The Expendables trailer.

Either this was an unintentional leak, or someone at Millennium Films publicity has serious quality control issues. Aside from the shockingly poor audio/video quality (I'll repost if a better copy becomes available), this is a long, lumbering, borderline dull trailer. The plot is barely detailed, the character conflicts are absent, and the preview seems a mishmash of random bits of narrative. Some of the action beats are fun, but the trailer seems so discombobulated that it's all rendered a mush. Yes, I know it's a macho action film, but must Giselle Itié be threatened, assaulted, and sexualized in every one of her scenes? And for goodness sake, when your main trump card is your all-star cast, make a point to highlight the WHOLE cast, not just a few stars. I can understand that some big stars might only have (surprise?) cameos, but why no billing for Eric Roberts, Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Danny Trejo, Terry Crews, Brittany Murphy, or Charisma Carpenter? Stallone hit solid doubles with Rocky Balboa and Rambo, so his directorial hand should be a good thing. But this trailer is an absolute mess. This is not a promising intro for what should be one of Lionsgate's biggest moneymakers of 2010.

Scott Mendelson