The Expendables

As always, expectations are the biggest factor in how much you enjoy movie. I went in to Expendables with low expectations and found myself enjoying the movie right away. It is a a very violent and bloody film, but while the action was well-delivered, it was the non-action dialogue scenes that were surprisingly entertaining. Never underestimate Sylvester Stallone – he is much smarter then he is given credit for, I especially applaud him for not kissing the girl at the end, which would have been too Hollywood cliche. Not sure Sly should have been the lead, since Jason Statham was clearly the better actor. Sly was not awful, but his plastic-surgery altered face was distracting. Among the many action stars on the screen, Mickey Rourke is by far the best actor of the bunch, and steals the film with his few scenes. Jet Li and Dolph Lundgren are great in their minor roles as well. Two big cameos were Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis, although from the trailers I expected Bruce Willis to have a bigger role than he did.

The Other Guys

Like any Will Ferrell movie, I found myself laughing out loud in the theater. This film was very quirky and felt very different than the humor I expected for some reason. It’s hard to describe, just odd. But I really enjoyed it from start to finish. Mark Wahlberg is great as the angry sidekick/straightman. One of the best gags in the film is that their police chief played by Michael Keaton, keeps unknowingly quoting TLC for some reason, such as “don’t go chasing waterfalls”. See what I mean by odd but funny?