A group of elite mercenaries The Expendables are deployed to the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Somalia to halt local pirates from executing the hostages. The team consists of leader Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone) a former SAS soldier, blades specialist Lee Christmas (Jason Statham), martial artist Yin Yang (Jet Li), sniper Gunnar Jensen (Dolph Lundgren), weapons specialist Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) and demolitions expert Toll Road (Randy Couture). When the pirate leader demands more money than the agreed amount, Jensen instigates a firefight causing casualties for the pirates. Yang and Jensen fight and Ross intervenes. As a result of his psychological problems Ross reluctantly releases Jensen from the Expendables.  Ross and his rival mercenary leader Trench (Arnold Schwarzenegger) go to see Mr Church (Bruce Willis) who names himself after the church they meet in. He offers them a mission in Vilena a fictional island in the Gulf of Mexico to overthrow a brutal dictator General Garza (David Zayas).  Busy with other things Trench gives the contract to Ross. Christmas visits his future fiance Lacy (Charisma Carpenter) whom he discovers has left him for another man.  Ross and Christmas do initial reconnaissance after meeting with their contact Sandra (Gisele Itié), only for the mission to go awry. Ross learns that Garza is backed by ex CIA agent James Munroe (Eric Roberts) whose henchmen Paine (Steve Austin) and Wickham (Gary Daniels) control and keep Garza in power by making his people fear him.  Sandra is revealed to be Garza’s daughter. more…

CIA agent Evelyn Salt (Angelina Jolie ) interrogates a Russian defector, Orlov who tells her about Day X an operation organized by a powerful Russian spymaster during the Cold War. Its goal is to bring about the destruction of the United States, Orlov mentions that at the funeral of the late Vice President  in New York City the visiting Russian President will be killed by a Russian spy named Evelyn Salt. Salt shaken by the accusation attempts to contact her husband Mike a German arachnologist fearing for his safety. Meanwhile Orlov escapes, prompting Salt to escape which causes the CIA to think she is a spy.  She flees to her apartment and finds her husband missing.  Salt quickly grabs essentials as well as a venomous spider. After barely escaping a highway pursuit, Salt takes a bus to New York City. The next morning she sneaks into the heavily guarded St Bartholomew’s Church  where the Vice President’s funeral is being held and shoots the Russian President. She is then confronted by Peabody and surrenders but soon escapes the NYPD.  A series of flashbacks show Salt growing up in the Soviet Union  where Orlov taught her and many other children to obey him and to ingratiate themselves into the American government. Then when it came to Day X, he would command them to strike from various positions in the US. Salt meets Orlov who congratulates her on her killing, but questions her decision to marry a foreigner who might be a distraction from her mission. He takes Evelyn to a river barge where he tests her allegiance by having another agent kill Mike in front of her. Salt appears to be unaffected by this, thus passing Orlov’s test.  He then tells her Part Two of Day X which would involve seizing the United States’ stock of nuclear weapons. The enraged Salt, who had gone to Orlov in an attempt to save her husband kills her master Orlov she used to worship and everyone else on the barge, because Mike was the only person who cared for her in a world where she was considered state property.   more…

Royce (Adrien Brody) awakens from unconsciousness to find himself parachuting into an unfamiliar jungle.  He meets several others who have arrived there in the same manner Mexican drug cartel enforcer Cuchillo (Danny Trejo), Spetsnaz soldier Nikolai (Oleg Taktarov), Israel Defense Forces sniper Isabelle (Alice Braga), Revolutionary United Front officer Mombasa (Mahershalalhashbaz Ali), death row inmate Stans (Walton Goggins), Yakuza enforcer Hanzo (Louis Ozawa Changchien) and doctor Edwin (Topher Grace). None of them know where they are or how they arrived there. Royce takes charge but reveals little about himself, though Isabelle suspects that he is a mercenary and former black ops  soldier.  He speculates that they have been brought to the jungle for a reason, since with the exception of Edwin they are all armed and lethal killers. In the jungle they find empty cages, plants with a neurotoxic poison that Edwin collects on a scalpel and a deceased United States Special Forces soldier.  Arriving at higher ground they find themselves staring at an alien sky and conclude that they are not on Earth. After the party is attacked by a pack of quadrupedal alien beasts, Royce deduces that the planet is some type of game preserve and that the humans are being hunted as game. Hearing Cuchillo’s cries for help, they find his dead body being used and voice being mimicked in an attempt to bait them into a trap. They follow the quadrupeds tracks to a hunting encampment and find a captive Predator. Three larger Predators attack, killing Mombasa, but the rest of the group escapes. Isabelle reveals that she has heard of these creatures before  from a report by the only survivor of a Special Forces team who encountered one in Guatemala in 1987. more…

Oscar winner Russell Crowe stars in the new adaptation of Robin Hood.  As Richard The Lionheart (Danny Huston) returns from the Third Crusade, both he and his right hand man, Robert Loxley are slain in France.  It’s left to one of their archers, Robin Longstride (Crowe) to return Richard’s crown to London and Loxley’s sword to Nottingham.  Upon arrival his arrival he and his band of noblemen discover the oppression caused by the new Sheriff of Nottingham (Matthew Macfadyen).  Robin travels to Nottingham a town suffering from the corruption caused by the sheriff and crippling taxation, where he falls for the recently widowed Lady Marian (Cate Blanchett) a woman skeptical of the identity and motivations of this crusader from the forest.   Robin hopes to earn the hand of Maid Marian and salvage the village, Robin and his band of marauders stand up to the Sheriff of Nottingham and the corruption he has caused and lead an uprising against the crown that will forever alter the balance of power.  Together they begin preying on the indulgent upper class to correct injustices under the sheriff.

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