Arnold joins dream team ‘Expendables’ cast

Sylvester Stallone’s action adventure THE EXPENDABLES is turning into a mega line-up of action veterans now that TMZ confirms that California “Govenator” Arnold Schwarzenegger will be joining an impressive cast list that already includes Stallone, Mickey Rourke, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Randy Couture, Dolph Lundgren, Eric Roberts, and possibly Scott Adkins. Ben Kingsley and Forest Whitaker are rumored to be in the film as well.

TMZ and others are making a big stink about Arnold doing some acting on the side while California’s budget falls through the San Andreas Fault line, surely to cause the next big quake and sink half the state into the sea before global warming gets a chance to flood the coast line first. Politics aside, I’m happy to see Arnold getting back in the movie game with Stallone now that his tenure as governor is gradually coming to a close. Schwarzenegger was last seen on screen joking around with Jackie Chan in the underappreciated Disney bomb AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS in 2004.

Stallone has made a phenomenal comeback as an action star and filmmaker with RAMBO. I say, let these guys go out with a bang before they end up in wheelchairs. Heck, Clint Eastwood is still facing down punks onscreen at 78 in GRAN TORINO. There’s no reason these guys should stop.

I just think it’s a shame Stallone couldn’t have fit more stars in his movie. Let’s get all these guys together with Bruce Willis, Chuck Norris, David Carradine, Samuel L. Jackson, Wesley Snipes, Ron Perlman, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, Kurt Russell, Roddy Piper, etc. I’d like to see one movie populated by nothing but hundreds of action stars past and present. Let it be a free-for-all where everybody tries to out-shoot, out-punch or out-talk one another. Who cares who is left standing? It would be a lot more fun than watching giant heaps of computer-generated rubbish roll around together through cityscapes for two hours in another TRANSFORMERS sequel.

THE EXPENDABLES, a film about a group of mercenaries sent to take down a South American dictator, begins shooting in March and is planned for release in 2010. Jet Li is listed as being part of the lead cast so it should be interesting to see what he ends up doing. Unfortunately, his recent Hollywood efforts have been less than stellar. WAR, co-starring Statham, turned out to be a dud.

Stallone’s pic is being produced by Nu Image, the company also responsible for Isaac Florentine’s upcoming film, NINIA, starring Scott Adkins.

Update: Arnold confirms TMZ’s report in an interview on ABC.