The Expendables 3

Watching The Expendables 3, I came to the conclusion that the current career of Sylvester Stallone is not far removed from that of Adam Sandler.  Both are actors whose recent body of work could be considered paid vacations, and basically one big opportunity to hang out with a bunch of friends and make a silly movie together.  In both cases, the end result is a disappointment for the audience.  Stallone's latest film is packed to the rafters with big name action talent from the past and the present, yet nobody is given much to do, except for Stallone, who obviously doesn't want to get upstaged.

From its inception, The Expendables franchise has more or less been the clown car of action movies, stuffing a huge list of big names in a tiny space like Jason Statham, Bruce Willis (who bowed out of this entry due to disagreements over pay), Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Terry Crews, and Chuck Norris.  This time, we get some new faces, like Harrison Ford, Wesley Snipes, Mel Gibson (who plays the villain in this installment), Antonio Banderas, and a name that no kick-ass action movie should be without, Kelsey Grammer.  (Uh huh...) The guys look like they're having fun working together, but just as in the previous two films, the fun doesn't come through in the finished product.  It's a retro action retread that is laughably simple in its plotting.  And despite there being plenty of action, it's hard to get involved or be concerned for our heroes when the villains are too dumb to live.

Yes, this is yet another movie where the bad guys decide that the best way to kill our heroes is to shoot at the ground around them at all times, instead of actually aiming at them.  The only time any one of the heroes are shot, it's dramatically convenient.  The bullets have read the screenplay in advance, and know their marks.  Naturally, this means that our heroes never miss.  They can take on an entire terrorist army that seems to clock in at around 200 men or so, and have them all be dead by the end of a shootout that lasts around 12 minutes.  The movie has a humungous body count, and a wide variety of four letter words in its dialogue.  But, because nobody actually bleeds during the movie, and that really, really bad four letter word is only said once, the movie has been granted a PG-13-rating, instead of an R like the last two movies were.  Obviously, the MPAA is fine with kids seeing countless extras getting blown away, their necks snapped, and their bodies slammed against walls until they're dead.  It's a good thing the rating system is out there to protect kids against films like Life Itself, which has no violence or language of any kind, but got hit with an R-rating simply because it had a photo of topless women in it at one point.

The plot: Barney (Stallone) and his team of Expendables break an old friend (Wesley Snipes) out of a prison train in the film's opening action sequence, only to immediately fly off to another mission.  This time, they're out to stop a mad weapons dealer, only to find out that the man they're after is Stonebanks (Mel Gibson), who used to be a member of Barney's team until he went bad.  During the ensuing shootout, one of the Expendables is gravely wounded when he is shot twice in the leg. (Oddly enough, in the next scene, he somehow has a chest wound.)  Barney swears revenge, but he's not going to risk the lives of his old friends.  Instead, he's going to risk the lives of a bunch of fresh, young recruits who are skilled in firearms, computer hacking and martial arts.  Naturally, the new younger members get captured by Stonebanks, so Barney is going to have to rely on the old gang if he wants to get the job done.

With the young new members stepping in and fighting alongside the veterans in the climax, The Expendables 3 is obviously intended to be sort of a "passing the torch" movie to a new generation of action stars.  Of the young talent, the one getting the most attention is Ronda Rousey, a mixed martial arts star who is making her acting debut here.  She makes her entrance in the movie wearing big, thick glasses for no other reason than nobody would expect a woman wearing big glasses could ever kick butt.  For whatever reason, this is the only scene she wears them, and they're never seen again.  As for her performance, while her fighting is obviously great, she needs to learn to show emotion or not talk in the same tone of voice no matter what's going on.  She is the only one of the young cast to stand out, but it's simply because of her gender, not because of anything she actually does in the film.

Just like before, the main draw of the film is seeing these big action stars of the 80s and 90s teaming up to blow stuff up together.  And just like before, it sounds like a lot more fun than it actually is.  A lot of the big names are kept off camera for a good chunk of the film, or given little to do when they are on the screen.  Everybody seems to be making a conscious effort not to outshine Stallone, who always gets to take the lead, gets the most screen time, and gets to kill the most bad guys.  Of the "old veteran" team, the only one who gets to stand out is Antonio Banderas, and it's for all the wrong reasons.  He doesn't grab our attention by doing anything cool or anything, instead he grabs it by being the most annoying comic relief character to appear in any movie so far this year.  Banderas simply tries too hard to come across as "the silly one" of the team, constantly mugging for the camera and talking so fast, you'd think he's being paid by how many words he can fit in a minute.  He's like a live action cartoon who somehow wandered into a Stallone movie.

Each time I've walked into an Expendables movie, I've come hoping for a good time, and each time I've been disappointed.  This one disappointed me more than the first two.  I'm not going to say there's no hope for this franchise, as there are plenty of opportunities.  The series is simply too unfocused and too sloppy to be any fun.  A movie that combines Stallone, Schwarzenegger and Harrison Ford should be a blast.  If only wishing could make it so.

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