I hate wrestling. Instead I wish they had high school "wrastlin'", and the students could wear outrageous themed costumes (Jose from shop class wearing a Mexican wrestler outfit and being dubbed "Montezuma", Karl from Home Ec could be "The Eggbeater" and wear metal armor with an eggbeater attachment on his wrist), and then the students could engage in mock wrestling including smashing fake chairs over each others' heads. Now that's a high school sport I can get behind!

That, my friends, is what I call epic.

Liberty, I find it difficult to trust your recommendations because you seem to get excited about everything (that and we have very different tastes in movies).

Last night I watched The Expendables, one I've been wanting to see since it came out a year or two ago. If you are a fan of 80's action movies chances are this film will appeal to you. Everything in it is like an homage to bad 80's action films...in fact the whole movie is an 80's action film, just set in current times and with a huge budget and plot.

Sly Stallone is the head of a group of mercenaries that pull off jobs that no one in the govt. wants to do, so he and his team live off of violently resolving specific conflicts, like assassinations, hostage crises, and other covert sorts operations. They take a job to oust a Latin American dictator neck deep in the drug trade and end up getting a lot more personally involved than anyone had anticipated. The film has an ensemble cast loaded with action stars of the 80's and 90's. Almost all of em' are here:

Bruce Willis (in a cameo)
Sylvester Stallone
Arnold Schwarzeneggar (in a cameo)
Jet Li
Jason Statham
Dolph Lundgren
Mickey Rourke
Eric Roberts
"Stone Cold" Steve Austin

Notably absent is Jean-Claude Van Damme and my understanding is that while Jean-Claude (a fixture in a bunch of 80's action movies) declined appearing in the film and later regretted it. The film was also going to originally have Wesley Snipes (which admittedly would have been pretty cool) but things fell through and they ended up hiring ex-NFL star Terry Crews, who is one of the more memorable actors in the movie. I'd have loved to have seen Kurt Russell, Jesse Ventura, Bill Duke, and a few others in there too.

Long story short, plot aside (which is a rehashed 80's plot...good guys take out sadistic bad guys in third world country), the film is surprisingly slow for almost the whole first half. The characters aren't really deep (although I really liked Mickey Rourke's character, he's the only one in the film with any modicum of depth), then again they're not meant to be. These are almost stock characters one would expect to find in movies like Commando and Kickboxer. When the action kicks in (about halfway through) it is fast, gritty, and quite visceral. And I don't know what kind of shotgun Terry Crews is carrying around, but the moment he starts firing it the movie really enters its own element. Overall I enjoyed the film, although it's far from perfect. But for being an 80's action movie with a huge budget and ensemble cast of that era's stars, I found myself enjoying it a great deal. Not a thinking movie by any stretch, just one to turn your brain off and enjoy the film for what it is, classic action movie. 3 1/2 stars out of 5. This film is a love letter to action film fans.

Did I mention Terry Crews' shotgun is insane?

Libby I remember seeing parts of that movie when I was younger, but I never watched it all the way through or understood it properly at that age. I`m glad you liked it though.

I finally saw the movie "Tomorrow When The War Began"!!!!! wow, I'm not sure which is more epic - the book or the movie! they did an amazing job showing all the crazy events that happen to Ellie and her friends! WOW! that has to be one of the most epic movies ever! I love it!
I hope they are able to make the next book into a movie!
the acting was amazing! the whole thing just came off so beautifully!

I recently viewed The Neverending Story (1984) for the first time. Its storytelling device (a fairytale framed in a contemporary story) reminded me of another, far more quotable 80s flick, The Princess Bride. While I like that movie better, Story was enjoyable enough...though the ending seemed somewhat predictable (admittedly, TPB has a predictable ending too, but to me, the journey there was more fun).

Friday night I watched Source Code again, this time with friends who hadn't seen it yet. I caught a number of things I missed the first time, clues as to how things would proceed. A friend noted that

*Highfives Shadowlander* I love The Expendables!

*Highfives Shadowlander* I love The Expendables!

Fantastic! If you like that then our taste in movies is probably pretty similar . They're making a sequel and this time it looks like Jean-Claude Van Damme will be in it as well as Carl Weathers. Woot! They'll have half the cast of Predator by the time they're all done. Should be something to see.

Gazer, I'm curious as to your reaction to the ending of Source Code. I'll be honest,

I have no problem watching big, dumb action movies every now and then but I found The Expendables dull. The cast even seemed bored and tired.

@Bookie Hey, I liked Source Code.

@Shadowlander Yeah, I'm really excited for the sequel!

I have no problem watching big, dumb action movies every now and then but I found The Expendables dull. The cast even seemed bored and tired.

Like I said before, it's got some pacing issues. But when the movie kicked in it really did it big . When Terry Crews pulls out the shotgun and starts blasting away it went from 0-60 in about 3 seconds.

Bookwyrm, about the ending of Source Code:

I recently viewed The Neverending Story (1984) for the first time. Its storytelling device (a fairytale framed in a contemporary story) reminded me of another, far more quotable 80s flick, The Princess Bride. While I like that movie better, Story was enjoyable enough...though the ending seemed somewhat predictable (admittedly, TPB has a predictable ending too, but to me, the journey there was more fun).

The Neverending Story was one of my favorite movies when I was a kid! I still love it! And I must admit, much to everyone's horror...I have never seen The Princess Bride.

The Neverending Story is still one of my favourite films! It can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned, but I know I'm biased because it's one of my childhood favourites - there's definitely a lot of nostalgia colouring my opinion.