Sylvester Stallone’s cut of The Expendables adds 11 minutes of footage to the movie, and one change in particular improves the film significantly.

The director’s cut of The Expendables adds to the movie a lot, and two key areas deepen the themes of the film. Originally released in 2010, The Expendables was Sylvester Stallone’s throwback to ’80s action movies, which Stallone also co-wrote and directed. The ensemble of action heroes assembled in The Expendables was a key gimmick, with the movie spawning two sequels while The Expendables 4 is also on the way.

Stallone’s director’s cut of The Expendables later arrived in 2011, bringing with it 11 minutes of additional footage. The extended version of the movie was an improvement in many areas. One area in particular where it benefitted was in giving much more clarity to the editing of Jet Li’s martial arts fights. While the director’s cut made other changes, additions, and revisions, the opening and ending of the film were both improved with soundtrack additions.

In the director’s cut, the opening credits occur as the Expendables return home from their introductory mission. This sequence plays as a newly edited montage over the team, with Sully Erna’s “Sinner’s Prayer” on the soundtrack. This adds a great deal to the opening of the film by showing the Expendables as cynical mercenaries taking on missions for a paycheck, but all of them yearning for redemption. The lyrics include “I am sinner, Heaven’s closed for what I’ve done”, which plays into the eventual decision of the Expendables to free Vilena from the tyrannical rule of General Garza (David Zayas) and James Munroe (Eric Roberts).

That also leads into the next soundtrack-related improvement of The Expendables. During the final battle, Shinedown’s “Diamond Eyes” plays, itself a surprising mission from the theatrical version considering how heavily it was featured in the film’s marketing. The song’s re-integration into Sylvester Stallone’s director’s cut greatly elevates the finale in how it ties the Expendables themselves together. The mercenaries are a team of five men taking on a despot’s entire militia single-handedly. Intermediately, they still overcome incredible odds as a unit that trust in each other and beat overwhelming odds.

“Diamond Eyes” also returns during the end credits (replacing Thin Lizzy’s “The Boys Are Back In Town” in the theatrical version). Adding the song here makes the ending feel more triumphant for the Expendables with the daring, seemingly suicidal mission they’ve accomplished in Vilena. The team have even rehabilitated the erratic, formerly drug addicted Gunner Jensen (Dolph Lundgren) and given him a second chance. As “Diamond Eyes” plays, the team is now fully whole once more as they head into The Expendables 2.

Gunner himself benefits a great deal overall in the director’s cut with a more fleshed out and tragic story, making his redemption that much better. The Expendables is an overall better movie from the additions and changes made in Stallone’s director’s cut. What the inclusion of “Sinner’s Prayer” and “Diamond Eyes” show is that the soundtrack can make just as much of a difference in storytelling as anything else.

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