'Expendables 3' Proves Third Time's Not The Charm What’s your Reaction? +1 0 +1 0 +1 0 +1 0 +1 0 Facebook Twitter Email Going into the opening weekend of The Expendables 3, there are two big questions that surround its box office potential. First of all, will the fact that a DVD-quality version of the film got leaked online about three weeks ago affect the box office in any real fashion? Second, will the choice to cut the film down from an R-rating to a PG-13 rating help or hurt the film’s box office take? To the first question, I would argue that the core audience for this film aren’t the sort of young tech-savvy kids who know how to or care much to download a movie online and watch it on their computer. On the other hand, the core demographic for this film is certainly old enough to buy a ticket to an R-rated movie, so will the number of younger audience members who can now see this film without a parent or guardian in theaters compensate for the fans who will turn their nose at a blood-less Expendables film? Let’s assume for a moment that the PG-13 thing cancels each other out (new kids flock, but gore-hounds flee) and most of the people who downloaded the movie weren’t going to see it in a theater in the first place (a likely assumption). Where does that leave the movie? Well The Expendables opened in August of 2010 at debuted with $35 million despite mixed-negative reviews and the notion that most of the very biggest action stars of the 1990′s and 1980′s stayed home. The film still earned $103m domestic and $274m worldwide on an $80m budget, good enough for a sequel for the Millennium Productions would-be franchise. The Expendables 2 opened two years later to $28m, a token downturn despite Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chuck Norris, Bruce Willis, and Jean-Claude Van Damme being added to the mix. The film, more of a B-movie camp fest (as opposed to the original, which at least tried to be a real movie), earned $85m domestic but $305m worldwide on a $100m budget, still a big hit for Stallone and his over-the-hill crew. Thus two years later, we have The Expendables 3, directed by relative novice Patrick Hughes (he helmed the pretty solid Red Hill back in 2010) taking over for Simon West (Expendables 2) and Stallone (Expendables) respectively. The hook this time around, as was the case in both films, is who came to play this time. If the first film was “Stallone and whomever would say yes” (Dolph Lundgren, Jet Li, Jason Statham, Eric Roberts, Steve Austin, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, etc.) and the sequel was “the guys you expected to show up the first time” (Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Chuck Norris, etc.), then this third entry is “basically everyone we could cram into one film. Joining the motley crew this time around are Harrison Ford, Wesley Snipes, Antonio Banderas, Mel Gibson (as the villain), and legendary action movie bad-ass Kelsey Grammar, who I have been assured did all of his own stunts. The films themselves aren’t much, but the appeal rests on the notion of seeing all of these action stars together in one film. Will audiences who mostly shrugged their shoulders at the first two installments show up for this one as well? Probably, more or less, but the most interesting statistic next weekend will be age-related demographics. [youtube_sc url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hGFIU41d_o] [youtube_sc url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFmN2l4cW1U] [youtube_sc url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUc671jQQfE] [youtube_sc url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF4pxMy3PfI]