Director: Simon West
Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Bruce Willis, Dolph Lundgren, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chuck Norris, Jet Li, Randy Couture, Nan Yu
Running Time: 98 minutes
Certificate: 15
Along with shellsuits, shoulder pads, and backcombing the 1980s gave us some of the finest tongue-in-cheek action films of all time. THE EXPENDABLES (2010) attempts to capture the innocence and fun of COMMANDO, DIE HARD, RAMBO et al failed due to a bloated cast and confused script, but $274million worldwide gave Sly and co. a second chance with Simon West (TOMB RAIDER, CON AIR) taking the reins.
At Church’s (Willis) request Barney (Stallone) and his team, along with Maggie (Yu), attempt to procure a hard drive from a plane crash site. When one of their team is killed at the hands of Vilain (Van Damme) and the hard drive lost the expendables set out to get it back and avenge the fallen.
With Schwarzenegger, Willis, Stallone, Statham, Lundgren, Li and Norris all vying for screen time THE EXPENDABLES 2 mimics its predecessor by feeling muddled and overblown. Fortunately this sequel makes room for laughs in its screenplay, something sorely missing first time around. With Simon West behind the camera the action is spectacular – the first 15 and final 20 minutes make BLACK HAWK DOWN look like an episode of SESAME STREET – but as shown by TOMB RAIDER and THE MECHANIC West isn’t so successful when it comes to developing characters or subtlety. Of course no one is going to watch THE EXPENDABLES 2 for character or subtlety, they’ll want explosions, but ignoring this aspect completely makes it tough to care what happens to the protagonists. The undoubted highlights come towards the films climax when Willis and Schwarzenegger share the screen; their exploits and wisecracks hark back to the 80s with a self-deprecating edge.
With hints of 1980s charm interspersed with dreadful dialogue and questionable one-liners THE EXPENDABLES 2 improves on the first outing, but never scales the heights to which it aspires. No doubt they will be back, and at this rate THE EXPENDABLES 5 should be close to perfect.
THE EXPENDABLES 2 is available on DVD and Blu-ray now
