Riot’s Reviews: Expend4bles
There’s a common misconception about action films that all a studio needs is some car chases, lots of guns, and even more explosions and they’ll be sitting on a slam-dunk cash cow. They’re not entirely wrong of course, there is always exceptions (this is the fourth Expendables after all) but like any other genre, action films require elements that will ensure its success. This is no definitive list to be sure but I would argue you need (in no necessary order and on top of guns, explosions, chases and fight scenes): 1) a relatable, charismatic hero 2) a compelling villain 3) seemingly insurmountable odds against the protagonist 4) practical effects 5) a final, epic confrontation. Most action films could honestly get away with not meeting all of these expectations. Unfortunately for Expend4bles, they were DOA on most, if not all of them.
I was met with an ample mixture of incredulity and shock when I told a number of co-workers that I was going to see Expend4bles for this week’s review. Even before the viewing, I couldn’t blame them for their response. The previews painted the picture of a film that wasn’t offering much more than a few new faces and the loaded promises of new and interesting action scenes. Putting the action aside for now, this was a major diversion from what the Expendable series has come to be known for: a veritable who’s who of current and former action stars looking to blow s*** up. This time, instead of nostalgic action heroes, we got a host of new faces to the team including Megan Fox, 50 Cent, Andy Garcia,Tony Jaa, Iko Uwais, Jacob Scipio, and Levy Tran who each struggled for quality screen time, turning in extremely shaky performances and often awkward attempts at levity. I can forgive Jaa and Uwais to an extent, as they were at least able to bring their martial arts repertoire to the table and were critical to what I’d say was the only element of the film worth a damn: the hand to hand combat/fight choreography. Trying to make Uwais a compelling villain though was too much of a tall order and the twist ending served nothing to make the “final confrontation” (if you could really call it that) worth waiting for.
The faces we are used to (Sylvester Stallone, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, and Jason Statham) were hardly any better. Stallone and Lundgren, already difficult to audibly understand in the past, delivered roughly spoken, minimal, and awkward dialogue. Couture, seemingly chosen to try and fill in the comedic gaping hole left by Terry Crews, just wasn’t able to muster the same level of humor. And Statham, trying to shoulder the burden of a majority (probably too much honestly) of the film, was limited by stunts and other action sequences that were simply too far beyond the suspension of disbelief. There is certainly an argument that a typical American action movie doesn’t need any spectacular plotlines and that bad dialogue can even be forgiven if the combat sequences are good enough. Expend4ables unfortunately not only provides the audience with such few suspenseful or interesting action scenes, it piles onto the bad with even worse CGI.
Expend4ables has the markings of an original idea that is spread too thin and has reached the inevitable end of its limits. I can respect Sly for trying to keep the brand alive, but the formula was difficult enough to carry out in its inception. Too many faces/characters is already a challenging and unique problem, but with the years continuing to go by, it’s even harder to expect these actors to keep being the action heroes they once were and it would seem that the draw of calling on old names to come out for the Expendables movies has also run dry. The fourth installment certainly feels like one of those films that probably should have never been made and while I will always be a sucker for some quality hand-to-hand combat scenes, it simply wasn’t enough to validate a trip into the theater.
Riot’s Rating: 3/10: Most of the people I know were already never intending on seeing this film. I would recommend leaving this one alone.
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