Three stars. Rating: R, for strong bloody violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.24.12
It’s time once again to buy stock
in ordnance manufacturers; Sylvester Stallone and his geezer squad are back to
wreak more havoc and shoot up fresh landscapes.
 |
| Determined to rescue a lone American trapped by gun-toting mercenaries, our heroes — from left, Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone), Lee Christmas (Jason Statham) and Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) — blast their way into a fortified compound, and then prepare to eliminate any two-legged signs of resistance. It's just another day at the office for these guys... |
Really, even by the already
crazed standards of Hollywood’s exaggerated action flicks, I’ve rarely seen so
much gunfire. Or so many blood squibs spurting from the chests, limbs and heads
of obligingly posed victims. Particularly the goons shot by long-range,
high-power sniper rifle, whose heads explode in a spray of viscera.
It’s almost enough to harsh the
laughably ludicrous vibe of this otherwise mindless live-action cartoon.
The Expendables 2 is even
sillier than its 2010 predecessor, an AARP
spin on The Seven Samurai, The Dirty Dozen and all sorts of other
gang-of-losers-against-insurmountable-odds epics. Ironically enough, "sillier" means better, in this case; thanks to the lighter tone, this sequel is quite a bit more entertaining. The notion that Stallone and
his old coot buddies still can raise hell, definitely raises smiles ... and,
yeah, it's a kick to see so many familiar faces.
With tongue even more firmly in
cheek, Stallone once again shares screenwriting credit, but this time hands the
directing chores to Simon West, a veteran of similar high-octane action fare
such as Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, last year’s remake of The Mechanic and
TV’s much-loved (if woefully short-lived) 2003 cop series, Keen Eddie.
The first Expendables at least
made an effort to blend some actual character drama with its grim doings, with Dolph Lundgren’s
Gunnar Jensen failing to play nice with the rest of the crew, most particularly
Jet Li’s Yin Yang. Lundgren is sweetness and light this time — and has
inherited a college-educated science background (!) — but Li makes little more
than a token appearance in an audacious pre-credits rescue mission, which
pretty much sets the tone for what follows.
Indeed, West errs slightly with
this prologue; it’s far better staged than most of what follows. The folks who
make these sorts of films really need to stop front-loading their best stuff;
the rest of the film invariably feels anti-climactic.
But back to basics.
Any trace of squabbling has
vanished, with Barney Ross (Stallone) and the rest of his crew — Lee Christmas
(Jason Statham), Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) and Toll Road (Randy Couture) —
joking and tossing brewskies like seasoned best buds. They’ve also taken on a
rookie, a talented sharpshooter dubbed Billy the Kid (Liam Hemsworth), who
seems to fit right in with the gang.
