Sophia Takal is an actor/director/producer. She directed the feature film Green and is editing a new one called Always Shine. She produces and acts in her husband, writer/director Lawrence Michael Levine’s movies like Gabi on the Roof in July and Wild Canaries, which just came out on Netflix! She also acts in other people’s movies.
The last couple weeks were poised to be some of the worst weeks of my life. I’ve been trying to put together a movie but everything seemed to be crumbling before my eyes. I was crying constantly, curled up in a ball, sweating and smelly, while the sun shone and everyone around me seemed to be achieving everything they’d ever hoped to accomplish.
I was a shell of my former self. That energetic, passionate, carefree person had been replaced by an anxious, angry, unemotional robot, disconnected from myself and everyone I cared so deeply about. So I turned to my close friends for help. I asked for them to nurture me and they did! I felt so loved and taken care of and so appreciative of all their patience and non-judgement. They helped me realize that what was important to me — creativity, community, intimacy — hadn’t been taken away at all. By the end of the week, through the help of those closest to me, I emerged a new person, ready to free my intuitive self and connect with the people I care deeply about rather than worrying about what everyone else would think of me. Ready to kick some ass.
The Expendables 3 follows Sly Stallone and a motley crew of old geezers as they try to kill people, mainly bad guys. Eventually, they want to kill Mel Gibson (I think his character name is Scumbag?), either because Harrison Ford asks him to or because Stallone holds a grudge. The job seems too dangerous for a bunch of old geezers so instead Mr. Sylvester asks a bunch of young, very sexy people to help him kill Mel Gibson. Kelsey Grammer, by far the best actor in the film, helps him find all of these young people.
The old geezers are very, very frustrated. They don’t think its right that Mr. Stallone is casting them aside for a younger, more gender-diverse motley crew. They try to intimidate the young people but the young people are too young and dumb to even realize what’s going on. The geezers sit around not knowing what to do! One of them, Jason Statham, throws a knife in a TV. I was confused why Statham was considered Expendable because he is so hunky and relatively young (47) compared to the others. Wesley Snipes, who was in jail for tax evasion (in the movie, and IRL) is very upset too. The young people plus Sylvester and Arnold “Terminator” Schwarzenager [sic] fly somewhere to find Mel Gibson and they decide to catch him using computer technology and other very young people tools. One of the young people isn’t interested in killing Mel Gibson unless he knows why the guy is so bad. He wants to know so badly why they are going after Scumbag. And then it turns out they want Mel Gibson alive, not dead, and Stallone is pissed.
The lady badass asks why Stallone fired his old geezer friends and he just says it was time. These poor old geezers, like Dolph Lundgren, are completely obsolete — they’ve been replaced by machines and hot young people! The computer technology works and there’s a huge shootout but Mel Gibson is still alive. The hot girl tasers him and they get him in a van.
With the movie halfway over, I can only imagine how the old geezers are feeling back in America with nothing to do. There’s some exposition scene between Mel Gibson and Sylvester Stallone that feels weird smack in the middle of the action but it’s also much appreciated because we were all wondering why he hated Mel Gibson so much. Mel Gibson says, “Success is being willing to do the things other people aren’t willing to do,” and I really relate to that — except I think he means it very differently than how I interpret it. Then Mel Gibson escapes because his watch had a GPS tracker — it’s not only young people who know about technology after all!
THEN SOMETHING CRAZY HAPPENS. THE YOUNG PEOPLE GET KIDNAPPED AND STALLONE HAS TO ASK THE ORIGINAL EXPENDABLES FOR HELP!!!!!!!!! HE NEEDS HIS FRIENDS. HE WAS MISTAKEN. HE GOT DISTRACTED BY THE FLASHY, HOT YOUNG THINGS. THE COMPUTERS. THE ROBOTS WALKING AROUND IN SKIMPY DRESSES. SUCCESS. DON’T YOU SEE HOW THIS RELATES TO MY LIFE?????? ANY OTHER WEEK I MIGHT HAVE THOUGHT THIS MOVIE WAS DUMB BUT THIS WEEK I SEE HOW THE MESSAGE OF TRUE FRIENDSHIP IS REALLY JUST THE MOST IMPORTANT MESSAGE EVER. HIS FRIENDS ARE HIS FAMILY AND THEY ARE THERE IN HIS TIME OF NEED EVEN THOUGH HE THREW THEM AWAY LIKE EXPENDABLE OLD GEEZERS.
These are his true friends all in a row:
See how Dolph is looking at Stallone and how they all seem to be determined and believe in him? That’s after he told them to buzz off. That’s really true friendship and unconditional love.
The only bad thing I have to say about this movie is that it seemed for a while that no one was speaking English. I couldn’t understand what anyone was saying, I think mainly because the writersmust have put a bunch of words in a blender and then lined them up to make a script. That’s really the only explanation because there is no other reason why it should be so hard to understand professional actors in a film. Also, at one point, Mel Gibson walks up to a painting and says, “This is a piece of shit. It’s ugly. I bet the artist never thought it would sell for $300 million.” That made me think that maybe the writers weretalking about The Expendables 3, except everyone expects this film to make $300 million.
In closing, I want to take this moment to say thanks to all my friends who helped me through this week. I couldn’t have done it without you: Larry, Noah, Ahna, Melanie, Lindsay, Jen, Anna Margaret, Mom, Dad, MooMooLove, Lanie, Mark and Rob. I have friends as great as Stallone’s in The Expendables and I feel so lucky about that.
