The ExpEndables

This movie is exactly what I wanted it to be. A bunch of out dated eighties stars killing brown and black people. The worst thing that could have happened to this movie is if it became a social commentary. That is probably the only bullet that gets dodged in this one.

Sly Stallone co-wrote, directs, and stars in a movie about mercenaries for hire. Their newest mission is to stop a South American dictator with a connection to drugs and the CIA, holy god even the headline from this movie is from the Reagan era. The plan is simple go in, set explosives, kill them all. They don't bother with computer imaging or stealthy maneuvers as that type of filmmaking clearly flies over the head of John Rambo. What he does know how to do is kill wave after wave of evil opponents.

Bruce Willis makes a cameo as the man who hires Stallone and his crazy team to take down this government. While Arnold Schwarzenegger makes a cameo within the cameo. Assumidly these men were too busy still being relevant and running a state into the ground respectively. Yet somehow this scene still took six hours to film.

The movie sets the tone early with the first casualty in the flick. From there Stallone and company find plenty of visually fun ways to kill pirates and small armies. At one point in the making of the film they could have achieved a PG-13 rating but Rocky instead decides to keep as many expletives as he deems necessary and gallons of computer generated blood that is purely laughable.

Besides Joseph Dredd, Jason Statham racks up the second most screen time and probably does the best with what he is given. He is one of the few big names that can look forward to new casting rather than poorly made sequels to huge hits. The man is the epitome of cool in this one, he's not afraid to show his softer side as he struggles not only with evil doers but with matters of the heart.

Other members of the team include Jet Li, who pulls together a whole bunch of short jokes and only gets one martial arts scene. Dolph Lungren has an off screen drug problem and can't decide what team he is on. Mickey Rourke, a retired member of the team, offers sage advice on the honor behind the mercenary business. There is also screen fillers Terry Crews, who carries a big gun and throws things, and Randy Couture who speaks on behalf of all of those with cauliflower ear. Opposing these men is character actor Eric Roberts with his kickboxing and wrestling muscle Gary Daniels and Stone Cold Steve Austin.

This movie is not meant to be taken seriously, there are too many laugh out moments for that to be the case. Maybe Sly is getting slicker with age making nods to ideas of the past such as bare knuckle fights and phone with cords attached. But on the other hand maybe this is all he knows and the only thing he was ever good at. C+

Iron Man

The summer movie season has begun with the first big blockbuster of the season. And it is everything you expect it to be. For better or worse.

Lots of CGI action sequences: Check

Lots of star power: Check

Hot women: Check

Mickey Rourke covered in tattoos: Check

Like many sequels it seems that director Jon Favreau doesn't quite know where to take his story so instead includes almost every possibility. The movie is overrun with different story lines and doesn't seem to focus on one for very long. The same can be said for the cast. If you don't like the interactions between Don Cheadle and Robert Downey Jr. just wait ten seconds till Scarlett Johansson comes walking out in something tight and black (not that there is anything wrong with that).

The beauty of the first movie was keeping it simple, and it is often easy to do with an origin story after that they need to find other stories from the comic book series. "Demon in a Bottle" seems to lend itself to being the next story but then you run the risk of alienating your audience by forcing your character to deal with something real, like alcoholism. So we see glimpses of the alcoholic playboy, and get pieces of his history with S.H.I.E.L.D., and slight nods to the Avengers without a whole lot of detail to any of it.

As a side note The Avengers movie is really starting to look great. Fanboy favorite Joss Whedon is set to direct, and many of the actors staring in their own movies look like they will be tagging along in this movie as well, including Downey Jr. as Iron Man. While Ed Norton still looks iffy the signings of young actors on the cusp of super stardom like Chris Evans as Captain America and Chirs Hemsworth as Thor (both due out in 2011) is brilliant as you can get them for less money and sign them to longer contracts. But I digress

The characters really are the ones that save this movie. Justin Theroux (Tropic Thunder) has some sharp writing where if you tune out for one second you may miss several zingers. I'm not sure how much chemistry there is between Robert Downey and Gwyneth Paltrow but the exchanges are solid. Poorly done romantic comedies should jot down some of the screenplay techniques used. He also does well writing strong female characters for a genre that usually leave the women on the sideline.

But the show stealers are Sam Rockwell as industrial rival Justin Hammer and Mickey Rourke as Ivan Ranko (a mixture of Whiplash and the Crimson Dynamo from the series). Rockwell as Hammer is charismatic, unknowing, and tired of being one-upped by Stark. Rourke is all kinds of bad ass, his fight sequences at the end and during the INDY car race scene are short, which is unfortunate as this is the only time we ever really see Stark in trouble. It would've been nice to get them more screen time but with so many characters to deal with it seemed like too much of a challenge.

Iron Man 2 does its part for opening the summer movie season by being not too much to chew on and visually solid. As long as you don't expect it to live up to the original you should be able to enjoy the flick. C+/B-