Film Weekly

A plot gone awry

May 12 - 18, 2010
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I think that someone somewhere deserves to be repeatedly slapped in the face with a trout for investing in this disaster of a movie!

However, The Losers is brilliant for one simple reason, it allows me to see what would happen if the A-Team turned out to be the B-Team!

With most of the films I review, it's easy to say whether I liked it or not, but with this one it's a little harder because I'm honestly not sure if this is an abysmal effort at an action film, or a fantastic parody of the genre.

The Losers are a squad of Special Forces soldiers who are presumed dead after a haphazard mission in Bolivia goes awry. Since everyone assumes that the soldiers are dead anyway, they use this to their advantage and try to find the man responsible for their 'deaths'.

As with most action films this one starts strong. However, once the audience gets past the first few explosions, there is not really a lot left except pieces of a shaky plot. Unlike classic action films like Die Hard, parts one and two, (not three because it was awful, sorry Bruce, just calling it how I see it) this film was missing some basic character and story development.

To me, it just didn't seem like the characters evolved with the plot and, if anything, it seemed like they were at odds with each other. There was very little back story for the characters which made it hard for me to feel any real kind of interest in them.

This film features a run-of-the-mill plot involving a team of idealistic misfits who are out to save the world from an evil genius who seems to have a credit card that's got no spending limit.

There is, however, a femme fatal to provide a slight distraction from the monotony of the plot, so credit goes to Zoe Saldana for keeping things vaguely interesting when the rest of the action seems to drag a little.

Since I can't be sure if The Losers was a parody or not, I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt and say it was. That means that the dialogue was spot on, I mean really fantastic. It was so overtly clichŽ that at times I was actually laughing out loud in the cinema, much to the bemusement of those taking the film seriously.

I'm also slightly happy that, as bad as this film was, at least it wasn't a remake of a classic, like the upcoming rehashes of Nightmare on Elm Street or Predators (which, incidentally, I am genuinely dreading).

The majority of The Losers is pretty much a hail of bullets and explosions, which is great if that's all you're looking for in movie. However, if you're looking for a little more depth, you'd better stay on the safe side and go to see How To Train Your Dragon.







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