Film Review: The Expendables 3

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Antonio Banderas, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Film Review, Film Review: The Expendables, Film Review: The Expendables 3, Films, Glenn Powel, Harrison Ford, Jason Statham, Kellan Lutz, Kelsey Grammer, Mel Gibson, movies, Ronda Rousey, Sly Stallone, Sylvester Stallone, The Expendables, The Expendables3

Sly Stallone and the Expendables are back with a big bang. This time around the bad guy is the cruel and ruthless Stonebanks (Mel Gibson), one of the original Expendables. When one of the Expendables dies on a mission to bring Stonebanks down, Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone) begins to question his relationship to the crew. Not wanting to deal with more loss he decides to ditch the old gang and hire new blood to hunt his one time partner down.

Guided by Bonaparte (Kelsey Grammer) he headhunts some new talent and ends up with a bunch of inexperienced hackers, bouncers and motor mouth Galgo (Antonio Banderas) who is looking for a new crew.

But of course once the shit hits the fan the only people who can really help Barnet are his old trusty Expendables.

The Expendables 3 may have turned to younger actors like Kellan Lutz, Ronda Rousey and Glenn Powell to liven up the action scenes, but it sadly lacks the same humour and enjoyment factor from the earlier films.

Out of the original cast only Jason Statham, as Lee Christmas, and Sly himself seem up for the job as an Expendable, the rest of the crew require a lot of good will to be believable. Arnold Schwarzenegger (Trench) looks as if just standing and smoking his cigars is all he can muster and Harrison Ford (Drummer) is visibly shaking.

The Expendables 3 has clearly lost complete sight of the motto ‘less is more’ and thinks that by loading up on testosterone and big names is enough to make an action movie, but it is simply not good enough. The action scenes are lacking, jumping out of the way as buildings explode and ‘nearly’ getting hit by bullets just isn’t very exciting, even if it last for 20 minutes.

Overall The Expendables 3 is a pale remake of what has gone before and can only function as an example of how to present as many big named stars as possible in a really bad film.