SYLVESTER STALLONE puts the BIG BANG back in testosterone driven action flicks.
Stallone assembled for the first time the combined screen machismo of Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren (Drago!), Eric Roberts, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Randy Coutre, David Zayas (Dexter), Terry Crews AND Mickey Rourke.
PLUS two of the biggest unbilled superstars to ever "blow stuff UP real good" on screen – Bruce Willis and The Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger. Watching Sly, Bruce and Arnold do "their thing" together is alone worth the price of admission – zingy, unbridled star power with a knowing wink at themselves and the audience.
They’re having fun and so are we.
The Expendables are a team of mercs hired to overthrow a South American dictator but as the film unspools and the body count reaches epic proportions the true nature of their mission is revealed.
Every action star get their moment and big brawl. Rumblin’ in the jungle, Austin and Stallone go toe-to-toe in a tough bare knuckled brawl that sent Sly to the hospital with a broken neck and a pas de deux between blonde giant Lundgren and diminutive Li recalls the classic duel between Bruce Lee and Kareem Abdul Jabbar in Game of Death.
And the great one-liners fly trippingly off the tongues of these grizzled old pros as if it were Shakespeare — on ‘roids.
Mickey Rourke, fresh off his Wrestler comeback, gets to chew the emotional scenery without becoming cliché and maudlin while his Pope of Greenwich Village costar, big bad Eric Roberts, displays the kind of star power that etched his name in greatness long before Julia and Emma.
Despite employing a veritable army of stuntmen, Sly and the boys can be seen quite clearly doing most of the stunt work themselves. Stallone gives new meaning to "catching a flight" as he launches himself off a pier to make contact with an airborne clipper.
As a super-action flick they don’t get any bigger nor better. Stallone has proven himself once again to be the master of the heroic art form.
"This film was shot with brains and brawn," Sly told The ENQUIRER. "This is all about REAL fighting – mano a mano – keeping things as real as possible, instead of falling back on CGI."
This IS the film The Losers and The A-Team wanted to be.
The Expendables is more like classic flick The Professionals with world weary anti-heroes adrift without a moral compass, warriors lost in an emotionless minefield until they regain their souls – – by blowing EVERYTHING up!
Tech creds are top-notch.
And sources say, expect a sequel.
–MURPH the SURF
Special to NationalENQUIRER.com
