The Expendables

“If the money’s right, we don’t care where the job is.” So explains Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone), the leader of hired-gun task force the Expendables. This credo lands Ross and his team (Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, Jet Li, Randy Couture and Terry Crews) in the Gulf of Aden as the story begins Somali pirates, staging a videotaped decapitation, are pinned down by dancing laser sights, and soon the baddies are ripped apart.

The Expendables is a throwback to ’80s run-and-gun action, when Hollywood gym rats made boffo box office depopulating Third World countries. Pirates liquidated, the Expendables’ next mission concerns the fate of the South American nation of Vilena, where Generalissimo Garza, who grinds the populace beneath his iron heel, is torn between his imperialist backers (Eric Roberts and Steve Austin) and his idealistic daughter.

The Expendables tries manfully to top the kill-’em-all climax of Stallone’s last Rambo. But if The Expendables is no classic, for about 20 minutes, it blowed up real good.