Reason be gone

The eponymous Losers are a handful of archetypal hard cases, former Special Operatives framed by a shadowy madman for a Bolivian mission that went all FUBAR. So now they’re stranded in South America without passports, and presumed dead after madman Max (Jason Patric) had their evac chopper blown out of the sky. Why did Max do that? No reason, he just likes doing things like that.

So here these guys are, lazing about in the third world, watching cockfights and working in a toy factory to pay their bar tabs. You’d think for being such clever boys, they’d be able to think their way out of this pickle on their own, but it takes a hot, ass-kickin’ babe (that blue chick from Avatar gone natural) to roll in and pull them out of their funk. Seems Max has his eyes set on scoring a snuke, (a sonic nuke—even terrorists are going green these days) and setting off a global pissing contest. Why? Again, no real reason. He’s mad. Mad, I say. And so off the Losers go, capping rounds and blowing shit up as they giggle like 13-year-old boys at the mayhem they’re unleashing.

Having never read the comic books on which the film is based, I still suspect that something special was lost in the translation. This is nothing but a grungier version of The A-Team. I went in hoping for a more nihilistic version, rather than a cartoon world where no one seems to be affected by all the flying bullets and shit blowing up. But it’s PG-13, so there you go. But still, I enjoyed it as a matinee time-killer, although it’s otherwise pretty forgettable. It does deliver with the flashy camerawork, thudding soundtrack, snappy patter, explosions and a hot ass-kicking babe.