I love action films. I've always been a sucker for those movies that featured larger than life heroes taking on all odds to beat the bad guys. When those movies changed to feature heroes that were not always quite pure I still loved seeing them. When THE EXPENDABLES was released featuring not one but a number of action heroes on screen together I thought it was fantastic. This hadn't been done since the sixties when films like THE GREAT ESCAPE or THE DIRTY DOZEN were made.
If you haven't seen the movie it tells the story of Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone), the leader of a crew of for hire mercenaries that take on almost any job. The film opens with them rescuing a group of people taken hostage by pirates. Barney and his crew offer them the option to leave peacefully once and when they refuse they are all taken out with "extreme prejudice", graphically so. But when one of his team goes too far, even Barney sets him aside and refuses to use him on their next mission until he cleans himself up mentally.
Getting that next mission is fun in itself. Barney meets with a mysterious stranger played by Bruce Willis in a church. Willis has also called in someone else to offer them the job played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. Seeing these three icons of action films on the screen at the same time is a rare treat. Arnold turns the job down but Ross decides to recon the situation and see if it's possible to achieve.
Taking his right hand man Lee Christmas (Jason Statham) with him, they scope out the small South American island that's run by a small time dictator being propped up by an ex-CIA agent (Eric Roberts) whose using the people and the island for his drug operation. The people on the island, led by the dictator's daughter Sandra, are hoping to revolt. Ross figures out that his contractor is probably CIA and wants to control the island for the company. But something about the woman's resolve to stay on the island and try to make it better touches him. He and Christmas escape from the island after nearly being caught and he makes the decision to take on the job.
The team of the Expendables includes Toll Road (Randy Coutre), Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) and Yin Yang (Jet Li) along with Ross and Christmas. Each has their own specialty in fighting technique and all will come in handy as they face off against Roberts men on the island which include WWE star Stone Cold Steve Austin and martial arts star Gary Daniels. These include some of the best fight scenes ever filmed.
The movie is filled with explosions, fight scenes and heroic turns of events that make these mercs more human than most that shows a caring side to them as well as the hire for money side. You also witness a camaraderie and loyalty among the group that is rare in films these days. But most of all you have one of the best most high octane action films made in years.
Having been a while since I saw the film originally I wasn't sure at first what made this extended cut different. In retrospect I realized that there was more background and involvement with the entire crew, including part time member Mickey Rourke, than there was in the original release. This fills out the team better than at first and makes them more interesting as well.
Work on the sequel has already begun and more testosterone has been added by including both Chuck Norris and Jean-Claude Van Damme as well. The only action hero that seems to be missing is Steven Segal and Danny Trejo but maybe they'll be around for a third film, who knows?
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