Sabotage (2014) Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sam Worthington, Joe Manganiello, Josh Holloway, Terrence Howard Movie Review

Sabotage (2014)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Arnold Schwarzenegger in Sabotage (2014)

Self Destructed

John 'Breacher' Wharton (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and his DEA team pull of a successful raid on a drug cartel's safe house and in the middle of the action stash the money to return for once they have dealt with all the bad guys with guns. But when the money isn't where they stashed it every single member of the team comes under suspicion and John realises that one of his team had to have been involved. But when his team starts to be killed off one by one and then his family are kidnapped it becomes personal for John as he sets about saving his family and destroying the Cartel.

Something went wrong when they made "Sabotage" and I am not entirely sure what it is as the storyline which sees a DEA team having to deal with trust issues, investigations and someone picking them off one by one could have been an entertaining movie. But it didn't end up that way with the storyline ending up a mess and in a constant battle to gain and keep the audiences interest. Maybe that was down to the director as David Ayer has a style where you get little other than a lot of talking and then a minute of two of full on action before you get more scenes which are meant to shock via either being graphic or just disturbing, such as a scene involving corpses wrapped in chicken wire found in a lake. But this makes "Sabotage" incredibly uneven and uneven does not always make for an entertaining rollercoaster experience.

Olivia Williams in Sabotage (2014)

But I don't think that is the only problem because this is an Arnie movie and one where he is surrounded by some action stars with big physiques and big personalities. Yet it seems every single one has had to tone things down so none of them come across as a bigger action star than Arnie. Unfortunately with Arnie being past his best when it comes to big action this makes the movie wrong and makes it all the more reliant on those graphic scenes to entertain which maybe they do if you are young enough to think blood splattered all over a car's window screen is entertaining.

What this all boils down to is that "Sabotage" ended up a disappointment, an uneven movie which relies on its graphic nature more than anything to make it work. Maybe that graphic nature will be enough for younger audiences but for those who grew up on the action movies of Schwarzenegger are likely to feel this was the wrong movie for him.


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