Always look on the bright side of life ... and death-dealing
By Davin Arul
The Expendables 2
Rating(out of 5): * * *
(Nusantara Edaran Filem)

Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, Jet Li, Liam Hemsworth, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Yu Nan, Scott Adkins AND Chuck Norris

This whole is definitely not more than the sum of its parts. While the original The Expendables was a decently-told (if unremarkable) tale with explosive action sequences, this sequel is a hasty slap-dash of crowd-pleasing moments and adrenaline-pumping violence that doesn't give a hoot about story or character.

Instead we get Arnold Schwarzenegger in a hugely self-referential role, Bruce Willis doing … well, mostly that too, and Chuck Norris actually making a Chuck Norris joke.

So … everything's pretty much nudge-nudge-wink-wink here, which is about right because this frequently seems like it was made with the spirit of Monty Python hovering over the production. The feeling is heightened when the film's opening caption sets the scene as "Nepal" and our locally-inserted subtitle says "Laos".

Scenes actually begin like Monty Python sketches, such as one discourse between our band of brothers on "foods you must eat before you die" and then play out with not much thought given to their resolution or a punchline.

Bad guys pop up out of nowhere and have various bits and pieces removed from their bodies like Monty Python and the Holy Grail's infamous Black Knight duel.

And Dolph Lundgren is seen drinking in almost every scene he's in, as if he's doing a one-man rendition of the Philosophers Song.

(Go look up all this Python stuff on YouTube. It's brilliant. Say no more.)
All that, and the constant winking at the audience, almost leads you to expect the corpses strewn about the scenery to burst into a chorus of Always Look on the Bright Side of Life at any moment.

Pardon me, folks, I'm just trying to have fun writing this – about as much fun as the folks in front of and behind the camera on The Expendables 2 obviously had.

It's as though, while making this one, they just decided to chuck (no pun intended – honest) the script aside and improvise as they went along, starting out each shooting day with a "You know what would be really cool?" meeting around the catering table.

So you have Arnie spouting variations on his classic lines, Arnie and Bruce Willis spouting one another's catch-phrases, Jean-Claude Van Damme flexing his accent and his freaky-looking triceps, and Chuck Norris … well, suffice it to say that his somewhere-between-three-and-five minutes of screen time are all pure gold.

So far, I've said very little about the core Expendables team itself. And that's because they're like the straight men to all the gags (jokes AND chokes) flying around.

Stallone's Barney Ross is suitably flinty-eyed and square-jawed in pursuing his quest for revenge against Van Damme's villainous Vilain, Statham dishes out beatdowns like they're going out of style … you get the idea.

Mostly, though, the core team just gets to go through the motions while the "guest stars" hog the good lines and the glory.

While this one has many more cheer-worthy scenes than the original, the first film held together much more coherently than this one.

The Expendables 2 is all close shaves, improbable (and fortuitous) coincidences, impossibly light-hearted death-dealing - it's a collection of memorable moments that don't add up to a polished film.

Action-flick fans will eat this up, but even the more discerning among us would lament the wasted potential, that it doesn't even try to build on the strong foundation laid by the original. Ah well, there's always Expendables 3.

You know what would be really cool for that one? Chuck Norris vs Rajinikanth. Damn, they've got me doing it now too ....

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