’s easy to understand why this sequel got a PG-13 rating instead of an R.
Kellan Lutz ends up showing the same range as an actor that he showed earlier in the horrifically bad “The Legend of Hercules,” and that is not a compliment. As for Glen Powell and Victor Ortiz, they don’t leave much of an impression here. Things fare much better though for Ronda Rousey who plays the highly athletic nightclub bouncer, Luna. Don’t even ask if she holds her own with the male action stars because you can quickly tell she can even before she starts kicking ass. While her co-stars won’t linger in the mind long after you’ve endured “The Expendables 3,” Rousey makes you eager to see a female version of this franchise sooner rather than later.
Antonio Banderas shows up as Galgo, the soldier who won’t shut up. It’s like he’s doing a version of his “Puss in Boots” character on acid, and it’s a kick to see how much energy the Spanish actor still has at his age. Harrison Ford is also on board as Max Drummer, the CIA dude who manages the Expendables. It’s fun seeing Ford join the party, but it doesn’t take long to see that he is playing the same character Bruce Willis played in the last two films. All the writers have done here is change the name to protect the greedy “Die Hard” movie star.
Granted, there are some nice in-jokes throughout “The Expendables 3” which show the cast having a good sense of humor about themselves. I have to give Snipes credit as even he pokes fun at his felonious past, and there’s a nice line of dialogue regarding Willis’ disappearance from the franchise. But while the cast is clearly having fun, that fun never translates over to the audience. On top of being saddled with a weak story and crappy dialogue, this sequel makes you feel like you are a guest at a party where you’re not really party to the party.
Looking back, this movie could have used a lot more of Schwarzenegger in it as he proves to be the one who gives us all the 1980’s action nostalgia we could ever possibly want. Seeing him spout off classic one-liners from “Predator” provided me with the most enjoyable moments this misbegotten sequel had to offer. Indeed, he’s always had a good sense of humor about himself and is always determined to give audiences what they want. To see him reduced to a series of cameos here does “The Expendables 3” a major disservice.
Actually, the best and most enjoyable performance here is, in my humble opinion, Mel Gibson’s who plays the ruthless arms dealer Conrad Stonebanks. Playing a crazed villain has become the kind of role Gibson typically plays these days, and this is one of the most gleefully psychotic bad guys he has played thus far. That crazy energy he displayed in the “Mad Max” and “Lethal Weapon” movies is put to great use here, and he makes Conrad the kind of bad guy we seriously love to hate.
“The Expendables” movies have been about reviving the old days of 1980’s action flicks, but this third entry misses the whole point about what made them so much fun; even with the thinnest of plots, they were about something. “The Expendables 3” feels like it barely exists, and I came out of the theater feeling empty and depressed. Those 1980’s action classics always got my adrenaline pumping, but this one almost put me to sleep despite an especially loud climax. After two fun action movies which made me nostalgic for what I grew up on cinematically, here we have with a sequel which reminded us of why so many in this genre suck nowadays.
“The Expendables 3” was directed by Patrick Hughes, an Australian filmmaker who is said to be helming the American remake of “The Raid: Redemption.” Now it is bad enough anyone is remaking that infinitely awesome flick, but I hope he has better luck with that one than he did with this lousy sequel.
The Ultimate Rabbit 