This review first appeared in The Colorado Springs Gazette. To read this review at its original source, click here.

The Expendables oozes testosterone from every pore the way stale alcohol oozes from the pores of a drunk. The film, a class reunion of some of the biggest action genre stars of the last three decades—particularly the 80s—is about 20 years too late. Yet preposterous and honestly awful as it is, there’s a part of you that can’t help but be thankful for the fact that a darkened theater hides a multitude of grins.

Sylvester Stallone leads a group of mercenaries employed by the CIA to overthrow a brutal South American dictator on the island of Vilena. Sly’s team includes knife aficionado Jason Statham, martial arts expert Jet Li, gun-happy Terry Crews, demolitions specialist Randy Couture, and Dolph Lundgren, haunted by one too many missions. It isn’t long before Sly and Co. realize that the dictator is just a puppet, propped by James Monroe (Eric Roberts), a former CIA operative gone rogue, and his right hand man Paine (Steve Austin). And with an army at their disposal, they’re not going quietly.

At its core, The Expendables is an old fashioned, 80s throwback. Nothing wrong with that, though one wishes more was done with it. The plot hangs by the flimsiest of threads. Remove its modern aesthetics and its celebrity cast and all you have left is the sort of straight-to-DVD drivel that usually stars Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal or Wesley Snipes (come to think of it, where were they?). Then again, this has been such a disappointing summer; The Expendables is what counts for superlative action these days.

The Expendables is the sort of film in which arthritis is more dangerous that bullets. The combined ages of our heroes is 348 (and that’s not even counting Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger, who each make cameos, inspiring the inevitable Planet Hollywood jokes). Stallone, now 64, is still the size of two men, but wisely leaves the most Herculean heroics (and romancing) to the younger guys.

The Expendables is essentially one large explosion. More than once, I heard Will Ferrell’s voice from The Other Guys echoing in my ears: “How do they walk away in movies without flinching when it explodes behind them? There’s no way. The movie industry is completely irresponsible for the way they portray explosions!” When they’re not blowing stuff up, Sly and his team are dismembering baddies with guns and knives, spilling blood on an Armageddon scale and testing out stunts you know they’ve waited years to try. Sly, who both wrote and directed, knows what we’ve come to see, but takes his own sweet time delivering. The final act of the film—a glut of bombs, bullets and blood—certainly possesses its own sort of cut-rate, gratuitous poetry. Artless or not, it’s undeniably fun.

This is a funny film, though most of the comedy is unintentional. The jokes that work best are self-referential, especially one made at Schwarzenegger’s expense about the limitations of executive office. In some ways, The Expendables isn’t really a movie—it’s one last sycophantic hurrah for a cadre of stars about to be put to pasture. But fun as the film occasionally was, those involved would have done well to take the advice from another 80’s action classic: “You’re too old for this &$#&!”

© Copyright 2010 Brandon Fibbs. All rights reserved.

Directed by Sylvester Stallone
Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, Dolph Lundgren, Eric Roberts, Steve Austin
Rated R for strong action and bloody violence throughout, and for some language.
Running Time: 103 minutes