[Ed. Note: This is the first part of a series expressing our affection for the kind of unpretentious, action entertainment Stallone is hoping to revive to with “The Expendables.”]
There are few greater joys than ’80s action films. When I was younger, my brother and I sought out the craziest ones we could find for marathon viewing. The appeal is obvious: these movies are pure; they don’t waste time trying to excuse their existence. There are no hackneyed back stories that reduce the protagonists to simpering man-babies in third act monologues; there are no juvenile progressive sucker punches (usually); and, most importantly, there’s no pretension.
You can’t tell someone who didn’t like Die Hard that they didn’t “get it” or use your love of Rowdy Herrington flicks to passive-aggressively show off to your friends. You’re not watching these movies to groom your image or impress anyone. All you’re doing is marveling at the most sensible use of a medium that consists of moving images: incredible feats performed by tough, charismatic men. You’re laughing at the goofy charm (or genuine stupidity) of whatever insane premise is holding it all together.
As noted previously on BH, Hollywood has abandoned these fundamentals, and the result has been a decade of hum-drum, camera-shaking clunkers with no personality and virtually no special effects created for real-life cameras to capture. That is, Hollywood has abandoned these fundamentals, with one exception: Sylvester Stallone.
Out of all the goofy movies my brother and I watched way back when, the Stallone ones were the best. Cobra, Tango & Cash, Over the Top– the man had such conviction, no matter how preposterous the movie, that he could be a compelling, magnetic screen presence, yet he always carried himself with a goofy charm, often having fun at his own expense. It’s not surprising to me, then, that while the careers of several of his’80s action peers are on shaky ground, Sly is forging his own second golden age at 64 years old (he and George W. Bush share the exact same birthday–coincidence?). After a hiatus of several years, Stallone successfully rebooted both of his signature franchises–Rocky and Rambo– and his latest offering, The Expendables, is poised to make big bucks this weekend.
So, since Sly seems to get it–since he’s offering us the no-frills, no-CGI man’s movie that we, the moviegoing American public have been starving for–at Big Hollywood, we’re celebrating the legacy of Stallone and giving the American ’80s action film its due in an event titled: Bring On “The Expendables!”
As our resident music critic/punching bag, let me kick things off with a bit of an aside before the actual writers with politics and media cred jump in. How awesome is Sylvester Stallone? Rhinestone awesome. Apparently, Stallone turned down roles in Romancing the Stone and Beverly Hills Cop to star in a goofy, slapdash Dolly Parton film by the director of A Christmas Story. If he’s ever done anything more ballsy than breaking with 99.99% of his peers to endorse the opponent of Barack Obama in the 2008 election, it’s this movie.
In a gender-reversed take on My Fair Lady, he plays a fast-talking New York cabbie who has to become a country singer to help Dolly Parton win a bet that may cost her… well, you can guess what men would make her wager. He could have paid someone to overdub some singing for him, but he really sings those silly country songs, and he makes them work with his rough voice. He could have played it cool, but he really goes for broke with an inspired, downright spastic comic performance. Of course, the Hollywood snobs gave him a Razzie for it, but his performance (and revisions to the script) really turned the film into a screwball camp classic.
And that is exactly what’s great about the man. With Sylvester Stallone, you always know he isn’t worried about what other people think–not because he thinks he’s better or knows better than them, but because he’s confident enough in his own artistry (yeah, I said it) to make movies just the way he likes them. And, what do you know–most everybody else likes them, too.
[Author’s Note: In case anyone who is involved at all in Mr. Stallone’s career reads this: RAMBO vs. PREDATOR. Make it happen.]
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