Director: Patrick Hughes
Cast:
Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford,
Antonio Banderas, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture,
Terry Crews, Wesley Snipes, Kelsey Grammer, Kellan Lutz, Ronda Rousey,
Glen Powell, Victor Ortiz and Robert Davi
Rating: 1 star
If you thought you stumbled upon the geriatric ward of Hollywood’s nonsensical films while watching Expendables 3,
you wouldn’t be entirely off the mark. The franchise throws in a
glittering bunch of erstwhile A-listers and its latest offering is only
bigger, though not much better. It almost appears like one of those
Bollywood films that rope in mega A-listers, have little to offer in
terms of plot but inexplicably do well at the box office.
What
does ‘expendable’ mean? The Oxford Dictionary will have you believe that
it is something ‘of relatively little significance, and therefore able
to be abandoned or destroyed’. There could not have been a more
appropriate name for a film especially since the series as well as the
actors can easily be expended or abandoned and no one would really know.
That this is the third time Sylvester Stallone, producer and lead
protagonist of the series, is testimony to just how much a Hollywood
audience in similar to Bollywood’s. Throw in a bunch of big names,
whether or not they’re relevant in pop culture today, and have the most
loosely written, contrived plot thrown in with a few punch lines and few
more expletives; you have a successful film. How many stars does it
take to carry a weak film? About 8. How many stars does it take to do
the same in Bollywood? One. Ek Hai Salman. Eat that, Hollywood!
Since
we really have to make an effort to give this review of the film a
touch of the cerebral, let’s begin with the plot. Barney Ross (Stallone)
and his mercenaries discover that the arms trader they intended to bust
was actually a co-founder of The Expendables Conrad Stonebanks (Mel
Gibson) who decided to turn on the team in favour of profits from the
arms trade. The confrontation leads to a dangerous fight that results in
Hale Caesar’s (Terry Crews) grave injuries forcing the team to retreat.
Ross, driven by his unrelenting pursuit of Stonebanks, puts together an
Expendables 2.0 of sorts with young talent in the hope of putting an
end to Stonebanks’ tyranny. That he finally had to take the help of the
original Expendables to bail out the new crop that finds itself in a fix
makes one wonder what really was the line of thinking while the story
was being written. The film follows a boringly predictable path and
after a lot of explosions and hand-to-hand combats, the two-hour-ordeal
called Expendables 3 comes to an end.
Now’s the tough
part. How does one talk about performances in a film when the standard
level of expression is reminiscent of a toddler with bowel struggles?
Stallone looks like he hasn’t had much toiletry success in over 48-hours
and he is joined by the likes of Schwarzenegger (of course!) and Jason
Statham. Statham, for whom such roles are de rigueur, is not a patch on
his previous roles that range from Snatch to Death Race.
The piercing blue eyes of Mel Gibson actually aid his performance and
one must really give credit where its due: Gibson is the only one who
emerges from the film looking like he went into it with some talent in
the first place. He is scheming, mean and has superb command over his
lines and their delivery. He plays a fairly contrived role with
admirable conviction.
The rest of the younger cast deliver
one-note performances and there’s little to speak of them. Ronda Rousey,
who plays Luna, is unbelievably annoying and makes you wonder why the
director would flesh out a role like that from the only woman in the
cast! But then again the film is so flawed that there are greater
disappointments to face. Nothing matches the let down of a role that
Antonio Banderas (of delicious-due-to-all-thing-Spanish fame) as
Galgo. Banderas, when you go beyond his looks, is actually quite a
talented actor but he is reduced to such sidekick tripe that your heart
goes out to him.
Expendables 3 reminds
you of the mindless Bollywood films of the 90s that were rigid in
formula and high on star power that combined delivered something in the
sub zero range. Such a waste of time. Expended for no reason at all.
Source: deccanchronicle.com
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